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September 12, 1895.]
CHINA OVERLAND TRADE REPORT.
Subsequent events have shown, however, numbers of native regiments under arms, or | India may be expected to again set f
con-
So
also will it be in China, where the trade in foreign goods will suffer no more from native competition than it has in India.
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at any rate in uniforms, had something to do with it. Then again, he says, grey shirt- ings are used for bags in which tea is brought from the plantations to the market In its report of the opening of the in Twatutia, and the demand on this account Changkee mills at Shanghai the other must now be large. The reference to day the Mercury said: "These" (the Japanese cloths is as follows:-"Japanese operatives) " receiving the enhanced wages "cotton clothes of all kinds have once necessarily given to skilled workers more made an enormous stride forwards."will acquire consequent greater wants "Their total value in 1893 was £5,202 "that always follow greater wages, and by contact and example the social_raising of the people will surely follow in the wake "greater demand for a certain class of "luxuries which the country cannot yet supply, and the ultimate result must be "the increase of commerce and the solidify- ing of trade between East and West. As "a cotton spinner very tersely explained "it, Here in China we will spin say from "6 counts to 16, which will be sent into the "'interior. Our people will earn more
for 74,520 pieces; last year it was **
£7,855 for 125,597 pieces, an augmen-
"of 75 per cent." Goods of that quality, however, of a value of Is. 3d, a piece, can hardly enter into competition with English goods, selling at 6s. a piece and upwards; they must be totally different lines. Eng- lish goods, however, have been handicapped by the fall in exchange, while Japanese goods have been proportiouately favoured. Mr. HOPKINS gives a table showing the comparative retail prices at Tamsui of a few typical foreign articles in the month of March during the years 1893-95, from which it appears that grey shirtings rose from $2.20 per piece in 1892 to $3.10 per piece in 1894 and 1895 and white shirtings from $3.10 to $4.80, while Japanese cotton crape, which sold at $1 in 1893 was 86 cents in 1894 and 87 cents in 1895. Thus while the local retail prices of grey and white shirtings had increased 40 and 35 per cent. respectively, that of Japanese crape had decreased 14 per cent.
money, which will enable them to buy from “'16 to 30s spun in India and other places. "The operatives there will be enabled to buy
that the Government, weak as it is to oppose a foreign invasion, is strong enough to grapple with any nascent rebellion and much more so with these secret societies, which appear to consist very largely of
retired expectant and
officials, and who are violently anti-foreign. The in- quiry at Kucheng has, too, most vincingly demonstrated the inability of the so-called "Vegetarians" to offer any oppo- sition to the local Government, and the plea of the Viceroy that he was unable to control the society is shown to have been utterlytation in quantity on the single year" of the new business. This will produce a false. Indeed, nothing has been more clearly established than the unwillingness of the Fukien authorities, including the Viceroy, to protect the lives of the mis- sionaries, and nothing can be more certain morally than that the Kucheng massacre was perpetrated, if not at the suggestion then by the connivance of the authorities. We trust that Lord SALISBURY will not rest satisfied with the heads of a few coolies, whose slaughter on a scale of compensation to relatives was no doubt arranged for before permission was given to the Consuls to be present at the inquiry. Nor have we much faith in the deterrent effect of a pecuniary indemnity, even when placed at the figure suggested by the Saturday Review of £100,000, and with the stipulation that part of it should come from the pockets of
officials Something more than this is needed the highest official in the pro- vince should be held personally respon- sible, and, as we can have no faith in Chinese justice, we should insist upon that official being sent to British territory as prisoner, as Commissioner YEH was sent to Calcutta. We ought also to insist upon the provinces or at least the districts where such outrages take place being opened up per- manently to foreign trade and residence, so far at least as is practicable, with a plain intimation that any repetition of such outrages would entail occupation by foreign troops. As we have noted above, Sir NICHOLAS O'CONOR has, or ought to have, the ball at his feet. It is for England to dictate the terms: the Chinese Government must submit to her dictation.
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PROSPECTS OF THE PIECE GOODS TRADE IN CHINA.
a
counts ranging from 80 to 250s spun in England; and in this way each will do "that for which he is best adopted and "trade will be consequently benefited.'
"Mr. TRATMAN, referring to the manufactures of the Hupeh cotton mill at Wuchang says:- "These goods have had a fair trial through
" a
Turning to Mr. TRATMAN's report on the trade of Chungking we find that the import of cotton and woollen goods, with few exceptions, shows a heavy decline, as it did also the previous year.
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"This
steady falling off" Mr. TRATMAN says, "is much to be regretted, but it is accounted "for in the now familiar way-fall in ex- "change. That the desire to purchase this "class of goods exists is shown by the fact "that the import in 1894 of the cheap cotton "cloth known as 'Italians' was more than 'double that of 1893. A large lot of these 'Italians,' sold cheap in Shanghai on under- "writers' account, found their way here, and were quickly disposed of at the low rate "which the importers were enabled to put 家属 on them. The prices of other cottons and "woollens were on an average 90 per cent, "higher than in 1891. As long as this state "of things continues no expansion of In his report on the trade of Tamsui and this branch of trade can be hoped for." Kelung for the year 1894, Mr. L. C. HOP- With the last remark we do not agree. In KINS, the Acting Consul, remarks on an in- the face of a falling exchange trade has crease in the trade in cotton goods, rather a necessarily suffered, but now that exchange cheerful topic in these days, when on almost bids fair to remain fairly steady, with pos- every hand we hear of decreases, while sibly a slight upward tendency, a consider- pessimists foretell the speedy extinction of able improvement in the import trade may, the import of British cotton goods in the Far we think, be looked for. Trade, in fact, East. At Tamsui the average import of grey will adjust itself to any rate of exchange, if and white shirtings taken together during the the rate remains steady, but it cannot adjust decade 1884-93 was 90,000 pieces, in 1893 itself to violent fluctuations. The establish- it was 80,000 pieces, and last year 114,000 ment of cotton factories in China may be taken pieces. These figures, Mr. HOPKINS says, as a sign of the development of the country, are satisfactory and in some degree surpris and the more the country is developed ing,
"for the growth has occurred in the the greater will be the volume of its face of an unprecedented fall during the foreign trade. The cotton industry was year of 9d, in the gold value of the tael, started in India forty years "which one would suppose ought to have and has steadily advanced during that greatly checked the demand. But more period, but it has been accompanied also "than that, it has taken place along with, with a remarkable advance in the import of "and in spite of, a very large increase in cotton goods from England. In 1870 the "the imports of Japanese cloths." Un-import amounted to Rx 16,271,216 and in doubtedly, Mr. HOPKINS continues, the 1893 to Rx 25,658 965. It is true that Chinese in the island have prospered and since 1891 there has been a decline, made money for the last few years, probably the population is steadily increasing also, but he scarcely thinks this is a sufficient explanation of the increase, and he suggests that perhaps the presence of considerable
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due to exchange difficulties and also to the commercial depression which has prevailed all over the world, but with a steady ex- change and returning prosperity an upward movement in the import of cotton goods in
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out these provinces during the past few years, but they are not appreciated to any- "thing like the same extent as similar goods of foreign manufacture. The yarn is short and difficult to work with the primitive 'appliances in use here. The shirtings have not the same toughness as even the most common kinds of English goods, and they tear very easily. This inferiority of the "Hupeh goods is not, I am told to be in any way attributed to the manufacture, "but simply to the fact that the cotton used is "much below the standard of Indian cotton." The competition of the native goods is a factor British merchants and manufacturers have to reckon with, and readjustments as regards the class of goods sent out and the terms on which business is transacted may be neces sary, but, with a reasonably steady exchange, we see no reason to anticipate anything but an increase in the general volume of trade between England and China, both in im- ports and exports.
THE NEW PUBLIC OFFICES AND COMPETITIVE DESIGNS.
invite com-
At the meeting of the Legislative Council held on the 16th August the Hon. E. R. BELILIOS asked if it was the intention of the Government to petitive designs from local architects for the proposed new Government Offices, or if the Government proposed that the designs should be prepared and the work carried out by the Public Works Depart- ment. The Colonial Secretary replied that the answer to the former part of the ques- tion was no, and to the latter part yes. We hope that at the next meeting of Coun- cil Mr. BELILIOS and his unofficial col- leagues will carry the matter a step further and bring forward a formal resolution that in the opinion of the Council it is desirable that competitive designs should be invited. The public interest must be set before official susceptibilities. We fail to see, how- ever, why official susceptibilities should be in any way hurt in the matter. It is the public usual course in England, when a building has to be erected, to invite com petitive designs, and to the adoption of that
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