polise it. No injury is done thereby to any one, but a
great benefit is conferred on the whole population of Holland
and its dependencies, since the produce of the state
monopolies saves them from the weight of a heavy taxation.
Had the Government not kept the nutmeg trade of
Banda in its own hands, it is probable that the whole of
the islands would long ago have become the property of
one or more large capitalists. The monopoly would have
been almost the same, since no known spot on the globe
can produce nutmegs so cheaply as Banda, but the profits
of the monopoly would have gone to a few individuals
instead of to the nation. As an illustration of how a state
monopoly may become a state duty, let us suppose that no
gold existed in Australia, but that it had been found in
immense quantities by one of our ships in some small and
barren island. In this case it would plainly become the
duty of the state to keep and work the mines for the
public benefit, since by doing so, the gain would be fairly
divided among the whole population by decrease of taxation
; whereas by leaving it open to free trade while merely
keeping the government of the island, we should certainly
produce enormous evils during the first struggle for the
precious metal, and should ultimately subside into the
monopoly of some wealthy individual or great company,
whose enormous revenue would not equally benefit the
community. The nutmegs of Banda and the tin of Banca
are to some extent parallel cases to this supposititious
one, and I believe the Dutch Government will act most
unwisely if they give up their monopoly.
Even the destruction of the nutmeg and clove trees in
many islands, in order to restrict their cultivation to one or
two where the monopoly could be easily guarded, usually
made the theme of so much virtuous indignation against
the Dutch, may be defended on similar principles, and is
certainly not nearly so bad as many monopolies wre ourselves
have till very recently maintained. Nutmegs and
cloves are not necessaries of life ; they are not even used
as spices by the natives of the Moluccas, and no one was
materially or permanently injured by the destruction of
the trees, since there are a hundred other products that can
be grown in the same islands, equally valuable and far
more beneficial in a social point of view. It is a case
exactly parallel to our prohibition of the growth of tobacco
in England, for fiscal purposes, and is, morally and economically,
neither better nor worse. The salt monopoly which
we so long maintained in India was much worse. As long
as we keep up a system of excise and customs on articles
of daily use, which requires an elaborate array of officers
and coastguards to carry into effect, and which creates a
number of purely legal crimes, it is the height of absurdity
for us to affect indignation at the conduct of the Dutch,
who carried out a much more justifiable, less hurtful, and