About The Same Time, Machinery For Weaving Was Sent Out From London;
And A Factory Was Started At Afrehitoo, In Imeeo.
The whiz of the
wheels and spindles brought in volunteers from all quarters, who
deemed it a privilege to be admitted to work:
Yet, in six months, not
a boy could be hired; and the machinery was knocked down, and packed
off to Sydney.
It was the same way with the cultivation of the sugar-cane, a plant
indigenous to the island; peculiarly fitted to the soil and climate,
and of so excellent a quality that Bligh took slips of it to the West
Indies. All the plantations went on famously for a while; the natives
swarming in the fields like ants, and making a prodigious stir. What
few plantations now remain are owned and worked by whites; who would
rather pay a drunken sailor eighteen or twenty Spanish dollars a
month, than hire a sober native for his "fish and tarro."
It is well worthy remark here, that every evidence of civilization
among the South Sea Islands directly pertains to foreigners; though
the fact of such evidence existing at all is usually urged as a proof
of the elevated condition of the natives. Thus, at Honolulu, the
capital of the Sandwich Islands, there are fine dwelling-houses,
several hotels, and barber-shops, ay, even billiard-rooms; but all
these are owned and used, be it observed, by whites. There are
tailors, and blacksmiths, and carpenters also; but not one of them is
a native.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 233 of 389
Words from 61597 to 61852
of 103097
