The trade between Java and China in vessels belonging to Europeans, at present consists principally in carrying out tin, pepper, spices, rattans, and betel-nut, for the China market, and receiving in return a few articles of China produce in demand for the European market, a balance of cash, and a supply of manufactures required annually at Batavia; but it is calculated that cotton, rice, and timber, which may be considered as the staple produce of Java, might be exported to China with advantage.
A small quantity of Javan cotton lately sent to China, was sold at a higher rate than the ordinary prices of the cotton from Western India[61]. Cotton-yarn is an article sometimes exported to China, but in the existing state of society on Java, the exportation of the raw material is likely to be attended with the greatest advantages. Some writers have estimated the capability of Java to export raw cotton almost incredibly high, but it must be admitted, that although the soil is not universally favourable, yet few countries afford greater general advantages for the cotton cultivation, it being practicable to raise it to a great extent, without interfering with the general grain produce of the country. It could be grown as a second crop on the rice fields, being planted shortly after the harvest, and attaining maturity before the season again comes round for irrigating the lands. Nothing can convey a higher idea of the richness of the soil of Java, and of the advantages of its climate, than the fact, that during one half the year the lands yield a rich and abundant crop of grain, more than sufficient for the ordinary food of the population, and during the other half a valuable staple, which affords the material for clothing them, and opens in its manufacture a source of wealth and of continual domestic industry through the year.
Enterprising individuals, merchants of Batavia, have not been wanting to engage in the valuable fur trade, hitherto carried on principally by the Americans, between Kamtschatka and China. Mr. Timmerman Thyssen, an enlightened Dutch gentleman, whose name for honourable dealing and extensive business has always stood high among the merchants of Batavia, has entered into more than one speculation of this kind. Vessels fitted out from Batavia took in furs at Kamtschatka, which were intended to be exchanged in China for dollars; but the dangers of the passage in one instance, and the informality of the papers in another, rendered this bold and promising enterprize productive of but little pecuniary advantage. Nothing, however, has occurred, to prove that the adventure would not have fully answered its intention in time of peace, the principal difficulties which attended and frustrated it ceasing with the war.
Since the conquest a very extensive trade has been carried on by the English country ships importing from Calcutta, Madras, and Bombay, all kinds of piece goods, opium, and other articles, the returns for which have been usually made by bills, gold-dust, bees'-wax, tin, Japan camphor, sago, and teak timber.
The piece goods of Western India have always formed an extensive article of import into Java, and the annual value of those latterly imported cannot well be estimated at less than a million of dollars. Those generally meet a ready sale, at an advance of from thirty to forty per cent. upon the prime cost in India, and much more when the supply is scanty.
In consequence of these heavy and valuable importations, the returns to Bengal were till lately made principally by bills, obtainable either from government, or individuals desirous of purchasing colonial produce for the European market by means of funds in Western India. But there are also several articles, which experience has proved well calculated for making their returns direct to Bengal, particularly Japan copper and teak timber. Java is known to abound with valuable teak forests, and the quality of the wood has been considered as superior to that of Pegu or the Malabar coast. The restrictions under which this export was formerly placed as a government monopoly, prevented its finding its way beyond the immediate Dutch dependencies; but the extent to which it was even then sent to the Moluccas, to Malacca, and to the Cape of Good Hope, where all the public buildings are constructed of Javan teak, sufficiently attests the value and extent of the forests, as well as the good quality and durability of the wood. This valuable, but bulky article of export, is always in demand for ship-building in Bengal, and has afforded to the merchant a very liberal profit on exportation, after paying the present government prices, which are calculated at something above ten per cent. upon the actual expence of cutting and dragging the timber from the forests to the port of exportation. During the last two years, large ships have taken cargoes to Bengal, and afforded very handsome profits. From the neighbourhood of Rémbáng, where permission has been given to individuals to cut the timber, on paying a duty of ten per cent. on the estimated value when worked up, it has not only been exported at a cheap rate to Bengal, but several ships have been constructed of it, while along the whole line of coast, from Semárang to Grésik, small vessels and country craft are launched every month.
But although the direct trade with Bengal has thus been always against Java, the demand for sugar in the Bombay market always affords the means of a circuitous return of capital. Large quantities of Javan sugar have been exported to Bombay during the last four years, principally on the returning ships in ballast touching at Batavia on their way from China, and these cargoes have afforded considerable profit. A lucrative trade in this article is also sometimes carried on by the Arabs to the Red Sea, and particularly to Mocha; but Arab traders, of sufficient capital for these extensive speculations, have, by the effects of the former monopoly on Java, long been driven out of the market, and sufficient time has not been given for them to return.
The extensive produce of this fine island in sugar and coffee of superior quality, and the pepper and various other articles, either yielded by it or collected from the neighbouring countries, such as sago, tin, Japan copper, spices, elephants' teeth, sticklac, long pepper, cubebs, tortoise-shell, gold, diamonds, Japan wood, ebony, rattans, indigo, &c. present fine subjects for commercial speculation to all parts of Europe and America, the Cape of Good Hope, and the Mauritius; and the more so, as from the extensive native and European population, a very considerable and constant demand exists for the produce and manufactures of Europe, not only for the consumption and use of the island itself, but to supply the neighbouring Malayan states by way of barter.
The quantity of sugar seems to depend almost entirely upon the demand, and is likely at all times to equal it, few countries affording equal advantages for its manufacture. Owing to the want of a demand for this kind of produce, for several years antecedent to the conquest, many of the manufactories were discontinued; but since the trade has been opened, and the demand renewed, many of them have again commenced working, and the quantity produced in the year 1815 was not less than twenty thousand píkuls.
The manufacturers being no longer compelled to deliver their produce to government, can afford to sell the sugar at Batavia at from four to six Spanish dollars (or from twenty to thirty shillings) per píkul, the quality being distinguished into first, second, and third sorts, of which the first may be bought in the market for exportation at six Spanish dollars per píkul, or about twenty-five shillings the hundred-weight. The quality of this sugar is altogether different from the sugar in Bengal, and is said to be equal to that of Jamaica, being manufactured in a great measure according to the same process. While the European market is open for coffee and other light articles, the sugar of Java is always in demand for dead weight, and large quantities have recently been sold in the London market as high as ninety and one hundred shillings per hundred-weight[62].