e. If they stay in any
place longer than a night, every one follows his proper occupation, and
is very well used by those of his own trade; but if any man goes out of
the city to which he belongs without leave, and is found rambling without
a passport, he is severely treated, he is punished as a fugitive, and
sent home disgracefully; and, if he falls again into the like fault, is
condemned to slavery. If any man has a mind to travel only over the
precinct of his own city, he may freely do it, with his father's
permission and his wife's consent; but when he comes into any of the
country houses, if he expects to be entertained by them, he must labour
with them and conform to their rules; and if he does this, he may freely
go over the whole precinct, being then as useful to the city to which he
belongs as if he were still within it. Thus you see that there are no
idle persons among them, nor pretences of excusing any from labour. There
are no taverns, no ale-houses, nor stews among them, nor any other
occasions of corrupting each other, of getting into corners, or forming
themselves into parties; all men live in full view, so that all are
obliged both to perform their ordinary task and to employ themselves well
in their spare hours; and it is certain that a people thus ordered must
live in great abundance of all things, and these being equally
distributed among them, no man can want or be obliged to beg.

"In their great council at Amaurot, to which there are three sent from
every town once a year, they examine what towns abound in provisions and
what are under any scarcity, that so the one may be furnished from the
other; and this is done freely, without any sort of exchange; for,
according to their plenty or scarcity, they supply or are supplied from
one another, so that indeed the whole island is, as it were, one family.
When they have thus taken care of their whole country, and laid up stores
for two years (which they do to prevent the ill consequences of an
unfavourable season), they order an exportation of the overplus, both of
corn, honey, wool, flax, wood, wax, tallow, leather, and cattle, which
they send out, commonly in great quantities, to other nations. They
order a seventh part of all these goods to be freely given to the poor of
the countries to which they send them, and sell the rest at moderate
rates; and by this exchange they not only bring back those few things
that they need at home (for, indeed, the