160 SPICES 



CHAP. 



islands. Still, however, comparatively few cloves were 

 produced or exported till the occupation of the islands 

 by the Dutch. 



As in the case of the nutmeg, they attempted to 

 form a monopoly of the spice by confining its cultiva- 

 tion to Amboyna, and by making periodical expeditions 

 to other islands to exterminate it. Though they pursued 

 this policy with great inhumanity, their attempts to 

 keep the trade exclusively in their hands was not 

 altogether successful. Large supplies reached England 

 independently of their Government. Thus, in 1609, a 

 ship belonging to the East India Company, the Consent^ 

 reached England with 112,000 Ib. of cloves on board, 

 on which duty to the amount of 1400, and an import 

 tax of as much again was paid ; the cloves sold for from 

 5s. 6d. to 5s. 9d. a pound. 



The Dutch, however, maintained almost a complete 

 monopoly of the spice trade till the eighteenth century, 

 at the end of which time attempts were made to wrest 

 it from them. 



In 1770 M. Poivre, the governor of Mauritius and 

 Bourbon, succeeded in procuring some living plants, 

 both of nutmegs and cloves, and introduced these 

 successfully into the island under his control, for the 

 benefit of the French Government, and from these trees 

 plants were sent to Cayenne about 1789 and onwards. 

 William Urban Buee introduced them from Cayenne 

 into the West Indies in 1789, obtaining one plant that 

 year and fourteen more in 1791, and in 1793 managed 

 with much expense and trouble to secure two boxes of 

 seed ; for exportation from French territory of plants and 

 seed was forbidden. His first two trees fruited in 1795, 

 and the produce was decided to be fit for any culinary 

 purpose, and as good as any of the East Indian cloves. 



Buee published an excellent Narrative of the 

 Successful Manner of Cultivating the Clove Tree in 

 the Island of Dominica, in 1797. 



Plants were introduced also into Martinique about 

 this time, and it is recorded that 300 Ib. of cloves were 



