COMMERCIAL RESOURCES OF CHINA.

THE first English ships reached China in the year 1634; and at length, in 1834, the trade will be thrown open. The commerce of the most numerous, the most industrious, and the richest people of Asia, will therefore have been bound in the fetters of Monopoly for exactly two centuries, in so far as England is concerned. How singular, that the greatest commercial nation in the world, and the nation which after all best understands the true principles of commercial policy, should be the last to abandon so prodigious a nuisance as the China monopoly ! It would be impossible to form an exact estimate of the evils and losses which the country has sustained from our perseverance in this folly ; but the reader may arrive at a tolerable notion of it, by considering, that in the fifty years which have elapsed since the Commutation Act, the people of this country will have paid to the East India Company, for the single article of tea, beyond what the tea might have been had for in a free market, a sum equal, with simple interest, to at least a hundred millions sterling,—or what would have paid one eighth part of the National Debt. During the same time, without reckon- ing interest, the people have paid as taxes to the Crown, on this department of commerce, about 120 millions sterling.

So much for the follies of the past. Let us now see if our fu- ture prospects offer any thing brighter. This will be best done by submitting to the reader a rapid view of the commercial resources of China; which we shall be enabled to do from sources more recent and authentic than are to be found embodied in a popular form, in any single publication. China Proper, exclusive of its colonies, conquests, and tributa- ries, contains an area of 1,372,450 miles, and embraces a territory extending from the 20th to the 40th degree; the great commercial emporium of Canton being in the same climate as Calcutta, and the capital, Pekin, in the same as Madrid. China contains two great rivers, nearly equal to some of the most magnificent rivers of the New World; and ten not inferior in magnitude to the Loire, the Rhine, and the Elbe. Most of these rivers are connected by numerous artificial navigable canals; among which the most re- markable is the great Imperial Canal, which has a course of 600 leagues, and very nearly connects Canton in the 23d degree of lati- tude with Pekin in the 40th.

The numbers of the Chinese has long been a subject of doubt- ful speculation. The question may now be considered as set at rest, by the publication, in 1825, of a census taken by Imperial authority in 1813. The practice of numbering the people has always obtained in China, either for fiscal or police purposes ; but in consequence of a capitation-tax previous to the year 1709, the people were tempted to withhold their names; and hence the small numbers exhibited in all our earlier statements. By a cen- sus taken in 1792, the population was found to amount to 307,467,200; and by the census of 1813, to 367,821,647; show- ing an increase in twenty years of about 20 per cent. This is not much more than two-thirds of the rate of increase in Great Bri tam during the last period of the same length; a fact which tends to show, what had often been suspected, that population in China, although not stationary, increases but slowly. The population thus described is distributed over the eighteen provinces of which China is composed, in the manner exhibited in the following table.

Provincial

POPULATION.

Paortitess. Capital CiSie.. Area. Total. Per Nile.

Latitude N. Statute Stiles.

Pechely

404 ....

58700 27,990,971 468 iangnan (two divisions) .... 32 .... 85.000 72,011,560 347 iansi 29 72.000

rtltrlj: 2425.92

Fokien 26 .... 57.150

Chekian

30 .... 37.200 26156,784 705

Beekman (two dis'isions)

.... 31 .... 168,300 46,022,605 273 Homan 35 .... 64000 23,0.37.171 371 Shantong 37 .... 56,800 28,958,764 510 Shansi 33 . 63,500 14.004,210 220 Slensi (two divisions) 34 .... 157.700 23562,131 152 Sech,uen 31 .... 175,600 21.433,678 122 Canton 23 . 97,100 19,174.030 197 Konansi 25 .... 97.800 7.313.895 83 Yunnan 95 .... 131,400 5.564.320 42 Kweichow „... 51,200 5,288,219 103

1,372.450 311.821.647 1168

"--

The ptrpnintim of China Proper, or the population consisting of the proper Chinese race, amounted, then, twenty years ago, to 367,821,647; which, enormous as it appears, gives for the area of the country no more than 268 to the square mile,—a density not equal to that of our own country, or of several other countries of Europe. The reader, by casting his eye over the table, and com- paring it with the map, will see how this immense mass of human beings is distributed ; and hence will be able to speculate what portions of the country are likely to afford the greatest commer- cial resources. The most densely-peopled provinces are those of the East, and lying either upon the sea-coast, and abounding in harbours, or situated in the great alluvial plains of the principal rivers. All the great rivers of China running from west to east, it follows that the Western portions of China are for the most part hilly ; consequently barren, and in most cases thinly peopled. One great province, bordering upon the country of the Birmans, Tonquinese, and Siamese, has so low a rate of population as 42 to the square mile. Lying towards this quarter, even the province of Canton, best known to Europeans, and supposed by them to be so populous, is found, on account of it mountainous and sterile character, to contain less than 200 inhabitants to the square mile ; a ratio much inferior to that of the British possessions in Bengal. But the population of the Chinese empire now given is that of China Proper only. In Tartary and other dependencies, there is a further population, which is estimated at 2,203,654; making the total, in round numbers, 370,000,000.

The vast country occupied by the Chinese race has been subject to a single government for a period probably not short of thirty ages; in itself an evidence of early civilization, for none but a people to some extent civilized could, considering their vast numbers, have been so long held together. In this long period they have been only twice conquered by strangers, once in the thirteenth century, and once in the sixteenth. But the Tartar invasions amounted rather to changes of dynasty than conquests such as the North- ern nations made in other parts of Asia and in Europe. The in- vaders yielded to the laws and language of the conquered, and became amalgamated with them. The government and civil insti- tutions generally of the Chinese, have, in point of skill and prac- tical utility, a vast superiority over those of all other countries in the East; as might, indeed, be inferred from the superior wealth and industry of the people, whom they have protected from foreign aggression and domestic anarchy. The Chinese enjoy a decent share of security for their persons and for their property. Hence they arc more numerous, more industrious, more ingenious, more comfortable, and more sensible than any other Asiatic people. They are by far the best agriculturists, the best mechanics, and the best merchants in the East. Even in physical strength they have a superiority : a Chinese mechanic has twice the strength and ten times the ingenuity of a Hindoo ; and in the native coma- ..try of the latter, in fair competition with him, he will earn four times the wages. In China, the principle on which the taxes are imposed is fixed —determined—well-known. The land, of course, is private pro- perty. The amount of the taxes levied in money, is ten millions sterling, and the value of those levied in kind, is about two mil- lions ; making the whole about twelve millions sterling, which is under eightpence per head. This is not the whole amount of Chi- nese taxation ; it is only what is remitted to the Imperial treasury, after deducting many local and provincial charges. There is no question, however, but that the rate of taxation is small ; and this fact, together with its defined character, will go far to account for the wealth and prosperity of the Chinese in comparison with other Asiatics.

Such are the people with between three and four hundred mil- lions of whom we are at this time twelvemonth to open the commerce.

Let us next see what are the principal objects which the in- dustry of this remarkable people has produced, either to minister to their own comforts or for foreign exportation. Of minerals, China affords marble, rock-salt, fossil-alkali, saltpetre, native cin- nabar, and mineral coal ; and of the metals, iron, copper, tin, zinc, lead, quicksilver, silver, and gold; mines of all of which are wrought,,generally in the Northern and Western provinces, but the produce in all of them is inadequate to the demand, and hence every one of the metals now enumerated is at the present moment imported in considerable quantities either from America or Europe. Of the products of agriculture, the most remarkable are, wheat for the Northern provinces, rice for the Southern, with maize and roillets for the hills, cotton and silk for the rich plains of the .Eastern provinces, and tea for the hilly portions of almost every province in China, but particularly for the maritime provinces lying between the 25th and 35th degrees of North latitude. The price of corn in China is twice as great as in the under-peopled countries to the west of it, including even British India. The Chinese have no corn-laws: on the contrary, they welcome every one who brings corn to their ports, as friends, and there is neither duty on the cargo nor port-charges on the ship. As to tea, every province in China produces it for its own local consumption, as every country of the South of Europe produces a yin du pays for its own use; but it is only in three or four provinces,—and the parallel holds true with the vine,—that tea of a superior quality is produced, fit for exportation. Twenty years ago, the tea ex- ported from China was confined to two provinces. As the demand as been increased, it has now extended to four; and should that demand rise still Surther, it may be extended to a dozen provinces,—

•

for it is the produce of steep hills, which cannot be applied to the production of bread-corn, and these steep hills abound every- where. When tea began to be consumed to any extent in Europe, in the beginning of the eighteenth century, the tonal exports from China did not probably exceed in weight half a million of pounds. Fifty years ago, the total export from China to all Europe and all America was short of twenty millions of pounds. The total ex- port at present, by sea and land, to Europe and America, is cer- tainly not short of fifty millions of pounds,—being an increase of 150 per cent. in half a century. The soil and industry of China, then, produce fifty millions of pounds weight of tea which had no existence one hundred and thirty years ago. This quantity is worth, to the Chinese, three millions sterling ! and the facts show how valuable the commerce of the European nations must already be to a portion of the Chinese people ; and how readily such a country would meet the demand were our consumption of tea even as much as five pounds weight a head, instead of being, as it is, short of twenty ounces.

The Chinese have been misrepresented as hating commerce and holding it in contempt. This was the romancing of East India Directors ; and the silly people of this .country were so credulous as to believe them for whole centuries together. The Chinese Government, jealous of ns because essentially a weak one, was necessarily distrustful foreign commerce. But the Chinese people themselves are eminently a commercial people : and, in- deed, to argue that one of the most industrious nations in the world should hold the exchange of commodities in contempt, would be a contradiction in terms. The modest Company have insisted, in the same strain of logic which they used twenty years ago in respect to India, that it was impossible to augment the commerce of England with China. If, indeed, they had said—" We, the monopolists, not only cannot increase our commerce with China, but we cannot even prevent it from retrograding," they would have announced a truth worthy of all acceptation. In 1813-14, the export and import trade of the East India Company with China, both in its Indian and European branches, amounted to upwards of thirteen millions and a half of dollars; in 1830-31, it had fallen off to twelve millions of dollars. The trade of British India with China, in the first-named of these years, was consider- ably short of ten millions of dollars ; in the last-named, it consi- derably exceeded twenty-one millions of d011ars,—an increase of about 250 per cent. in sixteen years ! This was the damning fact with 'which Mr. GRANT very skilfully and fairly knocked on the head the sophistry of the East India Directors. In 1813-14, the total amount of tonnage belonging to European and American na- tions carrying on the China trade, may be taken at thirty-five thousand tons, and the total value of the exports and imports at five millions sterling. At present the tonnage is not under ninety thousand, and the value of the exports and imports may be estimated in round numbers at fifteen millions sterling. Here we have the quantity of shipping nearly trebled, and the value of the mer- chandise altogether trebled, in the short period of seventeen years.

Formerly there used to be a constant export of silver bullion to China, but within the last few years it has been as constantly ex- ported thence. In the two years ending in March 1831,t4h2e5g;96 1d and silver bullion exported from China amounted to 1 L Spanish dollars, or nearly two millions and a half sterling. The most remarkable proof of the passion of the Chinese for trade, and of the skill of Englishmen in notifying it, is afforded by the history and progress of the trade in Opium. This indeed is one of the most remarkable circumstances in the general history of commerce itself. Opium is a monopoly under the government of the East India Company, and a prohibited article in China. The entire commerce, in so far as the Chinese are concerned, is an affair of smuggling. The English free traders and the subjects of the Emperor of China have succeeded completely in baffling the Great Man of Pekin and the Great Men of Leadenhall Street. The monopoly has broken down in Hindustan, and the Celestial laws have been put to utter defiance even within the very precincts of the Imperial Palace. Opium has fallen to one half, nay to one third of the price which it bore fifteen or twenty years ago. The consumption of this article, which the Chinese use as we use wine and brandy,—and, in moderation as innoxiously,—spreads every year from district to district and from province to province; until at last it has begun to find its way into Tartary, along with our calicoes and broad-cloths. In 1816-17, the total quantity of Indian opium consumed by the Chinese was 3,210 chests, equal to 468,660 pounds weight; and the value was 3,657,000 Spanish dollars, or 731,400/. In 1830-31, the quantity had increased to 18,760 chests, or 2,626,000 pounds weight ; and the value to 12,900,031 dollars, or 2,580,006/. The quantity, therefore, had increased in a sixfold proportion, and the value in nearly a fourfold proportion, in fourteen years. We remember nothing comparable to this in the history of commerce, when it is considered that free- dom had to compete with monopoly on one hand and with prohi- bition on the other. The opium fuinished by British India, in fact, much more than pays for all the tea furnished to Great Bri- tain; and if we add the Turkey opium, chiefly supplied by the Americans, the value of this drug imported into China more than pays for the whole of the teas consumed by Europe and America. The mode in which the contraband trade in opium is conducted, is briefly this. One Portuguese, two Danish,one American, and two British ships, making in all seven vessels, of the united burden of two thousand tons, under the name of "receiving ships con- stantly lie at anchor off the little -island of Lintin, about fifty-six miles from Canton. To these vesseb—unarmed, and, with the SPECTATOR'S LIBRARY.

exception of officers, manned by the timid natives of India—the

smugglers repair at night, and through the joint effects of bribery NATURAL /VIRAL PHILOSOPHY,

forbidden drug, in defiance of the Chinese police, the Chinese army, the Chinese navy, and Imperial and provincial periodical FieTiox, edicts and proclamations innumerable. • Two questions of considerable interest remain to be noticed : 1st, Is there any danger of our intercourse terrupted? and 2d, Is there any chance of our being able to extend our trade to other ports than Canton ? Lord Comberrnere. 2 vols.

With respect to the first—we think- there is neither risk nor EICORATION,

Chance of our intercourse being interrupted. Let us see what the .

dressing the Emperor, on the project, Which he justly repudiates,

a view to put an end to the illicit trade in opium. " But this true, Art, Music, and the Drama. No. I. April 1.833 then would it suddenly put a barrier before them, and cut off the WHEWELL S APPLICATION O F AS T RONOMY AND

trade ? Besides, in Canton, there are several hundred thousands P Fuh-chow-foo, the capital of Fokien, and even there to a limited The individual of most universal mind (we state our opinion extent." We have great hopes; British enterprise, British calico, modestly, as of one scarcely qualified to be positive, albeit having British cotton twist, British broad-cloth, and Indian opium, are taken a pretty wide survey of men), and also the man of the doing wonders,—especially the last named, which, according to a widest range of accurate information that probably could be pointed complaint made to the Emperor last year, is to be found "in all out, is the author of the now first published treatise. Naturally

places, cities, villages, market-towns, camps, and stations." endowed with an energy and activity of intellect such as are For much of the information contained in the preceding state- rarely combined, he has long subjected himself to the discipline meat, we have to express our acknowledgments to a curious and of the exact sciences : not only has he mastered these in their old useful little book published at Macao in China, in 1832, and called domains, but he has endeavoured to extend their authority, by The Anglo-Chinese Kalendar and Register, with a Companion. applying their processes to departments of knowledge that had The Companion, especially, we have found both instructive and hitherto wanted theiraid. Astronomy and General Physics are here. entertaining. Here we have the Imperial family of China and the his particular province; but it would be difficult to state that branch Royal family of England side by side,—the Emperor TAOU- of science over which he had not extended the most masterly views,.. HWANG, son of the late Emperor KEA-KING, in friendly juxtaposi- supported and indeed built upon'a minute knowledge and a careful tion with WILLIAM the Fourth, son of GEORGE the Third; and examination of its phenomena.

TO-TSIN, First Member of the Chinese Cabinet, a Mantchou The present volume had the whole task been assigned to Mr._ Tartar of" the Bordered Yellow Standard," in the same relation to WHEWELL (supposing him to have been willing to undertake it— Earl GREY, First Lord of the Treasury, and Knight of the Garter; of the grounds of which supposition we have no means of judg- we have also the names of all the Provincial Governors and Chief ing), would have composed but a chapter of the entire work. It Officers, with the amount of their respective salaries,—without would have been condensed greatly, and its general conclusions. perquisites, however, which appear to be of more consequence in would have served for many other arguments. As it stands, China than even in England. The Governor of the metropolitan however, we feel we have strong reasons to lament that the whole province of Pechely has but 16,000 taels a year, or 4,8001.; task was not made over to one strong hand. We have now a choir 'whereas he of Keangsoo, renowned for nankeen and green tea, and of learned singers in praise of the Creation : will they sing in a population of seventy-two millions, has very . properly 24,000 tune ? it will be a famous glee, but would not one fine tenor have ' taels, or 7,200/. a year; which after all is not much more than one been better.

trade inApril 1834.. and in the Earth as a component part of the Universe. It is true,