Taxes — Monopolies — Poverty 



of land and done some building, threw up the 

 business and claimed ^^500,000 damages. It 

 was asserted that over ;^2 00,000 had already- 

 been spent. The matter is still unsettled. It 

 may be that the Portuguese Government will 

 have to pay /!i2 00,000 or more, and take over 

 the lands and buildings ; for which it would be 

 unlikely to find a profitable use at one-quarter 

 of the cost. But the lesson is worth something. 



It is rather gratifying to the Englishman, 

 before whom the bugbear of German competi- 

 tion, of German commercial wisdom and success, 

 has been brandished for years, to discover that 

 even the German " sometimes nods." The 

 possession of a few unused, and presumably 

 useless, buildings, and a shadowy claim against 

 a Government which is itself in financial diffi- 

 culties, do not seem a very brilliant result for 

 years of work, of diplomatic pressure and political 

 intrigue, coupled with the expenditure, one way 

 and another, of nearly a quarter of a million 

 sterling. 



I will conclude this chapter with a quotation 

 from the " First Voyage " of Captain Cook : 

 " Nature has been very bountiful in her gifts 

 to Madeira. The soil is so rich, and there 



163 



