The Biblical story of Cain and Abel may be taken in part as illustrative of the two vocations by which mankind slowly arose from the savage occupation of the hunter to the two higher divisions, namely, those who tamed the beasts, and those who tilled the soil.
Modern medical opinion is to the effect that no occupation so develops the physical perfection of humanity as the pastoral vocation; while reflection would indicate that it must cultivate a stronger set of characteristics than either hunting or tillage.
Bring into collision in a comparatively primitive state a pastoral people and one engaged in agriculture and the shepherds and herdsmen will rule.
But will their contempt for those they have brought under and subjected to their rule suffice to prevent miscegenation? That is the serious question for the Southern man.
It is apparent in East Africa, where this contact has existed for many generations, despite the preservation of every racial prejudice which marks the Southern white man, the superior race has not avoided miscegenation, but, upon the contrary, it has steadily progressed, until distinctions in color are almost gone, and even the more stubbornly yielding distinctions of facial traits and hair texture are gradually giving away, and this miscegenation seems to have checked progress in civilization.
Writing of the two classes of Negroes found near the great African lakes, the explorer Stanley says:
“We discovered that there were two different and distinctly differing races living in this region in harmony with each other, one being clearly of Indo-African origin, possessing exceedingly fine features, aquiline noses, slender necks, small heads, with a grand and proud carriage; an old, old race, possessing splendid traditions and ruled by inflexible customs, which would admit of no deviation. Though the majority have a nutty brown complexion, some even of a rich dark brown, the purest of their kind resemble old ivory in color and their skins have a beautiful soft feel, as of finest satin. These confine themselves solely to the breeding of cattle and are imbued with a supercilious contempt for the hoeman, the Bavira, who are strictly agricultural. No proud dukeling in England could regard a pauper with more pronounced contempt than the Wahuma profess for the Bavira. They will live in the country of the Bavira, but not in their villages; they will exchange their dairy produce for the grain and vegetables of the hoeman, but they will never give their daughters in marriage but to a Wahuma born. Their sons may possess children by Bavira women, but that is the utmost concession.”[296]
All of which indicates great pride still in the superior race; but a reduction to what is practically two classes of Negroes, as far as the outside world is concerned. Note Livingston also in Southwest Africa.
But in addition to the reasons advanced why this matter of the diffusion of the Negroes through the United States should be accepted as best, there is the consideration that it is inevitable. That it is in progress can no longer be doubted, although, as Robert Y. Hayne declared in 1827, it would be, “a very gradual operation.”
The strong grip which the Republican party maintained in Federal politics for the sixteen years, up to 1912, has in some measure to be credited to the influx from the South of Negroes into the North and West, where they most naturally and reasonably vote the Republican ticket. Indeed it has been positively asserted by one whose devotion to that party could scarcely, at the time, have been questioned, that they may have been brought there for this purpose.