A HISTORY OF SOUTH AFRICA By Eric: A: Walker.
Cufrent Literature
Fk a re-issue or a work (Longmans, 12s: ad.) remarkable nectrintinifilin Of detailed facts and for its fin- partiality than for any particular literary graces. It first appeared eight years ago, and .the erudite Professor Walker has added a chapter about events in the Union from that time until last year. He tens of theuuteesslul propagation...of the Afrikaans language and the publication of the Afrikaans Bible ; of the, flag dispute and the compromise Which settled it ; of the sovereign independence " end " finality with regard to constitutional freedom " which General Hertzog declared. South -Africa to have attained as a result -of the Statute of Westminster ; of the *coalition between Hertzog and Smuts ; of internal peace and the high price of gold. But recent years have seen outbreaks of-crude fundamentalism (as in the prosecution of Dr. du Plessis) and of the usual local brand of nationalism, while policy towards the .natives has been continuously reactionary. Some day South Africa may produce a statesman intelligent enough to realise that it • is bad business to keep the native population down at the lowest level of -mere subsistence, but his views would certainly be taken as an attempt to weaken the rigidity of the Colour Bar, for unfortunately the great open spaces tend to nurture the narrowest minds, and a blind devotion to the sanctity og-a White South Africa as an ideal has become habitual. • GRETCHEN DISCOVERS AMERICA By Helene Scheu-Riesz
Previous page
