18 CORAL AND ATOLLS 



process may be seen any day, and there is no reason to suppose 

 that any human agency was involved in the first planting of 

 the coconuts in Cocos-Keeling. 



In the staple industry of the island Hare also took his 

 share, but according to the island legends it was more for the 

 purpose of keeping his retinue employed than for any definite 

 commercial aim. It is said that when his men had prepared 

 a quantity of oil, Hare was in the habit of going by night and 

 removing the corks from the casks, that he might waste by 

 darkness what his men had prepared by day. In this way he 

 ensured a sufficiency of employment for the men of his party, 

 and so protected himself and his mimic court from interference 

 at the hands of idlers. 



The small faction over which Hare ruled were held by him 

 as slaves, for though he had been forced to take out certificates 

 of emancipation, the business had made no difference to the 

 status of his retainers. He so arranged it that the liberation 

 paper was served on board the Borneo at Fort Malboro in 

 1820, and it was he who gave an explanation of the contents 

 of the papers to the unknowing natives. Afterwards he made 

 them all sign documents declaring that they and their children 

 were his absolute property, and it was as his personal chattels 

 that they came to the islands. It was over the question of 

 slave workers or free colonists that Koss and Hare first fell to 

 quarrelling. It was the policy of the pioneer of the Ross 

 dynasty that all his people should be free men, " free," as he 

 said, "except to commit mischief"; and many are the pious 

 reflections in his journal concerning the slavery methods of 

 Hare. Naturally enough this state of affairs caused much ill- 

 feeling, and the quarrel was greatly aggravated by the very 

 natural desertion of many of Hare's people to the camp of 

 Ross Primus. It was the boast of the pioneer that none were 

 weaned away from the rival settlement, but that protection 

 was freely extended to those whom ill-treatment drove to seek 

 a refuge with him. 



As a matter of fact this neutral attitude did not last long — 

 at any rate on the part of the natives — for Hare's people 



