(^426) THE WEALTH AND POVERTY OF NATIONS
The Dutch and English sought trade, although commerce often led
to intervention in local quarrels and land takings. Government and se
curity cost money, for men of war and men at arms. But territory could
be turned into privilege and monopoly, and the costs of governance
could be shifted to both the home country and the subject population.
Besides, the proconsuls in the field had their own agenda; the Spanish
were not the only conquistadores.
Once installed, Dutch and British aimed at managed cultivation,
going well beyond what nature provided. Empire is a story of botani
cal enterprise, moving crops to soils and climes of opportunity: sugar
starting in the Indian Ocean and working round the globe to the
Caribbean islands; tea transplanted from China to India and Ceylon
(India tea vs. China tea); rubber seeds smuggled from Brazil and
planted in Malaya; cinchona (source of quinine) from South America
to St. Helena to Java; oleaginous plants from the New World to West
Africa; coffee here, cocoa there. Here the Royal Botanic Gardens at
Kew on the banks of the Thames, a princess's hobby to start with,
played a leading role—a model of science and commerce conjoined. All
of this was more profitable and durable than pillage or extraction,
though obviously no one objected to treasure trove—over the cen
turies, diamonds in India and South Africa, gold in Australia and Africa,
oil in Burma and the East Indies.
Private and special interests got in the way of rational, prudent in
tentions. The merchants themselves sought trade, not territory as such.
They would have done business with the devil if it meant profits. But
they did not want to be robbed or bullied by native dealers or officials,
who saw all traders as potential prey. So when Europeans ran into trou
ble, they called on their home governments for help.
Governments typically pitched in. To be sure, their starchy, largely
incompetent representatives, selected more for family and political con
nections than for merit, adored form and protocol.* (The biographies
of these stuffed shirts make one wonder how the British ever built and
held an empire. But a few exceptional individuals could make up for a
horde of placemen, the more so as genteel favorites were only too
happy to leave the work to their subordinates.) These wellborn officials
- Here is Sir George Robinson, Superintendant of British traders at Canton, grovel
ing before Lord Palmerston in London: "I trust it is not necessary for me to add any
thing like an assurance of the most profound deference and respect with which I shall
implicitly obey and execute the very spirit of such instructions as I may have the
honour to receive, on this or any other point. Strict undeviating obedience to the or
ders and directions of which I may be in possession ... is the foundation on which I