They would begin to save money, and property being rendered secure they would rapidly acquire new wants and new tastes, and become large consumers of European goods.

This would be a far surer source of profit to their rulers than imposts and extortion, and would be at the same time more likely to produce peace and obedience than the mock-military rule which has hitherto proved most ineffective.
To inaugurate such a system would however require an immediate outlay of capital, which neither Dutch nor Portuguese seem inclined to make, and a number of honest and energetic officials, which the latter nation at least seems unable to produce; so that it is much to be feared that Timor will for many years to come remain in its present state of chronic insurrection and misgovernment.
Morality at Delli is at as low an ebb as in the far interior of Brazil, and crimes are connived at which would entail infamy and criminal prosecution in Europe.

While I was there it was generally asserted and believed in the place, that two officers had poisoned the husbands of women with whom they were carrying on intrigues, and with whom they immediately cohabited on the death of their rivals.

Yet no one ever thought for a moment of showing disapprobation of the crime, or even of considering it a crime at all, the husbands in question being low half-castes, who of course ought to make way for the pleasures of their superiors.
Judging from what I saw myself and by the descriptions of Mr.Geach, the indigenous vegetation of Timor is poor and monotonous.

The lower ranges of the hills are everywhere covered with scrubby Eucalypti, which only occasionally grow into lofty forest trees.