140 COMMERCE AND EXCHANGE 



The definite determination of the fate of the interoceanic canal 

 has been so recently the subject of wide discussion that little more 

 need be said about it. To attempt to determine accurately, in ad- 

 vance, the exact effect of the canal assumes powers prophetic. Some 

 few things are, however, clear. The canal will greatly assist trade 

 between the manufacturing centers of the Atlantic and the Orient, 

 and also with the west coast of South America; it will afford a 

 cheaper route to market for grain and lumber from the Pacific Coast 

 of North America, and for sugar from the islands of the Pacific; it 

 will force a reduction in the through rates on the transcontinental 

 railroads and still further emphasize the advantage of coast over 

 interior by forcing still larger differentials than now exist in favor 

 of the former. It will mark the end of long-distance transportation 

 in sailing-ships. 



SECTION 4 

 The Opening of China 



The Japanese war with China, bringing in its train the cession of 

 many pieces of China's territory to foreign countries, created a 

 whirlwind in world politics of a very violent character. In the dust 

 which this whirlwind raised it looked as though China was threat- 

 ened with disintegration. When, after the Boxer outbreak, with its 

 accompanying international military pageant at Pekin, the storm 

 subsided and it became possible to estimate the results, it was seen 

 that from an economical and commercial point of view China had 

 changed but little. Nine cities had been added to the list of treaty 

 ports as a more or less direct result of the Treaty of Shemonoseki. 

 The inland waters of China had been opened to foreigners, and trading 

 and warehouse privileges extended, on paper at least. But the net 

 result to trade during the following six years was an increase of only 

 ten per cent, a rate of increase less than two per cent per annum 

 on the average which might well have come without so much 

 turmoil. 



The insistence of Great Britain and of the United States upon the 

 open door in China, while preventing many complications that 

 threatened serious interruptions in trade, had a defensive rather than 

 an aggressive value. It held the doors open, but it stimulated no 

 new trade. In short, the opening of China in any real commercial 

 sense is still a matter of the future. The future, however, is in this 

 respect bright with hope. 



The necessity for re-examining the customs duties of China, and 

 of strengthening the hands of its excellent administration, which 

 arose from the arrangements to insure the payment of the indem- 

 nity after the Boxer outbreak, afforded an opportunity for lighten- 



