HISTORY ETHNOGRAPHY NATURE WINE-MAKING SITE MAP
Selected and rare materials, excerpts and observations from ancient, medieval and contemporary authors, travelers and researchers about Cyprus.
 
 
 
 
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SIR SAMUEL WHITE BAKER
CYPRUS AS I SAW IT IN 1879
page 454

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profits that may perhaps increase, such as the sponge Isheries, and a probable discovery of red coral by the employment of the helmet-diving apparatus. At present the condition of the sea-bottom is little known ; the sponges, of an inferior quality, are collected l y dredging, and the boats pay a fixed sum for a licence according to the size and construction of the dredging apparatus, varying from £ζ to £20 per annum ; this yields a small annual revenue of about ^1600 , which embraces the entire coast of Cyprus. By careful management the salt might exhibit an increase, but on the other hand, the wine, if relieved from the present extreme taxation, would for the first two or three years ensure a considerable reduction, if No increase of imports can be expected until the general advance of internal prosperity shall enable the population to extend their demand for foreign [manufactures. We have seen that the peasantry are (contented with the home-made cotton stuffs which (they produce without an expenditure of money ; and the habits of the agricultural classes are simple, and (independent of external aid. It will require many years before the customs of the Cypriotes shall be changed by the intercourse with strangers, and the increase of their wealth, commencing from the zero (of poverty, must be the base of future expectations. IWe generally remark in the advancing desires of communities that women exert a powerful influence iin the development of manufactures. The wholesome, and to a certain extent civilising, attention to personal appearance, creates a demand for articles of dress and other little vanities which encourage trade, and by degrees the improvement in every household expands into a new birth of external relations with foreign

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