Athens, on the other hand, was so situated as to become a place of industry and commerce; and from about the time of her great land-crisis, solved by Solon, her industrial and commercial interests determined her economic development. It follows from the success of Peisistratos that the mass of the people, blind to the importance of the political rights conferred upon them, were conscious of no such betterment from Solon's "shaking-off-of-burdens" as could make them averse to the rule of a "tyrant" who even laid upon them a new tax. The solution may perhaps lie in points of fiscal policy to which we have now no clear clue. Of Solon it is recorded[235] that he made a law against the export of any food produce of Attica save oil--the yield of the olive. This implied that of that product only was there in his opinion a redundancy; and we have it from the same source that he "saw that the soil was so poor that it could only suffice for the farmers," and so "gave great honour to trade," and "made a law that a son was not obliged to support his father if his father had not taught him a trade."[236] Himself a travelled merchant, he further recognised that "merchants are unwilling to despatch cargoes to a country which has nothing to export"; and we are led to infer that he encouraged on the one hand the export of manufactures, _plus_ oil, and on the other the importation of corn and other food. In point of fact, grain was already being imported in increasing quantity from the recently colonised lands of Sicily and the Crimea;[237] and if the imports were free or lightly taxed the inland cultivators would have a local grievance in the depression of the prices of their produce.