Letters of Aristodemus and Sincerus. 233 



(from want of funds) reduced the estimated cost of 

 almost everything. As an example, the Fiscal was to 

 have a salary of y"i,ooo, but the Council of Ten only 

 allowed ./450. "Nobody of importance would accept 

 such a low salary, as the meanest white received /300 

 to /400, together with a free house, food,, and washing. 

 To show the cheese-paring policy of the Ten , the 

 yearly expenditure was estimated at fully /25o,ooo, which 

 a later concept-plan reduced to /187,55c; butthe members 

 of the last meeting of the Ten had found ways and 

 meansto reduce the whole annual expenditure to f\ 16,800. 



By the new regulations no produce was to be shipped 

 without previous notification to the secretary of the 

 quality and quantity, on pain of forfeiture to the Com- 

 pany. The reason for this law was supposed to be that 

 nothing should be sent away from mortgaged estates, 

 except to the persons entitled. 1 his was considered as 

 very oppressive to the estates which were unincumbered, 

 and especially to those at a distance, such as at Mahaica. 



Another law which gave great offence was, that one 

 white man was to be employed to every fifty slaves. 

 This law they said was useless, as it would be better to 

 increase the garrison, which could be maintained at a 

 lower figure. The planters were given two years to 

 comply, but it was considered doubtful if they would 

 ever succeed in getting such a number of whites as 

 would be required. Even if the law was carried 

 out, nothing could be more dangerous to the peace, as 

 each white man from his higher rank became very 

 assuming, and was unwilling to be under subordination, so 

 that when several white servants were employed together 

 each wanted to be master, and daily quarrels took place, 



GG 



