The European war, says the Asahi," has struck 2 disastrous blow at the raw silk trade, and the market is lower than it has been for seventeen years. How much lower it will go it is impossible to say. The average value of raw silk exported during the past three years was Y.180,000,000, of which sum 'Y.195,000,000 represented shipments to America, the balance going to Europe—Y.92,000,000 to France 'Y.24,000,000 to Italy, Y.4,000,000 to Russia, and Y.670,000 to England. 'The export to Europe has practical-.|Iy_ stopped, but that to America is going on as usual. The raw silk supplied to America from Europe (mainly by France) amounts to five or six million pounds' weight, and for this America will probably look to Japan this year. Sericulture in France and Italy was declining even before the war, and there can be no doubt that, after the war, the Jay crease. Some of those in the trade believe the prospects to be brilliant.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.