CHAPTER XII.
Commerce.—State of exports and imports.—Exactions at the customs—depredations and impositions.—Foreign merchants—disabilities they labour under.—Insecurity.—State of finances.—Revenue, etc.
Commerce, like agriculture, in Hayti is at a very low ebb, and presents a very discouraging view of the state of that country. Without agriculture commerce can receive but little encouragement; and if the cultivation of the soil decline, commerce must decline also, the one being unquestionably dependent on the other. If there be a failure in those territorial productions which constitute the staple commodities of Hayti, there will be nothing to excite commercial enterprise and speculation, and consequently the intercourse with foreigners will decrease, to the great injury of the country. Were Hayti in a situation to become an entrepôt for foreign property, or were it so circumstanced as to have the means of carrying on an extensive trade with the South American states, it might probably relieve her in some measure from the heavy weight with which she is now borne down. But she has no such intercourse, nor are the people in the least conversant with the nature of it: their knowledge of commerce not extending much beyond the limits of mere petty bartering, and all important commercial dealings are centred in the foreign houses established there. The British, Americans, and even the French, will not confide in the integrity of the Haytians; all their engagements are effected, all their arrangements are made by the agents from their respective countries, who have patents to reside in the several parts of the republic. An attempt was made to induce the legislative body to enact a law for compelling foreigners to consign their cargoes or shipments to Haytian citizen agents; and I believe Boyer was much disposed to countenance the proposition, but it met with great disapprobation from those individuals in the chamber of communes who were on friendly terms with the foreigners, and who had discretion enough to foresee that such a law would be destructive of that commerce which they were so anxious to extend. This iniquitous law was proposed by M. Elic and M. Ardouin, the representatives for Port au Prince, and it was supported by other members of the chamber, who, as native agents, resided in the several ports, but decried by those who apprehended the serious check which foreign intercourse would receive from so unwise and impolitic a measure. It was, however, negatived, and the proposers and supporters of it drew upon themselves much obloquy and reproach.
The Haytian government has often promulgated very glowing abstracts of the flourishing state of its commerce, and would seem to expect that such accounts should be received as proofs of the rising greatness of the country. But the very documents themselves are prima facie evidence of their being a fabrication. They are gross impositions to lead strangers into the belief that the intercourse is of importance, and that considerable advantages accrue from it to those nations who engage in it with spirit, and pursue it without relaxation.
As there is no individual wealth in the country, the means of the people depend upon their own exertions in the culture of the soil; and therefore as cultivation has dwindled from the want of industry, those means must have become exceedingly circumscribed. Hence it is not probable that the annual value of the imports into the country can have so far exceeded the exports from it, as the following statements, which have been already before the public, particularly exhibit.
The return for the year 1821, being the year after the annexation of Christophe’s dominions to the republic, gives the following balance of commerce with foreign nations:—