STATISTICAL LEGERDEMAIN.

We pass to the subject of shipbuilding. Mr. Williams is good enough to admit that England is actually at the head of the shipbuilding trade. But having made this admission, a pang of regret comes over him, and he tries to show that he is justified in putting even the British shipbuilding trade on his “black list.” This is his argument:—

“In 1883 the total tonnage built in the United Kingdom was 892,216; in 1893 it reached only 584,674; in 1894, ’tis true, it rose to 669,492, but this is much below the total even of 1892, which was 801,548.”

Again one can only admire Mr. Williams’s ingenuity. Reading his paragraph, who would dream that between the years so skilfully selected for comparison the trade had experienced an enormous drop, and afterwards, to all intents and purposes, completely recovered itself; that then a smaller drop had occurred, and that this in turn was being fast made good? The best way to expose the above piece of statistical legerdemain is to give without further comment the whole of the figures for the past fifteen years. They will be found in the following table. With figures such as these before him—and they must have been before him—it is astounding that Mr. Williams should have ventured to put shipbuilding on his black list.

Fifteen Years of British Shipbuilding.

Total Output of British and Irish Yards.
In Thousands of Tons.

188118821883188418851886188718881889189018911892189318941895
609783892588441331377574855813809801585669648

These figures may be illustrated as follows:—

SHIPS BUILT FOR FOREIGNERS.

But his perverse ingenuity does not end with the paragraph quoted. A few lines lower down he says:—

“All these figures include vessels built for foreigners as well as those for home and the Colonies. The year in which we built most vessels for other nations was 1889, when we supplied them with 183,224 tons. The four following years showed a progressive decrease, getting down as low as 89,386 tons in 1893; and though 1894 showed an increase to 94,876 tons, their upward movement was slight compared with the successive decreases of the previous years.”

The man who wrote these sentences obviously intended to convey to his readers the impression that our trade in the building of ships for foreign purchasers was a declining trade. That impression is false, and it is a little hard to understand how Mr. Williams could fail to see its falsity. The following figures show—what to most persons would be sufficiently obvious on reflection—that the tonnage of ships launched at our great yards varies largely from year to year. To pick out the year 1889, as Mr. Williams does, and declare that since that year there has been a decline in our sales to foreigners, is as grossly unfair as it would be, on the other hand, to pick out the year 1885, and say that since then there had been a fourfold increase.

Ships Built by us for Foreigners.

Thousands of Tons.

188118821883188418851886188718881889189018911892189318941895
10811612491363970911831611391098995128