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    C O M ME K C I A I

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    C O M Me K C I A I

    C O M ME R C I A L .

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    AUSTRALIA AND INDIA . In 1858 , the value of the exports of British manufactures and produce to Australia , was 10 , 464 , 198 / This was exclusive of goods of foreign produce and . manufacture exported , which may be put down at l , 5 OO , 000 Z . more . The value of our imports from those colonies was 5 , 255 , 687 Z ., exclusive of gold , and the value of tile gold imported was 9 , 066 , 2891 . With some vacillations , our trade with these colonies is increasing , and becoming more important from year to year . They stand eighth on the . list of countries with which we trade for the value of their imports , and third on the

    list for the value of our exports to them . They are the germs of a great empire and a vast traffic , and we ought not , by . any regulations , to lay the least impediment in the way of their greatness . We learn with satisfaction , by the latest accounts from them , which reached us only ^ on Thursday , that they are all in a tolerably flourishing condition . The customs revenue of New South Wales was nearly 10 , 000 Z . more in January , 1859 , than January , 1858 ; and in the same month of 1859 , the quantity of gold dust received hy escort , was 19 , 908 ounces , or 14 , 701 ounces more than in January , 1858 . So we are informed from Victoria , the miners have begim the year well , and produced 168 , 609 ounces of go ld in

    wool , and we receive wool from Australia—perhaps we may hereafter receive cotton—and to both countries we send , back their raw materials wrought into various kinds of cloth . For the many commodities which Australia thus derives , immediately or mediately , directly or indirectly , from India , her chief means of payment is gold . To stop the export of fold from Australia to India seems , thereboth coloniesand doing

    fore , a cruel injustice to , wron" - to both is an equally cruel injustice to Great Britain itself . It resembles that colonial system which formerly prevailed , and which actually forbade the colonies " to trade with one another , or with foreign countries , except through the mother country , making it necessary , before a hogshead of Jamaica sugar could ; reach North America , that it must be brought to Engl and .

    There is , in truth , no positive prohibition to export Australian gold to India , but there exists m India a regulation which virtually amounts to such a prohibition . Already inhabited by very opulent classes , and increasing very fast in wealth , India requires , and , in fact , can only be prevented from having a gold currency by a positive regulation Such a currency , too , has been in existence . Now , the chief use of gold is as currency , and to prohibit it to be used for this purpose is virtually to prohibit it from being imported into the ^ country where it cannot be used as money . This ,

    how-January , 1859 , against 157 , 603 ounces in January , 1858 . Both the arrivals by escort and the shipments of gold had increased . In the two first weeks of February , 1859 , the arrivals were 250 , 716 ounces , against 227 , 350 in the same period of 1858 ; and the shipments in the ... first six weeks of the year Tvere 289 , 273 ounces , against 230 , 273 ounces in the first six weeks of 1859 . New gold fields of fair promise had been opened , some of which were yielding well ; and improvements in the system of -washing had enabled the miners to extract larger quantities of gold from equal quantities of earth . These colonies , therefore , continue to flourish , and « re amongst the most prosperous countries of the world .

    ever , is done by the Government of India . It was done by the East India Company , and it is continued by the present Administration ^ By the Government the people of India are forbidden to use gold as money ; and , therefore , it cannot be imported , except in very small quantities for ornaments . We stop not to inquire , into the reasons of the prohibition . Politicians never want reasons fox' doing wrong . We may say , however , that the principle reason for continuing the regulation is a false expectation that a fall in the

    value of gold will occur , and a kind of prudery of honesty which does not always animate politicians , that the fall , were gold to be employed as money , would do injustice to the holders of a debt contracted in silver . Caring nothing , however , for the reasons of this strange prohibition , we only wish to direct the attention of our readers to some of the consequences . The prohibition is utterly false in principle , as false as would be a prohibition to a people as they advanced in civilisation to substitute wheaten bread for oat or

    Not very far from them , compared J ; o then * distance from us , lies another noble ^ country , even more important to England , at present , for the amount of its trade , than Australia . India is 3 econd on the list for the value of imports of all the countries with which we trade , and was actually first on the list in 1858 , though this Is not bite rule ; for generally the United States stand first , for the value of British produce and manufactures exported . Every year , too , of late , our trade with this great country has increased , and increased so rapidly last year as to induce a contemporary , forming his opinion by this one

    indicabarley cakes . We have mentioned that Australia derives , directly and indirectly , commodities from India , for which she must pay in gold ; but as she cannot pay directly in gold , she sends the gold to England , whence a portion of it , or its value , finds a "way to India in goods or in silver . Of late years , no doubt partly in consequence of Australia deriving apox'tion of her necessary supplies from India , silver has been continually sent from Europe to India . We read day by day that the last

    tion , to . assert last week that India , with the exception of the United States , is the most rapidly progressing country in the world . Long peopled , " with habits not yet broken through , which would permit the population cjonntinualiy and rapidly to increase , this must bo an . cxagjgeration ; but it is , nevertheless , a fact that the trade between India and Great Britain is increasing very fast , and that wo have as great an interest in promoting its prosperity as in promoting the prosperity of iVustrafia . With the welfare of both these countries our welfare is closely united , and a policy which impedes their prosperity must impede our prosperity . Of course , it follows that whatever promotes their trade with one another ¦ will be to our advnntnge , and whatever impedes

    duty paid all the cost . Such consequences of these absurd fiscal regulations happily gotrkl of them in the end , but ire now find similar consequences cropping out of our Mint regulations . To send cargoes this round-about course was only an occasional experiment , but mint regulations , worse than discriminating duties , compel a continual sending of Australian gold to England , to buy silver to send to India ? A greater waste of labour and property could not well be devised ; but the men who

    devised it— -though it is condemed alike by science and experience—claim obedience and reverence as the benefactors of mankind . When such contrasts between their demands on our respect and theresults of their acts are continually forced on our notice , that they should fall in our esteem can surprise nobody . The wonder is , that af ter such innumerable exposures of . inefficiency ¦ and blunder , statesmen can lift up their heads unabashed , and as boldly demand our confidence as if they had never been detected in a single error .

    One of the consequences of all such regulations is , that they create sinister interests and rally around them , as supportei-s , large bodies of nxen ^ who imagine that they and society would be mortally injured by abolishing them . Besides , all the officers of the Mints in the two countries , who have a great love for things as they are , and regard every demand for change and improvement as an insult , the bullion merchants avIio are engaged in making the double exchange ; the bill brokers , who get a ' commission on the greater number of pieces of paper they have to negotiate ; the bankers , who , in England , Australia , and India , are connected with exchange operations , and the carriers , who get the longer and the double freights , and all the connexions of those , person . " ,, have an

    interest in continuing this absurd prohibition . . regulations and restrictions ' require a stuff to carry them into effect , and tlie more they are multiplied the greater is the number of persons we have to reward for inflicting them on us . Moreover , whenever they affect trade , or any of the ordinary business of life , many persona must adapt their conduct to them and carry on tlieii" business in subservience to them . Then * habits are . formed on a faulty model . This gives a long life to nil such errors , and makes men fight almost to death , as now injFrance and heretofore in England , for monopolies which science demonstrates to be injurious to society . Error nnd restrictions , therefore , cannot be put down too soon , and if they can be prevented from coming into existence , so much the better .

    Australian gold arrived has been taken for the Continent , therewith to buy silver to send to India . Or wo read that bars of gold—most probably Australian gold—have . been taken from the Bank tO buy silver abroad , for we have none hero to spare , to make up the quantity required to be exported to India , Thus the prohibition to use gold as money in India causes the gold of Australia to be sent to [ Europe , therewith to buy silvei ' , to be sent to India instead of that gold going diropt from Australia . to India . Instead oi transmitting the more valuable metal , at a small expense of freight ,

    their mutual traffic must be our injui'y . A slight inspection of the table of imports into the two countries will show that Australia may derive a large proportion of its imports , suoh as coffee , tea , sugar , &c , direct from Intfta , and a large portion of its clothing , is composed of raw materials derived from India . Both countries being pretty mxicli ii } the same latitude , or about ecmiaistant from the equator—though the one lies on the south , and the other on the north side of the line—the natural productions or raw materials of each , except as one lms been much longer peopled than the other , do not afford— except as to the articles already indicated , which all go one way- — much soopofor international traffic In the natural course of trade we receive from India cotton and

    the snort distance , say 2 , 500 miles to India , wo bring it , say 12 , 000 miles to Europe , and send sliver at a much larger expense of freight , say , 6 , 000 miles to India . There was a tiino when our fiscal regulations induced merchants to ship Norway timber to Canada , and then import it into England as timber from our colouy , our absurd tarHF making it advantageous to send this timber two long Boa voyages , in order to place it in the hands of the consumer . At that time , too , it was advantageous to ship coffee from Eio Janeiro to the © ape of Good Hope , and there tore * ship it and import it into England as from a possession of the Bast India Company . Saving n discriminating

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    Friday Evening . Montby is in good demand , but the supply is large , and the market is , on the whole , easy . At tlie same time , with the Indian loan , the Ru ssian loan , and a uirther issue of Exchequer bonds hanging over it , it is uncertain ; ami though the terms arc not altered , lenders are not eager to part with their money . Though the dividends will bo in . tho course of payment next week , there is no probability ' of the dc * niand for money lessening to any great degree The Bank terms are the Usual rato for discount . Notwithstanding the largo quantity of sllvor which is to be dispatched to India by tho next »{» il <~ £ 000 , 000—the market for silver is tint , ¦ ami nivs declined

    * . , „ Tho funds , which havo boon dull all tho week , wore oxcossivoly flat to-day . Tho buHlm-HS clono was almost nil , and tho closing prieo of Consuls mb 95 ft , A bolow the closing prieo of yostordny . inoro is still a want of confidence in tho intentions ol tno sovereigns of tho Continent , nnd Count < -nvoui b memorandum to our consul 1 ms outmousureu u" » hopos of peace . Accordingly , tho tplogrnnli U s morning brought a further doelino from J- ' arls ol $ >» the 3 per cent , Rentes . Our market , too , was slightly influenced by the picture of u fl P ° " ^ with a bull account for a largo sum . Nor is tj oio any probability that the publlo securities w II snow any liveliness till the prosont critical period in tJio political relations of Europp is passed . Tho Russian loan , it is now statod on good au-

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    MONEY MARKET & STOCK EXCHANGE

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    a * 7 A THE LEADHi [ flo . 472 > April 9 , 1859

• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), April 9, 1859, page 474, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2289/page/26/