FOREIGN TRADE NO REMEDY. 211 



doing for China, Dom Pedro is doing for Brazil, but 

 it may be, in a different form. That country, like 

 every other, in order to prosper and develop must do 

 its own work; this fact its intelligent ruler thor- 

 oughly understands and acts upon. 



We have our own work to do and no other. It is 

 the only work we can control, and is our only depend- 

 ence. Is it wise to neglect or sacrifice it for the pur- 

 pose of grasping what we can not hold, even if we 

 could once get it ? We have our own market to sup- 

 ply, and our trade at home, and there is no other over 

 which we can, by any possibility, have full command. 

 This market and the consequent trade may be almost 

 indefinitely extended. Is it wise to destroy it in pur- 

 suit of an ignis fatuus ? 



With our industries and home traffic rehabilitated 

 there can be no doubt that our foreign trade would 

 largely increase in some directions. But it would be 

 of a character very unlike the present, and based on a 

 very different foundation. It would be a trade resting 

 on the wealth of the people, and not living on their 

 poverty ; a trade that would add to our comfort, and 

 not increase our miseries. Our best consumers and 

 customers are at home. It is our home market that 

 furnishes, or that can be made to furnish, an inex- 

 haustible source of wealth and comfort for all ; whilst 

 a general foreign market for our products can be ob- 

 tained only at the cost of more than ten dollars of 

 home trade for one of foreign, with the pauperizing 

 of our people and the destruction of our institutions. 



But all the evils of foreign trade are by no means 

 confined to the effort for successful competition in ob- 



