But the new system did not work smoothly. There was no harmony of sentiment between buyers and sellers; and what was one man's ideal of what he should give or receive in trade was always different from every other man's; and, before the community were well aware of what they were about, they found themselves drifting back to the adoption of the old system of barter, which had been tried and abandoned in the early days of the island's history. Instead of one price, every one who had commodities or services to sell adopted a scale of at least four prices: "pay price," "money price," "pay as money price," and a "trusting price;" and the seller, before fixing his price, invariably asked his customer how he would pay. [30] "Pay price" was barter; "money price" was payment in foreign coin; "pay as money" was in the ideal money of the island; "trusting" was an enhanced price, according to time. Thus, supposing a customer wanted a knife, its price in "pay" would be a bushel of corn; in "money price," a fifty-cent gold or silver coin; in "pay as money," sometimes as much as he could bring in a basket, at other times as much as he could bring in a wheelbarrow; and before the ultimate abandonment of the use of ideal money, a cart had to be employed to bring the money. Trade in this way became "most intricate." News also came, about this time, that the heathen, not being able to stay their stomachs with the pictures of fat cattle that had been so abundantly sent them, and considering themselves humbugged, were preparing to declare war. To meet a threatened increased expenditure on this account, the Government, therefore, levied new taxes; and as the valuation of the property of the island, under the influence of the new fiscal system, had, as before stated, enormously increased, it was anticipated that a small rate would yield a large revenue. But as soon as Scrapehem, Double, and their friends, who had been multiplying their property by multiplying titles, found out that the titles were to be valued and assessed as wealth, equally with the property which the titles represented, they hasted to swap back, and cancel their mortgages; and immediately half the reputed wealth of the island disappeared. There were some people, it will be remembered, who did not share in the general jubilation which welcomed the discovery and adoption of the new monetary system. These were the stony-hearted capitalists, meaning thereby persons who had produced by industry and frugality more than they had consumed, and had lent out this surplus in the form of ships, houses, horses and carts, wheelbarrows, coal, iron, and the like, on condition that they should be repaid the value of the several articles as expressed in money, with a portion of the profit that might have accrued to the borrower from their using.