Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 9.djvu/607

 NOTES AND ABSTRACTS 589

by the Phoenicians and the Romans, has in modern times oftenest been supplanted by a proselytizing national egotism which, regardless of the relativity of institu- tions and customs to the conditions in which they are found, has steadfastly pur- sued a course of interference. The British alone seem to have learned the wisdom of tactful acquiescence in all native arrangements not absolutely antagonistic to the essentials of European codes.

The labor question has proved one of the most vexing in the colonization of the tropics. With European labor impossible, and open slavery no longer toler- ated by moral standards, and coolie labor subjct to grave abuses, the tropics remain in a state of, to say the least, arrested development. The latest tropical colonizers, the Germans, frankly propose a return to some method of " compulsory labor."

In governing tropical colonies three essentials are toleration, firmness, and a rational education, using the last term in its broadest sense. Nothing could be more absurd than the attempt to make miniature French departments out of material scarcely fit for anything but absolute despotism. A ready-made govern- ment and civilization cannot be superimposed upon a native race. But with the greatest possible noninterference must go absolute firmness in maintaining what- ever has been decided upon. The importance of the third element of success is seen in the results achieved by medical missions and missions that teach trade. Civilizing agencies must deal first with the physical and the industrial and then pass to the inculcation of the most elementary of political, religious, and moral ideas. In these ways something may be done for the " lower races " in spite of conditions which are doubly disheartening because of the present acceleration of the pace of civilization. ALBERT G. KELLER, in Yale Review, November, 1903.

E. B. W.

An International Congress of Hygiene and Demography was held at Brussels September 2-8, under the patronage of King Leopold. It elected as its honorary president Prince Albert, heir to the throne of Belgium, who addressed the congress in these significant words : " Men are vitally concerned, and rightly so, with the principles of industrial and professional hygiene, whose application concerns the health of millions of workmen and upon which depend the strength and destiny of future generations. But although laws may do much, yet their efficacy has its limits. It is necessary that hygiene should be, not only in our codes, but also in our customs. To this end an active and persistent propaganda is needed to popularize the practice of hygiene by the pen, the spoken word, and above all by deeds."

The congress was divided into two parts, the one concerned with hygiene and the other with demography. The former division considered, among other ques- tions, that of diseases peculiar to miners, the interesting question of working- men's dwellings, and that of fatigue, particularly of manual laborers. Among the conclusions reached in relation to this last subject is the following, which is interesting from the standpoint of labor legislation : " The fourth section is of opinion that, due to the insufficiency of actual scientific data, it is not possible as yet to furnish numerical bases for the organization of labor so far as the matter of fatigue is concerned." That is to declare, in short, that existing legislation regarding the length of the working day for adults is absolutely empirical.

The second division, on demography, took up, among other topics, the statistics of births and deaths. It learned with satisfaction that the classification of causes of death with which M. Bertillon was occupied for many years has now been adopted and applied for a total population of more than 120 million persons. A very animated discussion arose in connection with the defense on the part of M. Canderlier of his thesis that population increases or diminishes in proportion as economic conditions are or are not favorable ; or, in other words, that the law of population expresses itself by the relation which exists between needs and resources. Such great divergence of opinion prevailed regarding the subject that M. Julin, secretary of the division, took occasion to recommend a method for the observation of facts, similar to that employed by the Society of Social Economics in its monographing of families. In this way the moral factors which no doubt