Page:History of the Indian Archipelago Vol 3.djvu/425

 ARTICLES OF EXPORTATION. 409 The possession of the Spice Islands, in 1796, put it in the power of the Englisli to obtain what they had long anxiously desired, spice plants, for the purpose of propagation in their own settle- ments, and the nutmeg has been tried in Penang, Bencoolen, and some of the West India islands. In the latter it has altogether failed, or has failed, at least, to all useful purposes. Within the Archi- pelago, the culture, as far as the quality is con- cerned, has been attended with somewhat more success than that of the clove, and very good nut- mesrs are now raised both at Penang' and Ben- coolen, but the cost of bringing them to market is so high, that the restoration of a free culture, in the native country of the nutmeg, would instantly destroy this unstable and factitious branch of in- dustry. The planters of Bencoolen assert that they cannot grow nutmegs under ^s. 6d. per pound, or J'^d'o Spanish dollars per picul, which, to be sure, is 44^ per cent, cheaper than the mo- nopoly prices at which nutmegs have been sold in the Spice Islands, but is, at the same time, 2000 per cent, dearer than the estimated natural cost. The bounty, therefore, paid to the planters of Ben- coolen, for growing their nutmegs, is the enor- mous difference now stated. It would be need- less to add more. It would, I imagine, be as vain an attempt to grow the grapes of Champagne or Burgundy in Normandy or England, as to grow