Page:Travel letters from New Zealand, Australia and Africa (1913).djvu/264

 bicycles. Being refused admission to the street cars, they buy bicycles. But the old Boers wouldn't permit the blacks to ride bicycles Although the natives are treated so harshly, I saw the statement in print lately that they possess more than one-third of all the cattle in Cape Colony, one-fourth of the sheep, produce three-fifths of all the corn, and own one-third of all the plows. As they are excellent workers, they are really a valuable asset The Hindus are not popular around Johannesburg; everywhere I have been in South Africa, the Hindus are severely criticised In the Cape Colony, the negroes can vote, and have many other privileges not accorded them in the Transvaal. There are thousands of mulattoes in Cape Colony, but very few in the Transvaal. In Cape Colony, the negroes have about as many privileges as negroes have in the northern sections of the United States, but in most other portions of South Africa they have fewer privileges than the negroes of Mississippi or Alabama. A white lawyer with whom I lately talked, says the race problem here is really a very serious one. Many university educated negroes are coming to Africa from the United States, and making trouble. The lawyer also said that the African M. E. Church is a source of much trouble, and that there has been serious talk of prohibiting it in the Transvaal During my stay in Johannesburg, the papers reported a meeting of the South-African Native National Congress. Fifteen chiefs and 200 other delegates were present. The chairman delivered his address in English, and it was interpreted into several native languages. "Gentlemen," said the speaker, "this land