CHAPTER XXXII 
TRADE AND BARTER 
No interest in the accumulation of property (816). 
Value of article dependent upon its want, not its worth (S17). 
Ignorance of presents (818); no medium of exchange and consequently often 
no business done (819). 
Trust and credit (820). 
Trade may be direct, indirect, or through agencies (821). 
Advertising, ‘“ shouting,” ete. (822). 
Trading expeditions and trade routes (828). 
Each nation usually has its own home products (824-828). 
Note on the Dutch-Indian trade (829). 
816. In his description of the Arawak on the Berbice, Pinckard 
states what is equally applicable to the Guiana Indians in general: 
They have no interest in the accumulation of property, and therefore 
do not labor to obtain wealth. They live under the most perfect 
equality, and hence are not impelled to industry by that spirit of 
emulation which, in society, leads to great and unwearied exertion. 
Content with their simple means, they evince no desire to emulate the 
habits or the occupations of the colonists; but, on the contrary, seem 
to regard their toils and customs with a sense of pity or contempt 
(Pnk, 1, 519). But this perfect equality does not necessarily imply 
a state of socialism; far from it. They have not a community of 
goods, individual property being distinctly marked between them. 
But this property is so simple and so easily acquired that they are 
perpetually borrowing and lending without the least care about pay- 
ment (HiC, 231). 
817. In trade and barter the value of an article to an Indian de- 
pends upon his temporary want of it and not upon its intrinsic worth 
(SR, m, 393). Thus, the Santo Domingo natives bartered their 
gold .. . for tags, nails, broken pieces of darning needles, beads, 
pins, laces, and broken saucers and dishes (DAC, 452). An Indian 
at one time shall require an ax, in exchange for that for which at 
another he will demand only a fishhook, without regarding any dis- 
proportion between their value (BA, 335). For what one Indian 
| Warrau] would want a gun or an ax, another, for the same thing. 
would want a couple of fishhooks, some beads, or a comb (SR, 1, 
175). One Makusi woman offered me a cow for two “flash ” finger 
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