in succession, he did pretty well, and might make money if he was careful. His wheat paid his rent and found his family in bread, his barley and his hay kept his team of horses in good condition; so that after he had ploughed and sown his own few fields he was able to spend, perhaps six or seven months of the year, in carting sandalwood for the merchants at Perth at a very fair rate of payment.
As long as the seasons were favourable to him such a settler might go on comfortably and prosperously, and pay his rent without much difficulty. But his position was always a very precarious one. If even but one or two bad harvests happened to come together his ruin became almost certain, because he had nothing to fall back upon, no sheep, no cattle, nothing but his few fields and his team of horses and cart. This has been one of the evils of the sandalwood trade. It has tempted men to look upon the possession of a wagon and three or four horses as a certain means of making money quickly; the land has been cared for only for the sake of providing food for the team, it has therefore been only half attended to and half cultivated; no stock (except a few pigs) has been kept because the man himself has been obliged to spend the greatest part of his time upon the road to and from Perth carrying the sandalwood; in short he has been a carrier much more than a farmer.
It is easily seen that even one bad season must bring such a class of men into trouble, because in that case everything upon which they depend gives way together. Their wheat fails and with it their power to pay the rent the barley and hay crops are deficient also, and thus the power of feeding the horses, and keeping them in condition for the heavy labour of the sandalwood trade, goes
