Interesting about sugar. It was very rare before the sixteenth century, but wherever colonists went to settle in the tropics, be it Brazil, Phillipines, Carribean, Northern Australia, about the first thing they got going was a sugar cane industry, nearly always hand-in-hand with slavery. All to satisfy a wierd craving for sugar! Last year I went on a guided tour of a sugar mill in North Queensland at Bowen, and the technology that goes into producing the white-and-deadly is mind - boggling.

We actually had slavery here in Australia; ships would go to Pacific Islands and virtually kidnap whole villages and bring them back to Australia, enticing them with very low wages. The trade was called "blackbirding" and their descendents, the "Kanakas" are still here as a distinct community, somewhat like the Cajun people of America.

All to get a plentiful source of sugar... strange world, hey!

Michael Gardner
Australia