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at 69 million pounds sterling, and the British | share af 43 million pounds sterling, a stake sufficiently large to make it worth our while to | look after, and this is nothing to what we may have under a process of prudent development, for we have as yet only reached the outer circle of China's millions of people. It may be of interest to compare the foreign trade of China in 1898 which was equal to about 2s. 104d. per head of her population and the for eign trade of Japan in 1897, which was about 18s. 4d. per head. Now if this 188. 4d. rate is ever reached by China the foreign trade of that country would be something like £345,000,000 sterling and if we maintain our present proportion of China's trade we stand to be great gainers. We have a long lead over other nations which it behoves us to keep. It may be well to note the fact that of all the coast ports, Newchwang is the most important for British trade, after Shanghai. The totul value of the trade of Nowchwang for 1899 was about seven millions sterling and Customs re- rénues about £1,350,000, of which 40 per cent. was paid by British merchants, Russia paid about 1 per cent., China 9 per cent., Japan 25 per cent., America and Gormany 13 per cent., Norway and Denmark 8 per cent. Russia will of course try to divert this trade and will place all possible fiscal difficulties in the way of other Powers if allowed. She is in full charge.
THE NEEDS OF THE NAVY, The lecturer dealt with this part of his lecture at considerable length. He said that as a phase of Home politics, promises of Army reform were scattered broadcast by candidates for seats in Parliament, during the election campaign just over, and without doubt, Army reform had been conclusively proved to be urgently required; but we had not heard a single word about the Navy! Could it be that the glamour of Ladysmith and South Africa generally have blinded the eyes of our people to the needs of the Navy, which after all, was the first and most important thing to be sure about; for if the Navy was kept up to the mark, none of our possessions could be Lady- smithed. Armies were defeated, and reassem- bled to fight again another day, but for a beaten Fleet, there was no such a thing possible under modern conditions. Were our Fleet defeated and disabled no
invasion of the United
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[February 16, 1901 but | to have declarations from our leading statesmen and the Transvaal is to be made to contribute that the wealth of the Orange River Colony
provoked, to the cost of the war which they so wantonly
THE HONGKONG WEEKLY PRESS AND
private firms for the Japanese Government, l Admiralty are prevented from knowing what our system is such that our best men at the they really do want, so that contractors are humbugged and money wasted over alterations to vessels building and the excuse given is "the progress of invention"! This is one of the principal causes of delay in the completion of many of our great building yards fight shy of our warships, and one of the reasons why Government work.
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ANOTHER NEED OF THE NAVY.
have to be attended to if we are to hold our There is another need of the Navy which will
that is that the machinery in our Royal Dock- own in the race of the nations for son power, yards is like the Warrior and her sister ships, of naval strength necessary to insure victory us
In taking into consideration the proportion; old and obsolete, and must be renewed. Per. against any of our possible antagonists there chen's failure to get ships built quickly enough, haps in this lie some of the causes of Mr. Gos ara many things to think of besides the actual it certainly was not the fault of private ship. count of battleships on the scale of the three builders, who to live at all must keep their yards Admirals' report." now generally accepted as the standard at which wo must aim, and the Tho French Admiralty have recently succeeded up to date, or s.o their business go to others. first thing to insist upon is that in counting in getting large sums voted to replace the ob battleships, the Admiralty strike off the list all solete machinery in their Dockyards and we must antiquated, inefficient or obsolete vessels having follow suit. The Admiralty should strike while muzzle-loading guns and low speed, and include the iron is hot, and while they are about it, only such modern ships as are fit to take their they should put the engineers of the Navy on a place, to the satisfaction of our fighting Ad- footing story to themselves and the | mirals, in the line of battle.
ing off the Warrior and two or three similar compulsion is not dignified, and unredressed It is no use strik-country. Doling ent concessions piecemoal under old crocks under pressure of a little popular ex-griorances impairs efficiency all round. The citement and adding them on again when it engineers .. has blown oror, thus deluding the people into do without them, so they must be considered cessary and we cannot possibly the belief that there are a certaiz number of and made contented. This rough and ready 1st class battleships ready for sea.
way of putting the case may not commend itself to "My Lords," but if they do not act, We now come to consider the matter of crui- depend upon it the powerful engineer class sers of which we are told on very high authority in the country will take it out of the that we are about 100 short should a European Government at the polls, sooner agaiu fired broadsides of double-shotted guns at just over can only be set down to their patriot. war break out. The Navy League has time and That they have not done it at the election ⚫ later.
authority on this extremely urgent need of theism, and therefore to their credit. It is to be Navy, happily with some effect, for we hear of hoped that the time is drawing nearer- when more cruisers being laid down with despatch, the Empire will be provided with machinery and the League will doubtless get ready to use for the supreme administrative control over in mind that our count of cruisers required is the ram if the necessity arises. It must be kept all resources under its flag, and that a world state like ours should be so wholly bdependent settled by the trade and extent of trade routes on a single island for the production and supply which our cruisers will have to protect in war time, besides leaving a sufficient number for
of all things required for its security in war is our admirals in command, as the eyes of their of our statesmen, for it is a most serious dis- a matter that must soon engage the attention fleets. gates" should be engraved on the walls of the
Nelson's pathetic cry for "more fri advantage to us as an Empire. Admiralty and never lost sight of. There is a endency to think that our supply of cruisers hould be governed by the number persured by
THE MATTER OF BUSINESS.
Kingdom would be necessary, for all the vic-other Powers, this though true as regards battle- torious Powers would have to do would be to cut off the food supplies which were incessantly pouring into our ports. The end would then be a matter of weeks, or perhaps days, according to our supplies in hand at the time.
OUR STRENGTH IN BATTLESHIPS,
With regard to our strength in battleships it must be impressed on the people that the stan- dard laid down by the three Admirals known as the five to three, and still considered necessary by our fighting Admirals has not been maintain- ed! In the Far East Germany has four battle- ships to our three. France and Russia 'com. bined will shortly be in the same position of superiority, and this though Great Britain and her colonies possesses 70 per cant. of the trade of China. Now our naval force cannot be con- sidered sufficient with our strongest foreign squadron left inferior in numbers to possible antagonists. Of course we all hope that it will never.come to war between our good friends the Germans and ourselves, or with France or Russia, but it is no good blinking the fact that Empires are ruled by self interest, not by senti- ment; for there is always a possibility of com- plications, and it is our duty as Britons. who love our own country better than any other, to be always ready for any more the continental chess board. How many people are aware that during the years 1897, '98, and 99 the House of Commons voted for new struction the sum of £23,733.221 sterling, of which sum only £19,113,222 sterling was spent, leaving a sum of no less than £4,621,940 ster- ling which was not spent, the excuse boing "that shipbuilders were unable to build fast enough." Now this has been categorically denied by shipbuilders, and every one who is acquainted with modern shipbuilding develop. ments in the United Kingdom can testify that foreign Governments were able to get their orders executed up to time complete in every detail! It really is only a question of paying liberally for what you want, and builders will get it done. Witness the splendid battleships turned out by
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con-
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is also a tendency on the part of our politicians ships is not so with regard to cruisers. There to think that all auxiliary vessels required for a modern fleet can be improvised from our Mer cantile Marine, seeing we did so well in trans- porting our 200,000 fighting men to South Africa without a serious hitch, more than the loss of a few horses, which was due to the people who had made the traffic a Lusiness for Admiralty thinking they knew better than
British mistáko which apparently no experience years with great success. That is a particularly
every war we engage in, can get over, and occurs with variations in
THE ADMIRALTY AND TORPEDO-ROAT DESTROYERS.
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The policy of our Admiralty in stopping the construction of torpedo-boat destroyers, because there are big improvements in the air in the matter of turbine propellers, reminds one of the story of the man who drained the water off his fish pond because it was going to rain and he wanted clean water; he got it after a time, but in the interval the poor fish all died. For them any kind of water would have been better than none, so with us and the t. b. destroyers, we know our men are ready to go to sea in washing tubs if need be and they have proved their grit in West Africa, South Africa, and elsewhere quite recently, and as fighting men they cannot be sur them with the best procurable appliances, over a passed, are we then to refrain from providing question of potty economy, or because some one has invented something that may or may not in time cause a revolution in existing practise? There can be no doubt as to the answer the country will give to such a question, for the people have the widows and the orphans of those who have fallen among them, and the Reaper has not spared the honsehold of our late Queen, her nobles, or her subjects who live in cottages | and work for daily wage. Increased taxation is a bard matter for the people, but ékistence with taxation is better than to endure a ruinous defeat; and talking of taxation it is satisfactory
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On the motion of Mr. SHARP, a hearty vote of thanks was accorded Captain Anderson-for his lecture.
HONG KONG SUGAR.
THE EXPORT TRADE TO JAPAN.
In the course of a very long and important report on the trade of Nagasaki for 1899 Mr. Consul Longford makes some valuable statements on the Hongkong sugar trade with Japan. Tho following extracts give the gist of his remarks:-
British interests as represented in the colony of "The trade in sugar in of great importance to
item among all the imports to Japan from that Hongkong, forming as it does by far the largest colony and contributing about 95 per cent. to their total value.
IMPORTANCE OF THE TRADE TO HONGKONG.
Formerly the Japanese preferred and indeed used solely unrefined sugar, but their taste has gradually changed and the use of that of higher grade is now universal throughout the Empire. Its import has been a most valuable item in the trade with Hongkong, but its continuation is now very seriously threatened, and as the 'sub- ject is one of important interest to that colony it may not be amiss to refer to it at some length, not from the narrow point of view of the com- paratively small imports into the ports com prised within the Consular district of Nagasaki, but from the wider one of the entire import into Japan. The compiler of the present report, when writing on the foreign trade of all Japan in the year 1894, referred to this import also at some length, pointing out that the establishment of sugar refineries in Japan was then in contem- plation, that circumstances promised to be ex- coodingly favourable to their success, and that disappearance of Hongkong's trade with Japan their result might easily be to cause the entire in this staple, perhaps even to create a formid. able competitor in the markets of China. Since then the competition that was threatened has become an actual fact.
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ELEMEN.8 IN FAVOUR OF HONGKONG REFINERIES.
imported, but its import is untaxed and freights At Hongkong all raw material has to be
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