British Opium Policy and Its Results to India and China

A

THE CONDITIONS OF COMMERCIAL PROGRESS IN CHINA.

The advisability or otherwise of opening up the country.
Benefits to the Chinese alluded to.
Effects on British trade.

Having pointed out the very large additions to the amount of foreign trade that have been directly created by the opening of the river ports, it may not be out of place to advert to the more Imperial question of the advisability or otherwise of further opening up the country generally, and to show some of the results that have been attained by previous advances. It is not, perhaps, our province to enlarge on the benefits which the Chinese derive from foreign intercourse, but these are patent to every one who desires to be acquainted with them, and even cursory observers returning from the interior are invariably struck by the prosperity of the natives in the vicinity of foreign settlements. The presence of foreign trade provides the laboring classes with highly remunerative employment; the country people find among the foreigners ready markets for their vast surplus produce; the merchants, taking advantage of the facilities which foreigners bring within their reach, double and treble their effective capital by the rapidity with which they are enabled to turn it over; and the Government authority in the country is respected, almost guaranteed, wherever foreigners establish themselves. These and many other advantages which foreign intercourse confers on the Chinese are, however, for the consideration of the native Government. It will be sufficient for us to trace the history of foreign trade in China, with a view to ascertaining what the general result to foreigners of the opening of new ports has been. For this purpose we have made an abstract of the British import trade with China from the year 1840 to the present time. The British trade has been selected because it is the largest, the only one of which we are in possession of exact statistics, and because it furnishes a very good guide to the progress of that of other nations.

Chinese exports excluded from present consideration, though of great importance.
The tea trade.

"For the sake of brevity and simplicity the export trade in native produce from China has been excluded, although one branch of it has made great advances since the opening of the Yangtze River, and though the benefits of this trade to foreign nations, and especially Great Britain, could be shown to be most important. The extension of the tea trade of late years, and consequent reduction of price, whatever effects it may have had on those immediately engaged in it, has undoubtedly placed this wholesome beverage within the reach of nearly the whole population of England, and that is an advantage not to be lightly estimated. Besides this, the article produces annually £3,000,000 sterling of revenue to the British Government; and yields £500,000 sterling every year to British ship-owners in the shape of freight, perhaps more, if shipments to all ports in British bottoms are included.

The silk trade.

"The contribution of Chinese silk to the industries of Europe, though of great importance to foreigners generally, is yet less affected by the movements of foreign Governments in China than are other departments of commerce.