222 SCIENCE PROGRESS 



fined to a small district, the agriculturist must grow practically 

 everything he requires and simply sell enough to provide a 

 little money with which to purchase the small amount of 

 clothing, tools and other necessities that he cannot make for 

 himself. In other words, it was only when the white nations 

 were represented in the tropics that any important amount of 

 differentiation became possible in the crops grown by the people. 



The market open to the peasant is in general afforded either 

 by the travelling middleman or by the existence of a local 

 market in v/hich he can himself or by aid of his women-folk 

 sell his produce. Such markets are easy to establish where 

 there is a population, say of fishermen, who do not cultivate 

 for themselves, or where the local population is fairly dense, 

 but in thinly peopled countries they are very difficult if not 

 impossible to maintain. In these cases, and also to a very 

 large extent in the countries with local markets, the sale must 

 be through travelling middlemen. These men are very common 

 in many countries of the tropics ; they buy up large quantities 

 of produce but do not in general give the very best prices. 

 Where possible, co-operative sale is probably the best way 

 of disposing of produce, but it presupposes the existence in a 

 village of some public-spirited person with more intelligence 

 than the average villager. The produce of the villagers is 

 collected from them, and they are paid say three-quarters of 

 its value on the spot. It is then sent by the co-operative 

 society to the market in some large town, which may be at 

 a great distance, being there sold through an agent. After 

 paying the cost of freight the balance is distributed among 

 the producers ; it is found that in this way they usually get 

 a higher price for their crops, cattle, etc. Such societies have 

 been fairly successful in some parts of Ceylon and India, and 

 of course they are worked upon a large scale in Europe. 



Yet another way in which a market may be provided for 

 any produce that the peasant may grow, provided that this 

 produce is exportable, is through the medium of any capitalist 

 estates growing the same thing. For instance, if there be an 

 estate in a tea-producing district the small grower of tea 

 may sell his picked leaf to its factory, which can then make 

 it up into a grade fit to sell on the open market, and by 

 combining the crops of many small proprietors, can turn out 

 enough to be worth selling in such a place. For it must 



