“Well,” he said, “before coming to your house to tea this afternoon I took a walk through the town and saw some men lounging about talking, and others asleep under the shade of some plantain and fig trees.”
“Oh, yes,” I replied; “I know them very well. Some of them have been for several weeks over on the islands, living in rough shanties, fishing all day and smoke-drying their fish over their fires during the evenings. They returned this morning after their long spell on the islands, and they are resting for a few days before starting on another fishing expedition. Another lot of men came in yesterday with that heavy canoe in the rough that you saw on the beach. They were away some weeks felling a huge tree, hollowing it out, and shaping it in the rough with their little axes—a laborious job. Yesterday they floated it home, and are now enjoying a well-earned rest before finishing the canoe and selling it. What you saw was not an exhibition of laziness, but a relaxation after prolonged arduous work.”
Just then a strongly-formed, well-built young man went past the house. “There, do you see him?” asked my visitor; “I saw him asleep in his hammock-chair.”
“Yes, I know him,” was my reply; “he is one of the head-men of this district. His father was wealthy as natives go in this part, and left him enough to give him the equivalent of £300 a year in your money. Would you work if you had £300 a year coming in?”
“By Jove, no!” he quickly replied, slapping his knee at the very idea of possessing £300 a year without working for it. “I would have a nice little house with a fine garden, and I would sit smoking all day in the midst of my flowers.”
“Just so!!!” was my comment.
The natives of Africa live in an enervating climate, with a temperature frequently nearer 95° in the shade than 70°. They dwell in the midst of a prolific nature that supplies their vegetable foods with very little exertion, and in such environments that their needs are few and easily met. In their natural state there are both lazy and industrious folk as in other countries.
When the white man arrives he engages his native workman, at so much per month, for twelve, eighteen, or twenty-four months. For the first time in his life the native has to work regular hours, starting and leaving off to the deep notes of a bell, or the tap, tap of a drum. At first the experience is novel, and he is most willing and hard-working; but pay-day is a long way off, his enthusiasm cools as the novelty passes away, and then the master will have to look vigilantly and constantly after his hired workman. Give him piece-work and pay him by results and you will see prodigies of labour, for every payment made on those lines is an incentive to further effort. The native as keenly enjoys money and what money brings in extra food, comforts, and prestige as the white man, and is as willing to work for them.
The employer of labour in Africa is the white man, and he desires to get as much work as he can for his money, and the employee tries to give as little of his energy and strength as he can for the pay he is to receive twelve, eighteen, or twenty-four months hence, consequently there is a clash of interests; and while the white man has the opportunity, among his friends, of talking loudly about the “lazy niggers,” let him sit with the natives round the fire one evening, and he may be surprised to learn that there is another point of view, and that not over-flattering to his fairness as a master.
I have frequently asked employers of labour in England whether they were satisfied with the work done for them by their day labourers, and while they readily allowed for exceptions, yet they spoke strongly of such men as “doing as little as possible for their pay.” Every branch of work that it is possible to give out as piece-work is nowadays so arranged. Why? The masters are satisfied, for they get done that for which they pay; the men are better pleased, for they receive what they earn, and the quickest and most industrious man gains the largest pay, and his superior energy is not balanced against the laziest man in the shop. Let us do justice to the black man. He is the only one who in such a climate can work long hours at a time, and for months at a stretch. All the evidences of civilization on the Congo are the results of his energy and endurance directed by his white master. He is, however, no fonder of work than the average white man; but like the latter he is willing to labour to increase his comforts in the house, his prestige in the village, and to meet his obligations as a man, a husband, and a father, for each relationship makes its own demands on his resources.