TIipves amongst Blue-books, and rarely sought out except by the enthusiast in statistics or the student of history, are to be found the Consular returns of sh trade with China up to the year of grace 1868. Weare, however, now happy to be able to-announce the publication in China, in a form at once convenient, concise, and admirably adapted for immediate reference of a precis of the course of British trade in China during the past year, compiled by H. M. Consuls at the various ports.
Although in many respects less full, and not compiled on the same system as the official Customs Returns, which, since the establishment of the Foreign Inspectorate have been so ably prepared and regularly issued, these Consular returns have a special interest for British residents connected by business or otherwise with the prosperity of English' trade with China. In one respect, equally with the reports of the foreign Customs, they are wanting, and this want is felt especially when judging of the trade of the southern ports, In the reports: of the trade of Foochow, Amoy, Swatow and Canton, we find this difficulty pre-eminent, it being utterly impossible without trade statistics from the colony of Hongkong to form even a crude idea of the actual amount of British commerce with those ports. In a manner more or less characteristic of the individual whose name is attached to these reports—whether at Swatow we find Mr. Alabaster sighing over the nomina Hy small amount of trade, caused by the operation of the foreign Customs, or at Canton Mr. Robertson explaining by the same means the apparently insignificant consumption of opium compared with former years, we find complaints of the effects of the establish-iment of the foreign Customs. There is, however, no doubt that however fair in principle the effects of the Foreign Inspectorate in the southern ports, and more especially in the province of Kwangtung, have not been altogether satisfactory, and so long as the central government is unable to make its influence felt in these portions of the empire, so long must this defect exist. It is not long since we commented on the ridiculous position in which the so-called Supreme Government was placed in its dealing with the provineiul authorities of Kwantung by this natural antagonism of interests, which in the case of the armed Customs' cruisers sent out from Canton to intercept native vessels carrying foreign goods from Hongkong, led to the provincial mandarins going to the length of threatening to treat these craft if captured as pirates. We are therefore not unprepared to find that the provincial authorities have hit on the device of simply ignoring the existence of the foreign' Customs, and of charging on foreign imports the same taxes, or in some cases even less, when introduced through the provincial Custom houses, as when passed though the foreign inspectorate. The most conspicuous instance of this is to be found in the charges to which opium, entered through the foreign Customs at Canton on its way to the West River, is subjected, compared with the same commodity conveyed direct from Hongkong. In the one case the opium is subjected to duties and taxes amounting to Taels '89 per picul, while in the other it escapes with Taels 38, a difference of nearly two thirds. Asa natural consequence the import through Canton amounted to the trifling matter of 800 chests during the year. But although opium affords the most conclusive test of the want of accord between the two administrations, it is not the only one. Were we to take the reports of the foreign Customs, on which these returns have been founded, as in any way illustrative of the relative importance of the several ports and of British trade with China, we should be greatly deceived. In place of looking at Canton for the most prosperous and probably the most thickly populated city of the empire, we should expect to meet with a city in a rapid' state of decadence if not in actual ruin. Yet the contrary is the truth, and Canton probably alone amongst Chinese cities affords the spectacle of a town increasing in population as well as in individual wealth and comfort. The facilities supposed to be imported to foreign trade by the regulation of the tariff and the establishment of the Inspectorate have in fact been made use of to stop its natural progress, and to place obstacles in the way of business being carried on by foreigners or in foreign ships. It is not long ago since we had occasion to remark how seriously the unequal system of coast duties interfered with the home trade of China. How the heavy duties, paid by goods shipped in foreign vessels compared with, the comparatively light taxes to which goods sent direct in native craft prevented the expansion of trade, or even stopped it where it' was springing up. With an inconsistency worthy ofthe Chinese government it happened that natives who in their own craft were charged: merely nominal duties, came, when they desired to ship in foreign bottoms, to be charged a rate" greater even than the foreign shipper, the result being in the one case to force the Chinese mer-" chant to make use of a notoriously unsafe and' less satisfactory medium of conveyance, ' and' in the other to have recourse to' subterfuges' in order to conceal his property in the goods. Asa consequence, though we are sorry not to
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.