GOVERNMENTAL INTERFERENCE. 291 



this period in breaking down the artificial barriers which they had pre- 

 viously erected against international trade, but they also sought, as 

 never before, to overcome the natural impediments that had hitherto 

 limited the extension of their trade relations — internal as well as ex- 

 ternal — by impi'oving their highways, constructing and combining rail- 

 ways, and undertaking such stupendous engineering operations as the 

 St. Gothard and Arlberg tunnels. 



How wonderfully the trade of the states of Europe, that thus 

 mainly co-operated for promoting the freedom of exchange, coinci- 

 dently developed, with an undoubted corresponding increase in the 

 wealth and prosperity of their people, is shown by the fact that the 

 European trade of the six nations of Austria, Belgium, France, Hol- 

 land, Italy, and Great Britain increased, during the years from 1860 

 to 18T3, more than 100 per cent, while their aggregate population 

 during the same period increased but 7*8 per cent. How much this 

 remarkable increase of trade was due to the existence and influence of 

 the commercial treaties noted, is demonstrated by the further fact 

 that the increase of the trade of the above-named six nations during 

 the same period with all other countries, in which the conditions of 

 exchange had presumably not been liberalized, was at the rate of only 

 66 per cent. It is also interesting to note that the response made by 

 the Chambers of Commerce and various industrial bodies throughout 

 France to an inquiry addressed to them by the Government in 1875, 

 not only testified to the great benefit which had accrued to French 

 trade and industries by reason of her commercial treaties, but also 

 expressed an almost universal wish that they might be renewed upon 

 their expiration upon even a more liberal basis ; and it is altogether 

 probable that a similar response would have been made in most of the 

 other countries in Europe had like inquiries at the same time been in- 

 stituted. 



But, after the continuance for some years of the almost universal 

 depression of trade and industry which commenced in 1873, or after 

 the year 1876, the tendency of the governmental policy of the states 

 of Continental Europe, and to a great extent also popular sentiment, 

 turned in an opposite direction, or toward commercial illiberality. And 

 now nearly all of the liberal commercial treaties above referred to 

 have been terminated, or notice has been given of their non-renewal ; 

 and, with the exception of Great Britain, Holland, Sweden and Nor- 

 way, Denmark,* and possibly China, there is not a state in the world 

 claiming civilization and maintaining commerce to any extent with 



Trade, at the annual meeting of the British Association for the rromotion of Social 

 Science, October, 18Y5. 



* Denmark must be regarded as a purely agricultui-al country, possessing no mineral 

 resources or mining population, and very few manufactories, " and while one half of the 

 population live exclusively by agriculture, the industries and various branches of general 

 trade and commerce afPord occupation to less than one fourth of the whole number." — 

 Testimony Bnlish Commission on the Depression of Trade and Industri/. 



