The commerce of the two single ports of Shang-Hai and Canton, in imports and exports, without reckoning opium, was estimated in 1851 at 400 to 500,000,000 francs, which answers nearly to 800,000 tons, taking the average value per ton at 600 fr., and which makes twelve times as much as the estimate given by Mr. Mac Culloch.
At Manilla, the commerce in 1851 was 51,773,232 fr. of which about 24,000,000 were exports, and the remainder imports. This figure answers to the activity of 86,300 tons, taking the average value of the ton at 600 fr. It is more than twenty times the estimate of Mr. Mac Culloch.
For Java we have not been able to procure any positive information, but according to the periodical publications (Revue des deux Mondes, &c.) and according to the reports of travellers, the increase of business every year is much greater than in the Philippine Islands. We shall not therefore be charged with exaggeration, in fixing the figure of commercial activity in these colonies at 100,000,000 or about 150,000 tons, for the year 1851.
Mr. Anderson estimated the commerce between Europe and Indo-China at £26,000,000, or 650,000,000 francs, thus distributed:—
| The commerce between Europe and the Indies is estimated at | Exports | £12,000,000 |
| Imports | 8,000,000 | |
| The commerce with Singapore, China, Java, &c. &c. at | 6,000,000 | |
| Amount of the commerce with places to the east of Egypt | £26,000,000 | |
We have just seen from the researches of M. Arnaud Tison that Shang-Hai and Canton alone gave to commerce in 1851 an activity represented by the figure of 400 to 500,000,000 francs, which is quadruple that attributed by Mr. Anderson in 1841, to the entire commerce of the China Seas, including the Philippine islands, Java and Singapore.
We are therefore quite sure of being below the reality in fixing the amount of commerce with places to the east of Egypt, in 1851 at 100,000,000, instead of the 26,000,000 in 1841. At the time we write, this figure of 100,000,000 sterling is perhaps quadrupled and carried to 10,000,000,000 francs, and when the Canal is opened, this latter sum will be a mere mistake.
In fact not only the greatest part of the commerce of Europe with the extreme East will be carried on through the Maritime Canal, but moreover all the activity in operation between America and China, will abandon the route of Cape Horn for that of the Isthmus, which will be easier, shorter, and more certain.
For the farther support of our opinion, we have the vast countries which are at present completely without the sphere of the commercial activity of the world, and which, upon the opening of the Canal, will furnish a contingent which cannot be estimated now, but which will be considerable. Abyssinia, Yemen, Hedjaz, Mascata, and the coasts of Africa, will deliver quantities of merchandize; such as the coffee of Yemen and Abyssinia, gum arabic, wax, skins, ivory, wool, indigo, &c. &c. Mules and animals for the slaughterhouse abound in Abyssinia, and are sold at a low price. A mule may be had from 25 to 100 fr., an ox for 10 fr., a sheep for 3 fr.; timber and cabinet woods abound in the vast forests which have never felt the axe. Along the coasts of the Red Sea are very rich mines of sulphur, which have just begun to be worked; lead mines, quarries of marble and porphyry; extended beaches suitable for the establishment of salt pits, &c. &c.