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The two groups must exist as friends or as enemies. So long as young Ooroony reigned, it was thought there would be little difficulty in maintaining amicable relations; and it was hoped that the intercourse created by this arrangement, aided by the trade in sandal-wood, might have the effect to bind the natives to the whites by the tie of interest.
"Even if you succeed in your attempt, you will be certain to lose some of our hands; for although the best of them are on shore, the commander of the Talisman will think those that remain too numerous for a sandal-wood trader, and you are aware that we are sufficiently short-handed in such dangerous seas." The latter part of this speech was uttered in a slightly sarcastic tone.
He then told them that he was going to take them to another island where there was plenty of sandal-wood, and that when they had cut it down for him and shipped it he would take them back to their own country. This quieted them, though it seemed strange that they should have believed him.
"Ha!" exclaimed Montague, turning suddenly round with an inquiring gaze at the stalwart figure of the sandal-wood trader; "it is most fortunate that I have met with you, Mr. Gascoyne. I doubt not that you can conduct me to this vessel of yours, so that I may know the pirate when I fall in with him.
In the first place, the policy of retaining the monopoly of a trade that must be enormously profitable, was too obvious to need any arguments to support it. So long as the sandal-wood lasted, so long would it be in the power of the colonists to coin money; while it was certain that competitors would rush in, the moment the existence of this mine of wealth should be known.
They stopped 105 miles further on, at Banda, where mace and nutmegs are found, then at Solor, where a great trade in white sandal-wood is carried on.
The wine was of his own sending, and so were the China firescreens, and the sandal-wood work-box, and the ivory card case, and those magnificent pink and white chessmen, carved like little sepoys and mandarins, with the castles on elephants' backs, George the Third and his queen in pink ivory against the Emperor of China and lady in white the delight of Clive's childhood, the chief ornament of the old spinster's sitting-room.
When well greased and rendered somewhat stiff by the solids thus introduced, it is plaited into at least two hundred fine plaits; each of these plaits is then smeared with a mixture of sandal-wood dust and either gum water or paste of dhurra flour. On the last day of the operation, each tiny plait is carefully opened by the long hair-pin or skewer, and the head is ravissante.
A few may be thrown on coral islands, probably to die, certainly never to return. I must speak of the sandal-wood in which we are trading. It is a small tree, with numerous irregular branches, and which with the trunk are covered with a thick red-brown bark. The leaves, which turn inwards, are of a very dark green colour. The flowers, growing in clusters, are white, with a red exterior.
Four years passed away, and they filled four more ships, one with ivory, one with musk, one with cloves, and one with nutmegs. But when these ships were all loaded a terrible tempest arose. The ships were all of them sunk, with their cloves and nutmeg, and musk and ivory, and coral and sandal-wood and conchs.
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