272. Servitude of group to group. Agriculture is a peaceful occupation, the pursuit of which breeds out the physical strength of nomadism. The cases in which nomads rule over tillers belong, in general, under this head, more especially because such a difference in the economy of life produces mutual contempt and hatred. The Israelites entered Canaan as nomads, and their relation to the Canaanites was that which is here described. Another case is presented by the smiths, who generally appear as the earliest handicraftsmen, but are regarded with doubt and suspicion. They are not slaves, but they are treated as outcasts. Very often, in case of conquest by an invading tribe, the smiths remain under the invaders as a subject and despised caste. The Masarva are descendants of Betchuanas and Bushmen. They stand in a relation of slaves to the Betchuanas, Matabele, and Marutse, in whose land they dwell, except that they may not be sold.[631] The Vaganda are subject to the Vahuma.[632] The latter keep out of sight, being inferior in civilization but greater in power. Von Götzen also met with the Vahuma as rulers over the Vahuta, i.e. "belongers," as they called them.[633] The Arabs hold the negroes of Borku in subjection and rob them of the date harvest.[634] In other parts of the same district a nomad section rules over a settled section of the same population.[635] Nomads hold themselves to be the proper ones to rule.[636] The Hyksos's invasion of Egypt is a case of the subjection of tillers by nomads, attended by all the contempt of men on one grade of civilized effort for those on another.[637] The combination of the two, the nomads forming the ruling caste of military nobles, forms a strong state.[638] The Tuaregs of the Sahara do not allow the inhabitants of Kauar to raise vegetables or grains, but force them to buy the same of them (the Tuaregs), which they bring to them from the Sudan to buy salt, which the Kauar dwellers must have ready.[639] The Akarnanians, in 1350, sold themselves to the barbarians, in a body, in order to escape want.[640] The Masai are another group of warriors and raiders. The Varombutta do their hunting and tilling for them.[641] The Makololo hold the Makalaka in similar serfdom, but the subjection is easy and the servitude light, because the subject individuals can easily run away.[642] The Hupa of California hold their neighbors in similar subjection and in tributary servitude.[643] Other cases are furnished by the Vanyambo, west of the Victoria Nyassa,[644] and the Djur, who long served the Nubians as smiths.[645] It gives us pleasure to learn that, about sixty years ago, the inferior tribes on Uvea (Tai), of the Loyalty group, revolted against the dominant tribe and nearly exterminated it.[646]
273. Slavery and polygamy. Such instances show us the existence in human nature of a tendency of stronger groups to exploit weaker ones in the struggle for existence; in other words, slavery or forced labor is one way in which, in elementary civilization, the survival of the fittest group is brought about. The slavery of individuals has not the same definite result on the competition of life. "We find polygamy and slavery continually at work dissolving the cohesion of old political institutions in the old civilized races of Asia and Africa. In an uncivilized society, like that of Zululand, they prevent such cohesion ever taking place. They help to keep the Kaffir tribes in perpetual unrest and barbarism, by destroying the germs of civilization and preventing its growth."[647] That the two have this effect in common may very probably be true, but in many respects they are antagonistic to each other. Slavery meets the necessity for many laborers which may otherwise be a cause for polygamy. Wherever slavery exists it affords striking illustrations of the tendency of the mores towards consistency with each other, and that means, of course, their tendency to cluster around some one or two leading ones. Africa now furnishes the leading proofs of this. The negro society is one in which physical force is the chief deciding element. The negroes have enslaved each other for thousands of years. Very few of them have ever become slaves to whites without having been previously slaves to other negroes. In 1875 it was reckoned that twenty thousand persons, chiefly women and children whose male relatives had generally been killed, were taken into slavery from around Lake Nyassa. The difficulties and expense of the slave trade in that region became so great that it could not be carried on except by alliance with one tribe which defeated and enslaved another and sold the survivors. The Arabs opened paths for ivory hunting. The slave dealers used these means of communication. They established garrisons in order to exploit the territory, and ended by depopulating it.[648] Junker argues earnestly against the impression which has been established in Europe that Arabs are chiefly to blame for slavery. "There are places in Africa where three men cannot be sent on a journey together for fear two of them may combine and sell the third."[649]
274. Some men serving others. Freedom and equality. Figurative use of "slavery." Must we infer, then, that there is a social necessity that some men must serve others? In the New Testament it is taught that willing and voluntary service of others is the highest duty and glory of human life. If one man's strength is spent on another man's struggle for existence, the survival of the former in the competition of life is impaired. The men of talent are constantly forced to serve the rest. They make the discoveries and inventions, order the battles, write the books, and produce the works of art. The benefit and enjoyment go to the whole. There are those who joyfully order their own lives so that they may serve the welfare of mankind. The whole problem of mutual service is the great problem of societal organization. Is it a dream, then, that all men should ever be free and equal? It is at least evident that here ethical notions have been interjected into social relations, with the result that we have been taught to think of free and equal units willingly serving each other. That, at least, is an idealistic dream. Yet it no more follows from the fact that slavery has done good work in the history of civilization that slavery should forever endure than it follows from the fact that war has done good work in the history of civilization that war is, in itself, a good thing. Slavery alleviated the status of women; the domestication of beasts of draft and burden alleviated the status of slaves; we shall see below that serfs got freedom when wind, falling water, and steam were loaded with the heavy tasks. Just now the heavy burdens are borne by steam; electricity is just coming into use to help bear them. Steam and electricity at last mean coal, and the amount of coal in the globe is an arithmetical fact. When the coal is used up will slavery once more begin? One thing only can be affirmed with confidence; that is, that as no philosophical dogmas caused slavery to be abolished, so no philosophical dogmas can prevent its reintroduction if economic changes should make it fit and suitable again. As steam has had put upon it the hard work of life during the last two hundred years, the men have been emancipated from ancient hard conditions and burdens, and the generalities of the philosophers about liberty have easily won greater and greater faith and currency. However, the mass of mankind, taught to believe that they ought to have easy and pleasant times here, begin to complain again about "wages slavery," "debt slavery," "rent slavery," "sin slavery," "war slavery," "marriage slavery," etc. What men do not like they call "slavery," and so prove that it ought not to be. It appears to be still in their experience that a free man is oppressed by contracts of wages, debt, rent, and marriage, and that the cost of making ready for war and of warding off sin are very heavy. Political institutions readjust and redistribute the burdens of life over a population, and they change the form of the same perhaps, but the burdens are in the conditions of human life. They are always present, and political institutions never can do away with them at all. Therefore slavery, if we mean by it subjection to the conditions of human life, never can be abolished.
275. Ethnographical illustrations of slavery. In Togo male slaves work in the fields where yams are cultivated. Each carries a basket in which he has a chicken, which will live on worms and insects in the field. The slave is soon married. He has two days in the week to work for himself. One of his grown boys can replace him on the other four. He can buy a slave to replace him. Thus they often attain to wealth, freedom, and power. A female slave, if married to a free man, becomes free. This form of slavery is only a mode of service. The slave lives with the family, and enjoys domestic consideration. There is also debt slavery, the whole family being responsible for the debt of a member.[650] Klose, however, describes the ruin wrought by slave raids. "Murder and incendiarism are the orders in this business. Great villages and districts are made deserts and are depopulated by the raids." "It is not in negro nature to subject one's self voluntarily to labor. The negro wants to be compelled to work." The fetich priest gives him a harmless drink, which is to be fatal to him if he tries to run away.[651] The Ngumba in south Kamerun hold their slaves in huts near their own houses. A mishandled slave can leave his master and demand the protection of another. A debtor who cannot pay becomes slave of his creditor until the debt is paid in value, but this does not free him. He can pay also by his wife or daughter.[652] Amongst the Ewe-speaking tribes a woman who is condemned to a fine may sell or pawn her children, if her husband will not give her the amount to be paid. The husbands often hold back until the women pawn the children to them, whereby they obtain complete control of the children.[653] Their slaves are criminals and debtors, or, if foreigners, are victims of war or of kidnapping. They are not regarded with contempt, are well treated, do not have as hard a lot as an English agricultural laborer, and often attain to wealth and honor. The master-owner may not kill a slave.[654] In Bornu the women slaves find favor in the eyes of their masters, and by amiability win affection. If they have children they win a firm position, "for only the most stringent circumstances could compel a Moslem, whose ideas are reasonably correct, to sell the mother of his children."[655] The Somal and Afar do not deal much in slaves. They use women and a pariah class. A Somal is never slave to a Somal, and war captives are not made slaves. Also amongst the Galla it appears that debtor slavery does not exist. Criminal slavery does, however, exist, and is used by the chiefs. It is honorable to treat slaves well. In Kaffa the slaves are lazy and pretentious, because they know that their owners do not look to them for labor, but speculate on their children, whom they will sell.[656] In general, in East Africa, the master-owner has not the power of life and death, and the slave has a right of property. "A headman (of a village) in debt sells first his slaves, then his sisters, then his mother, and lastly his free wives, after which he has nothing left."[657] Stuhlmann[658] says that slaves in Uganda are well treated, as members of the family. Brunache[659] says the same of the Congo tribes so far as they have not been contaminated by contact with whites. This may be regarded as characteristic of African slavery. The Vanika of eastern Africa are herding nomads. They cannot use slaves, and make war only to steal cattle.[660] Bushmen love liberty. They submit to no slavery. They are hunters of a low grade. They hate cattle, as the basis of a life which is different from (higher than) their own. They massacre cattle which they cannot steal or carry away.[661] Mungo Park described free negroes reduced to slavery by famine.[662] In Ashanti a man and a woman discovered in the act in the bush, or in the open air, are slaves of him who discovered them, but they are redeemable by their families.[663] Ashanti slavery is domestic and very mild. The slave marries his master's daughter and plays with the master. He also eats from the same dish.[664] Slavery of this form is never cruel or harsh. Debt slavery is harder, for the services of the pawn count for nothing on the debt.[665] The effect of the abolition of slavery in Algeria was stupor amongst master-owners and grief amongst slaves. The former wondered how it could be wrong to care for persons who would have been eaten by their fellow-countrymen if they had succumbed to the hard struggle for existence at home. The latter saw themselves free—really free—in the desert, with no supply of food, clothing, or other supplies, and no human ties.[666] In all families of well-to-do people little negroes are found. The author saw one who told her that the lady of the house had suckled him.[667] It is reported from eastern Borneo that a white man could hire no natives for wages. They thought it degrading to work for wages, but if he would buy them they would work for him.[668] In spite of what has been said above about slavery on the west coast of Africa it is to be remembered that the master-owner has the power of life and death and that he often uses it. If he is condemned to death for a crime, he can give a slave to be executed in his place.[669] In eastern Angola, if a woman dies in childbirth, her husband has to pay her parents. If he cannot, he becomes their slave.[670] In South Africa Holub found that the fiercest slave chasers were blacks, who had slaves at home and treated them worse than Mohammedans ever did.[671] Formerly a Kaffir would work in the diamond mines for three marks a day until he got money enough to buy cattle and to buy a woman at home, a European suit, a kettle, and a rifle. Then he went home and set up an establishment. Then he would return to earn more and buy more wives, who would support him to his life's end.[672] The stronger Hottentot tribes hold classes of their own population, or mountain Damara and Bushmen, in servitude, although no law defines a "slave." Those people hold the treatment they receive to be due to their origin. Amongst all South African tribes the rich exert their power to subjugate the poor, who hang upon them in a kind of clientage, hoping to receive something. Cruelty and even murder are not punished by the judges.[673]
276. Family slavery. The savage form of slavery in Africa furnishes us one generalization which may be adopted with confidence. Whenever slaves live in a family, sharing in the family life and associating freely with the male members of it in work, religion, play, etc., the slavery is of a very light type and implies no hardship for the slave.
277. Slavery in North America among savages. Slavery is believed to have existed amongst the Indians of Virginia. "They made war, not for land or goods, but for women and children, whom they put not to death, but made them do service."[674] The young men and slaves worked in the fields of the Mississippi valley. The latter were not overworked.[675] The Algonquins made slaves of their prisoners, especially of the women and children.[676] The Illinois are represented as an intermediate party who got slaves in the South and sold them in the West.[677] The Wisconsin tribes used to make captives of Pawnees, Osages, Missouris, and Mandans. When Pawnees were such captives (slaves) they were treated with severity.[678] In the Gulf region of North America slavery was common from the earliest times. That slaves might not escape, a sinew in the leg was cut, by the Six Nations.[679] On the northwestern coast of North America slavery was far more developed than east of the Rocky Mountains. In Oregon and Washington slavery was interwoven with the social polity. Slaves were also harshly treated, as property, not within the limits of humanity. For a man to kill a half dozen of his own slaves was a sign of generous magnanimity on his part. One tribe stole captives from its weaker neighbors. Hence the slave trade is an important part of the commerce of all the tribes up to Alaska.[680] In 1841 it was reckoned that one third of the entire population from northern British Columbia to southern Alaska were "slaves of the most helpless and abject description." "The great supply was obtained by trade with the southern Indians, in which the Tsimshian acted as middlemen. They were kidnapped or captured by the southern Indians from their own adjacent tribes and sold to the Tsimshian, who traded them to the northern Thlinkit and interior Tinné tribes for furs." "Slaves did all the drudgery, fished for their owner, strengthened his force in war, were not allowed to hold property or to marry, and when old and worthless were killed. The master's power was unlimited." The slave must commit any crime at the command of the master. The slaves were set free at some ceremonies, but they were put to death at the funerals of chiefs, or as foundation sacrifices, or in reparation for insults or wrongs. The northern Indians were more warlike and would not make good slaves. The Oregon flatheads were docile and industrious.[681] The Chinooks became the wealthiest tribe in the region by acting as middlemen to sell war captives taken inland as far from home as possible.[682] Amongst the Thlinkits slaves are forbidden to wear the labret, and sex intercourse with a slave woman disgraces a free man.[683] "Amongst the early Central Americans the slave who achieved any feat of valor in war received his liberty and was adopted by the Capulli, or clan."[684] In Mexico there were slaves of three classes,—criminals, war captives, and persons who had voluntarily sold themselves or had been sold by their parents. The captor generally sacrificed a prisoner, but might hold him as a slave. Those who sold themselves did so to get a fund for gambling. There was a public slave mart at Azcapuzalco. The system is described as kind, but slaves might lose their lives through the act of the master at feasts or funerals.[685] "Actual slavery of the Indians in Mexico continued as late as the middle of the seventeenth century."[686] It is evident that slavery existed all over North and Central America, but was more developed on the Pacific coast than in the Mississippi valley. The meat eaters of the buffalo region had less opportunity to use the institution.[687]
278. Slavery in South America. In South America we also meet with at least one case of a tribe, or part of a tribe, which is in clientage to another tribe. This is a subdivision of the third rank of the Mbaya, who voluntarily entered into a relation of clientage to the Mbaya, giving them service under arms, and in house and field, without being their slaves, being protected in return by the powerful and feared tribe.[688] The Guykurus carry on frequent wars to get captives, whom they keep in stringent servitude. "There is, perhaps, no tribe of South American Indians, among whom the state of slavery is so distinctly marked as among them." Slaves and free do not intermarry, lest marriage be profaned. There is no way in which a slave may become free.[689] The Guykurus are the strongest tribe in the valley of the Paraguay. They have horses and were called by the Portuguese Cavalleiros.[690] In Brazil it was thought that the cultivation of the country was impossible unless the Indians were made slaves. The early laws and orders of the kings of Portugal seem to reveal a sincere desire to control greed and cruelty. In 1570 private slave raids were forbidden and slavery was confined to those captured in public and just war. Lisbon, however, became a great slave mart by the law that slaves passing from one colony (Africa) to another (America) must pass through Lisbon and pay a tax there. Peter Martyr is quoted that slavery was necessary for Indians who, if they had no master, would go on with their old customs and idolatry. Slavery killed them, however. It did not make them laborers.[691] In general, in the valley of the Yapura, in the first half of the nineteenth century, slaves were war captives who were very unkindly treated.[692] The aborigines began to sell their war captives to Europeans soon after the latter arrived. They wanted rosewood especially, and they took Indians to Africa as slaves.[693] Boggiani[694] expresses the opinion in regard to the savages of the Chaco, as the meadow region on the Paraguay river is called, that slavery amongst a people of more civilized mores, is, for them, "an incalculable benefit," and that "to hinder slavery, in such circumstances, would be a capital error." "It is necessary to force them to come out of their brutelike condition, and to awaken their intelligence, which is not wanting, if they receive practical and energetic direction." Bridges[695] says that one Fuegian is thrown into clientage to another by their mode of life. "For a young man, with no wife and few relatives, must live with some one who can protect him, and with whom he can live in comfort, whose wife or wives can catch fish for him, etc."
279. Slavery in Polynesia and Melanesia. Polynesia, Melanesia, and the East Indies, especially the last, present us pictures of a society which is old and whose mores have been worn threadbare, while their stage of civilization is still very low. Codrington[696] says: "There is no such thing as slavery, properly so called. In head-hunting expeditions prisoners are made for the sake of their heads, to be used when occasion requires, and such persons live with their captors in a condition very different from that of freedom, but they are not taken or maintained for the purposes of slaves." Ratzel[697] says: "Slavery prevailed everywhere in Melanesia, originating either in war or debt. Sometimes it was hard; sometimes not." Somerville says that "slaves are kept chiefly for their heads, which are demanded whenever any occasion necessitates them, such as the death of the owner." He is speaking of the Solomon Islands.[698] What Finsch says of the Melanesians may be extended to all the inhabitants of the South Sea islands.[699] They will not work because they do not need to. They have few wants. Pfeil wants to make the people of German Melanesia work, in order that they may contribute to the tasks of the human race. The problem presents one of the great reasons for slavery in history.
280. Slavery in the East Indies. The chief of Chittagong[700] wrote to the English governor, in 1774, that slavery in his district was due to the sale of himself by any person who was destitute, and had no friends or position. He and his wife must serve the master and his wife in any desired way, including services which a free servant would not perform, "through fear of demeaning himself and disgracing his family." Abolition of this slavery would produce complaints by the masters, and would not please the servants who are used to it. "Until lately the universal custom prevailed in the hills of having debtor slaves." The debtor gave one of his children or a female relative to serve as a menial until the debt should be paid. The pawned persons "were treated as members of the creditor's family and never exposed to harsh usage." The effect of interference by the English was that the wives and daughters of the great men suddenly had to do all the housework. "Debtor and creditor lost confidence in each other."[701] "There is a detestable and actual slavery in these hills, which is now only carried on by independent tribes, beyond English jurisdiction. This is the captivity to the bow and spear,—men and women taken prisoners by force in war, and sold from master to master. The origin of this custom was the want of women."[702] In the Chin hills there are slaves who are war captives, or criminals, or debtors, and others who are voluntary slaves, or slaves by birth. The master had full power of life and death, but, in fact, slaves were well treated. The people made raids on the Burmese lowlands and seized captives who were held for ransom. A slave man cohabits with a slave woman and brings up his children with affection "in the same humble, but not necessarily unhappy, position as his own."[703] In Ceylon there were slave persons of all ranks. Those of royal rank were princes who were prisoners or criminals. Any one might obtain slaves by purchase, or accept voluntary slaves who looked to him for good support.[704] A Malay will buy of a chief a number of war captives whom he takes to an island. Then he goes to a Chinaman and tells him that the slaves want to work on that island, but still owe the speaker the cost of transportation. The Chinaman pays this and gives to the slaves, on credit, clothes, etc., including money with which to gamble. Wages are low and interest high. They never can pay their debts and get their freedom again. This kind of slave trade has depopulated northern Nias.[705] On Sumatra, when a debtor is called upon to pay and cannot, or when he dies and does not leave enough property to pay his debts, his children fall into semi-slavery. They can perhaps persuade some one to pay their debts and accept their services. If their master formally three times demands payment of them which they cannot give, they fall into full slavery. Slavery exists in the Malay seaport towns, but not in the rural districts, where life is too simple.[706] In times of famine and want parents sell their children into slavery for a little rice. Children, especially daughters, constitute a large part of the fortune of a house father.[707]
At Koetei, on the Mahakkam in Borneo, all well-to-do people have debtors in pawn, whose position is somewhat better than that of slaves. The debtors seem content and submissive. Captives taken on head-hunting expeditions are held as slaves until human sacrifices are wanted.[708] The souls of all those who are put to death at the death of a Dyak rajah become his servants in the other world. In this world the killer can command, as his fetich, the soul of the killed. On the death of a great man his debtor slaves are bound to the carved village post, which indicates the glory of head-hunting, and are tortured to death.[709] "Slavery is greatly practiced" on Timorlaut. A thief, debtor, slanderer, or defamer may become the slave of the one he has wronged. The slave trade is also active between the islands.[710] The slaves of the sea Dyaks adopt their customs and become contented. Sometimes they win affection and are adopted, freed, and married to free women. Slaves and masters eat together the same food in the rural villages.[711] Among the land Dyaks slaves, by destitution and debt, "are just as happy as if perfectly free, enjoying all the liberty of their masters, who never think of ill-using them."[712] In old times one who set a house on fire was liable to become the slave of any one who was burned out.[713] Slaves on Timor do not seem to care for liberty. Their livelihood would not be so certain. There is a kind of slavery to the kingdom, not to any individual, but the slave cannot be sold by the king.[714] In the Barito valley a debtor slave has to do any kind of work. He may be punished by blows, or fines added to his debt, which may also be increased by any breaches of customs, or by the value of broken tools or vessels. A month after a child is born to him ten gulden are added, also expenses of education when the child is ready to go to work. He may be slain at a feast of the dead by his master. The owner can torment the debtor by new fines, and keep up the debt or even increase it.[715] In the Katingan valley there are no debtor slaves, because after three years a debtor who cannot pay becomes an hereditary slave, and cannot get his liberty even if he should get the means to pay his debt.[716] If he ever gets the means to pay and attempts to free himself he is compelled to pay fees, taxes, and customary dues to the "spirits of the house," etc. When he leaves his master's house he must not return to it for a year or two, nor eat anything brought from it—"to prove his independence." Then he gives a feast and becomes free.[717] "Slavery and pawnship are, in the nature of the case, the same."[718] The Dyaks put their Eden on a cloud island. They have a myth that the daughters of the great Being let down seven times seven hundred cords of gold thread in order to lower mortals upon a mountain, but the mortals were overhasty and tried to lower themselves by bamboos and rattans. The god, angry at this, condemned them to slavery. The myth, therefore, accounts for a caste of slaves. Formerly also war captives and criminals who could not pay fines became slaves. Debts cause men to fall into pawnship. Extravagant living, and gambling, lead to this condition. If a man becomes pawn for a debt his whole household goes with him. All have to work very hard to try to satisfy a greedy master. The pawn is entitled to one tenth of the harvest, or of the gain by trade. Free men despise pawns.[719] Wilken[720] says of the Bataks that a slave, by diligence and thrift, can always buy himself. In addition to all the ill chances of gambling, extravagance, making love to another man's wife, etc., by which a man may become a debtor slave, customs exist which are traps for the unwary. Sago and rice are left in the woods, in some islands, until wanted. If a man passes the store, he is supposed to take away the spirit of the goods. If caught, he and all his family become slaves. If a man dies who was wont to fish at a certain place, the place becomes taboo to his ghost. Any one who fishes there becomes a slave to his family. Also, if a district is in mourning, any one who breaks the mourning customs is made a slave.[721] The education of the Chinese in ethical doctrines has made slavery amongst them slight and mild. It is attributed to poverty, which forces parents to sell their daughters.[722] The owners must provide female slaves with husbands, and the law forbids the separation of husband and wife, or of parents and little children.[723] It appears that slavery is forbidden by law, but is tolerated in the case where the parents are poor. Boys once enslaved continue in bondage and their children follow them, but there is no legal possession. Girls become free at marriage.[724]