Segak. — The Balance of Trade. 191 



or, roughly, about 50 per cent. But it has to be further remem- 

 bered that in 1877 more than half the tonnage consisted of sailing- 

 vessels, whereas now the tonnage is about 80 per cent, steam, 

 and steamers, by reason of their greater speed, have an annual 

 carrying-capacity of about three or four times that of the same 

 tonnage of sailing-vessels. To put it moderately, then, compared 

 with 1877 the British excess of imports at the present time is 

 not relatively greater, and if it is to be reasoned that Britain is 

 now in a bad way because of it, it must also be concluded that 

 she was then also in a very parlous state. We do not now heal 

 that she was then living on her capital, although the alarmists 

 of the time loudly proclaimed their conviction of the fact. 

 Indeed, according to the estimate of Mulhall, the amount of 

 British capital invested abroad increased during the decennial 

 period 1872-82, in which the year 1877 is centrally situated, 

 by £275,000,000, and interest on this and other more recent 

 investments are now being received. Indeed, the total estimate 

 of British capital invested abroad was £600,000,000 in 1872, and 

 £875,000,000 in 1882, whereas now it is estimated at not less 

 than £2,000,000,000. If, then, in the years about 1877, when the 

 excess of imports reached £142,000,000, England was still in- 

 vesting abroad at such a great rate, surely now, with so much 

 more valuable shipping, and so much more capital invested 

 abroad, she is able to import an excess of £180,000,000 without 

 living on her capital. 



And what happened after 1877 ? There was a great drop 

 in the excess of imports, and ten years after the excess was less 

 than £81,000,000, as five years before it was only £40,000,000. 

 There is every reason to anticipate that we have now similarly 

 reached a maximum in the balance of trade, and that, as before, 

 the further trend of the graph in Fig. 1 will be for a time down- 

 wards. Then a rise again in the balance of trade to £200,000,000 

 or more in some future year will convince the alarmists of the 

 future that England is living on her capital, though they will be 

 willing to admit that she was not doing so in the year A.D. 1904. 



Balance of Trade of the United State*. 



Owing to the imports of the United States being valued ac- 

 cording to the value at the port of shipment instead of that of im- 

 portation, the graph representing the balance of trade in Fig. 2 

 would have to be altered somewhat in form, and raised as a whole 

 relatively to the base line, to make it strictly comparable with 

 those for the other nations. But taking the returns as they are 

 they show that whereas the United States had at one time an 

 excess of imports, she has had annually since 1876. with three 

 exceptions, an excess of exports. Allowance must, however, be 



