13,172. And the price of the meal is fixed at settlement?-Yes, or some time before it, in order that I may get the account extended and added up.
13,173. In what way is the price of the meal fixed for the year?-It is generally taken on an average. In 1870, for instance, which is the last year for which there has been a settlement, meal was pretty low in [Page 326] the spring, varying from 18s. to 19s. per boll, and it rose during the season until it was somewhere about £1, if not above it. These changes frequently take place in the markets; and in fixing the price for a particular year, we generally make an average of the prices from first to last. If we were not to do that, then it might chance that the poorest people might get the whole of their meal at the dearest price, or when the price of meal was highest; but the way in which we take it makes it more equal over all.
13,174. Do you take the average according to the whole quantity of meal which you have sold?-Yes. We add up the total amount of meal sold, and the prices per boll which the meal has cost. I don't do that, but I believe that is the way in which it is done. It is generally done by Mr. Bruce himself, but I have a general understanding about it. For instance, if 20 bolls cost a certain figure, and 30 bolls cost another figure, if we add the amounts together, and take the average of the whole, we know what to sell it for. That is the way in which I would do it, and I believe it is the way in which it is done.
13,175. You first strike the average of the wholesale price, and then you allow a certain amount of profit upon that?-Yes. We include the expense of bringing it here, and then we make an average price accordingly.
13,176. Do some of the fishermen who deal at your shop have pass-books?-Very few; but I think a great many of them keep accounts themselves. I never saw many men settling who did not know what quantity of meal they had had.
13,177. Have you sometimes objected to the trouble of keeping pass-books for the men?-I don't recollect doing that, but I might have said that it was vexatious. I think there were two or three cases in which I was anxious that the people should have pass-books, and I began them with them. They came with them for a certain time, but then they would come without the book, and that confused me altogether. However, I never was very much asked to keep pass-books for them, and the fact is that it would have been almost out of my power to have attended to them. I am frequently out of the shop, and there are days when the men are coming ashore in large numbers, on which we could scarcely have time to mark down the meal.
13,178. Have you a fixed day in the week for giving out meal?- We have had a fixed day for some years back. Formerly we had no particular day, but we could not get them to understand the quantity of meal that was to be disposed of; and as there are some people to whom we only allow a certain quantity of meal per week, we have found it better to fix a particular day on which they are to come for it. People who have credit, or who have money in Mr. Bruce's hands, can come any day and get what they please, so that there are scarcely any days in the week when some is not given out; but the bulk is given out on a particular day, generally on a Friday.
13,179. You said just now that certain people had to be restricted to a given quantity of meal: are these people who are in debt?- Yes, and people who have been in debt. If it had not been for that restriction, there are some people on the estate who were in debt not long ago, and who would still have been in debt.
13,180. I thought it was because they were in debt that you restricted them?-No; we restricted some because they might have got into debt. We just gave them an allowance sufficient to support them through the week; but if we had given them more, or given them what they wanted, they would have taken double the quantity. These, however, are only a few individuals; in general the people are much more careful.
13,181. When you put parties on an allowance in that way, are they generally people who have had a balance against them at settlement the year before?-Generally they are. Some of them may have been in debt £8 or £10, and some as high as £20, and it is these people we put on an allowance in order to try to keep them going.