tact of races temporary problems, there would not be cause for uncertainty, but aggressions on the part of the modern white man have placed the white race in contact with all colored peoples, and race friction is to increase rather than grow less.

Happily for the world, the practical statesman is wrong when asserting that history furnishes no light by which our feet may be guided in the situation which confronts us. Light from history is obtainable, both as to the fundamental problem underlying race friction and the practical problems arising out of the white man's control of the colored races. Such light is available as a result of the labors of the biologist and especially as a result of the advancement of the science of ethnology. Up to the present, the white man in contact with colored races has generally ignored light from history; it may even be said that he has been unaware that there is light from history by which he may be guided.

The work of ethnologists, many unknown to fame and believed to be dealing with not very important matters, is at hand to give the practical statesman that light for which he seeks and the need of which he so deeply feels. Ethnology has not said its last word, but it has spoken in authoritative tone those things upon which we may construct a race sociology; and it is this more than all else of which the white world stands in need.

It may surprise the practical man of affairs to learn that scientific research has revealed to us a record of more than six thousand years of race contact. In Africa, the white man's dealing with the negro dates back this far in authentic history, and in Asia we have at our disposal some forty centuries of the white man's dealing with the colored races of that continent. While sixty centuries are but a short period in the life of a race, yet they are sufficient from which to judge the results of race contact.

The science of ethnology, if properly restricted, will not deal with mankind as such, but with the various races. Its province is not to determine the origin of man and his development, but to trace the origin and development of the several races. Ethnology may properly be concerned with the results arising from contact of races. It is this phase of that science with which we deal in this volume. A study of the results arising from the contact of races is to have a practical influence upon the white man and his civilization. It will give knowledge that may be considered the imperative need of civilization.

Race friction is not local, not confined to one continent-it is world wide. We cannot escape it though we make the attempt. But there is no evidence whatever that either the white man or the colored seeks to avoid race contact. Contact is the source of friction. Steam, steel and electricity pre

vent isolation of any race or breed. We must look forward to a continuation of race contact. From the white man's standpoint, the color problem may be defined as the difficulty of determining the extent and intent of race contact to the end that the colored races may benefit and the white may not be endangered, either in race stock or culture. That the white race retain ethnic purity is not a superficial desire; it is a primary necessity if civilization, as we understand it, is to continue. By preserving itself, the white race is to promote its own progress and impart its achievements to the backward races.

A study of the following pages will reveal that the white race, as white, has outdistanced the other races in cultural attainments, spiritual and material. This will constitute light from history. We shall also see that the white race, become hybrid, has not been able to continue its cultural progress. This, too, is light from history. We confess that we do not know how to convince or even disturb that once large but constantly dwindling group of white theorists who, when confronted by indisputable facts, past and present, simply reply, "It might have been different, or it may yet be different." This group of non-scientific thinkers grudgingly acknowledges the age-long ascendency of the white race, but will tell one that it might have been otherwise and it may yet be so. Those who construct a race socio

logy upon "ifs," "mays" and "mights," dwell in the realm of fancy and are secure, for there is no method by which they may be reached. To them the ethnologist may reply, "When your 'ifs,' 'mays' and 'mights' come true, you are entitled to consideration."

In constructing a program by which the white race is to be guided in its future contact with the colored races, we are to be influenced by facts only. Suppositions and hopes have their place, but not properly so in determining the future of the white man and his civilization. What is needed is the light of experience, not the halo of prospect and prophecy. The results of past contact of white with colored are to be relied upon as imperative suggestions which are to determine the purpose and limits of future contact. By knowing the past, we may profit by reason of such knowledge, whether it reveals success or failure.

It may be necessary that some consider the fact that the races as such are not of recent origin. At the dawn of history, they were constituted very much as they are today. The earliest records reveal the white race in ascendency, just as that race is foremost at the present time. The relative position of the races has not changed for many thousands of years. Some ethnologists have asked: if the races have retained relative positions for six thousand

years, what reason have we to suppose that long before the dawn of history, say fifty thousand years ago, they were in different relation one to the other?

Contact of the white race with a colored produces that which is popularly called a color problem. But it is necessary for us to understand that a color problem is not merely a problem of color. A color problem rightfully understood goes deeper than the skin. It is that problem, or problems, arising from the culturally advanced white man's contact with the lesser advanced non-white. It is this and yet it is more. Culture is the product of a peculiar mentality acting upon environment and being in some degree responsive to the influences of environment. But races placed under similar environment do not produce similar culture. If advantage and opportunity be equal and the results widely different, we have cause for inquiry whether the different races have not evolved difference in mentality just as they have evolved difference in skin color, hair texture, and other less obvious, though equally material, physical distinctions. Is it not reasonable to believe that if evolution has given to the various races well defined markings in skin, hair, and headform, that the same forces may have established coordinated differentiations in brain quantity and quality? This is a plausible theory and to it we cannot refrain from inviting the consideration of the remaining members of that one time world