At Present The Condition
Of The Sea-Bottom Is Little Known; The Sponges, Of An Inferior-Quality,
Are Collected By
Dredging, and the boats pay a fixed sum for a licence
according to the size and construction of the dredging
Apparatus,
varying from 5 to 20 pounds per annum; this yields a small annual
revenue of about 1600 pounds, which embraces the entire coast of Cyprus.
By careful management the salt might exhibit an increase, but on the
other hand, the wine, if relieved from the present extreme taxation,
would for the first two or three years ensure a considerable reduction.
No increase of imports can be expected until the general advance of
internal prosperity shall enable the population to extend their demand
for foreign manufactures. We have seen that the peasantry are contented
with the home-made cotton stuffs which they produce without an
expenditure of money; and the habits of the agricultural classes are
simple, and independent of external aid. It will require many years
before the customs of the Cypriotes shall be changed by the intercourse
with strangers, and the increase of their wealth, commencing from the
zero of poverty, must be the base of future expectations. We generally
remark in the advancing desires of communities that women exert a
powerful influence in the development of manufactures. The wholesome,
and to a certain extent civilising, attention to personal appearance,
creates a demand for articles of dress and other little vanities which
encourage trade, and by degrees the improvement in every household
expands into a new birth of external relations with foreign countries,
which induces an increase of imports. The women of Cyprus are completely
subjugated to their husbands, and although exempt from the cruelty
unfortunately so prevalent among a similar class in England, they are
seldom indulged in the love of finery which in our own country is
carried to an excess. The baggy trousers and the high hob-nailed boots
of the Cyprian Venus will hardly excite the ambition of British
manufacturers, and for many years the females will remain in their
present position. There are already soap manufactories in the island,
and the first groundwork for improvements in personal habits will be
ensured by their extension, before the exterior fineries of more
civilised communities shall be introduced. We may therefore omit the
Cyprian female from the class that would benefit the island
commercially, but she will perform her duty in a sensible and simple
manner as a good housewife, and thereby assist in the prosperity of her
husband the agriculturist. The more pains that we may bestow upon an
examination of the resources of Cyprus, the more certain becomes the
conclusion that the present and the future depend entirely upon
agricultural development.
This fact is patent to all who can pretend to a knowledge of the island,
and the question will naturally intrude, "Was Cyprus occupied for
agricultural purposes?" Of course we know it was not: but on the other
hand, if we acknowledge the truth, "that it was accepted as a
strategical military point," it is highly desirable that the country
should be self-supporting, instead of, like Malta and Gibraltar, mainly
dependent upon external supplies.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 247 of 274
Words from 128681 to 129212
of 143016
