IV. CHINESE EXPORTS.
Efforts of the consuls to stimulate trade—Alcock's work at Foochow—His despatches—Exhibition of 1851—Exhibits of Chinese produce sent by Alcock.
VILLAGE ON THE CANALS.
The continuous efforts made by the consuls in the first decade after the treaty to stimulate the action of foreign merchants in laying hold of all the opportunities offered to them for extending their connections with the Chinese trade ought not to be passed over without notice. It was the burden of Consul Alcock's labours while in Foochow to gather information from every source, to digest it as well as he was able, and to lay it before his countrymen; and if he, in his despatches to the plenipotentiary, sometimes reflected on what seemed to him the apathy and want of enterprise of the merchants, that must be set down to a laudable zeal to make his office fruitful of benefit to his country. The same spirit animated his proceedings in Shanghai. The demand made for exhibits for the Great Exhibition of 1851 found Mr Alcock and his lieutenant Parkes eager to supply samples of Chinese products of every kind likely to be of commercial interest. On applying to the mercantile community of Shanghai for their co-operation in collecting materials, he found them not over-sanguine as to the results of such an effort, and in his despatch of December 1850 to the plenipotentiary he remarks that "the British and foreign residents in Shanghai appeared to feel that the impossibility of gaining access to the great seats of manufacture or the producing districts for raw material placed them in too disadvantageous a position to do justice either to themselves or the resources of the empire, which could only be very inadequately represented, and in a way more calculated to mislead than instruct." "The conclusion," he goes on to say, "at which the mercantile community has arrived has gone far to paralyse all exertion on my part." Nevertheless, with the restricted means at his disposal, he set to work to collect specimens of Chinese produce and industry and to transmit them to the Board of Trade for the use of the Commissioners. Of objects of art he sent a great variety in bronze, inlaid wood, porcelain, soapstone, and enamels, and the fancy articles which have since acquired such great reputation in the world that dealers in European and American capitals send out commissions every year to make extensive purchases. Colours used by the Chinese for dyeing purposes in twenty shades of blue, silk brocades, and many valuable products of the Chinese looms, were well represented, and the commoner utensils, such as scissors, needles, and razors, some of which were within the last few years specially recommended in consular reports to the notice of English manufacturers, as if the suggestion were made for the first time. Of raw material, samples were sent of hemp, indigo, and many other natural products; and when it is considered how eager the British mercantile community appeared to be to increase their importation of Chinese produce—be it tea, silk, or any other commodity—in order to balance the export trade, it is interesting to observe that in those early days a number of articles of export were described and classified, with an account of the districts of their origin, which have only taken their place in the list of exports from China within the last twenty years or so. These were sheep's wool of six different descriptions, and camels' hair, which are now so extensively dealt in at the northern ports of China. Perhaps these articles were not seen in bulk by foreigners until after the opening of the new ports in 1861, and it is worthy of remark that even after this discovery, and sundry experimental shipments, many years elapsed before the special products of Northern China became recognised articles of foreign trade. These now include straw plait, sheep's wool, goats' wools, goats' skins, dogs' skins, camels' hair, horses' tails, pigs' bristles, and a number of other articles of export which might perfectly well have been brought to the foreign market of Shanghai even before the opening of the northern ports. What was wanted was the knowledge that such products were procurable and the organisation of a market for their disposal in China, in Europe, and the United States. To stimulate inquiry into these matters was an object of the consular reports of the early days, and the fact that the seed then sown seemed to have been buried in sterile soil for thirty years affords a reasonable prospect that from the more advantageous basis on which commercial men now stand still larger developments of international commerce may be reserved to future adventurers.