al, for the interests of the small
towns are identical with those of the surrounding country.

The population is not only rural, but scattered more thinly over a vast
area than in any other British Colony, except north-western Canada, and
parts of Australasia. In Natal there are only two white men to the
square mile, and in Cape Colony less than two. Nor is this sparseness
incidental, as in North America, to the early days of settlement. It is
due to a physical condition--the condition of the soil--which is likely
to continue.

Below the white citizens, who are the ruling race, there lies a thick
stratum of coloured population numerically larger, and likely to remain
so, because it performs all the unskilled labour of the country. Here
is a condition which, though present in some of the Southern States of
America, is fortunately absent from all the self-governing Colonies of
Britain, and indeed caused Jamaica to be, some time ago, withdrawn from
that category.

The conjunction of these circumstances marks off South Africa as a very
peculiar country, where we may expect to find a correspondingly peculiar
political situation. Comparing it to other Colonies, we may say that the
Cape and Natal resemble Canada in the fact that there are two European
races present, and resemble the Southern States of America in having a
large mass of coloured people beneath the whites. But South Africa is in
other respects unlike both; and although situated in the southern
hemisphere, it bears little resemblance to Australia.

Now let us see how the circumstances above described have determined the
political issues that have arisen in Cape Colony.

Certain issues are absent which exist, not only in Europe and the United
States, but also in Australia and in Canada. There is no antagonism of
rich and poor, because there are very few poor and still fewer rich.
There is no working-man's or labour party, because so few white men are
employed in handicrafts. There is no Socialist movement, nor is any
likely soon to arise, because the mass of workers, to whom elsewhere
Socialism addresses itself, is mainly composed of black people, and no
white would dream of collectivism for the benefit of blacks. Thus the
whole group of labour questions, which bulks so largely in modern
industrial States, is practically absent, and replaced by a different
set of class questions, to be presently mentioned.

There is no regularly organized Protectionist party,