My writing ragans were very fond of their knowledge of letters; and trade and commerce now increasing, which put every one more or less in want of the same knowledge, they made a great profit of it, by instructing all who applied to them. This increase of writing necessarily provided a maintenance for several persons who travelled to Norbon for quills, and sold them to the Swangeantines at extravagant rates; till the Norbonese hearing that, brought them themselves to the foot of the mountain, where the Swangeantines bought them, as they did several other commodities which one country had and the other wanted, especially iron wares of almost every denomination: so that the mountain, being so excessively high, was the barrier; for the Norbonese finding that difficulty in ascending and descending which the Swangeantines with their graundees did not, there was a constant market of buyers and sellers on the Mount Alkoe side of the Black Mountain, which by degrees grew the general mart of the three kingdoms.
I have often reflected with myself, and have been amazed to think, that so ingenious and industrious a people as the Swangeantines have since appeared to be, and who, till I came amongst them, had nothing more than bare food, and a hole to lie in, in a barren rocky country, and then seemed to desire only what they had, should in ten years' time be supplied not only with the conveniences, but superfluities of life; and that they should then become so fond of them, as rather willingly to part with life itself than be reduced to the state I found them in. And I have as often, on this occasion, reflected on the goodness of Providence, in rendering one part of mankind easy under the absence of such comforts as others could not rest without; and have made it a great argument for my assent to well-attested truths above my comprehension. "For," says I, "to have affirmed, at my first coming, either that these things could have been made at all, or when done could have been of any additional benefit to these people, would have been so far beyond their imaginations, that the reporter of so plain a truth, as they now find it, would have been looked upon as a madman or an impostor; but by opening their views by little and little, and showing them the dependence of one thing upon another, he that should now affirm the inutility of them, would be observed in a much worse light." And yet, without any embellishments of art, how did this so great a people live under the protection of Providence? Let us first view them at a vast distance from any sort of sustenance, yet from the help of the graundee that distance was but a step to them. They were forced to inhabit the rocks, from an utter incapacity of providing shelter elsewhere, having no tool that would either cut down timber for a habitation, or dig up the earth for a fence, or materials to make one; but they had a liquor that would dissolve the rock itself into habitations. They had neither beast nor fish, for food or burthen; but they had fruits equivalent to both, of the same relish, and as wholesome, without shedding blood. Their fruits were dangerous till they had fermented in a boiling heat; and they had neither the sun, nor any fire, nor the knowledge how to propagate or continue it. But they had their hot springs always boiling, without their care or concern. They had neither the skins of beasts, the original clothing, nor any other artificial covering from the weather; but they were born with that warm clothing the graundee, which being of a considerable density, and full of veins flowing with warm blood, not only defended their flesh from all outward injuries, but was a most soft, comely, and warm dress to the body. They lived mostly in the dark rock, having less difference of light with the change of seasons than other people have; but either by custom or make, more light than what Providence has sent them in the sweecoe is disagreeable: so that where little is to be obtained, Providence, by confining the capacity, can give content with that; and where apparent wants are, we may see, by these people, how careful Providence is to supply them; for neither the graundee, the sweecoes, nor their springs, are to be found where those necessaries can be supplied by other means.
Amongst my other considerations, I have often thought that if I had gone to the top of the Black Mountains northward of Brandleguarp, in the very lightest time, I might have seen the sun; but these mountains were so elevated, that our lightest time was only the gilded glimmering of their tops, having never seen so much light on them as totally to eclipse all the stars, of which we had always the same in view, but in different positions.
CHAPTER XXV.
Peter's children provided for—Youwarkee's death—How the king and queen spent their time—Peter grows melancholy—Wants to get to England—Contrives means—Is taken up at sea.