Early Relations between the United States and China. 73 



the value of more than $300,000. Lead was brought in ingots 

 from Gibraltar and elsewhere to the value of about half that of 

 copper. 101 A very little steel was brought in from England and 

 Sweden. 102 The importation of opium by Americans was always 

 much less than that by the English, and most of it was the 

 inferior kind obtained in Turkey. Figures are difficult to obtain 

 for it, since it was a contraband article, but it seems to have 

 been first regularly imported about 1816. One year, 1831-2, it was 

 brought in to the value of more than two million dollars 103 but - 

 this seems to have been its high-water mark. In few years did it 

 approach that amount. Ginseng still continued to be shipped ~ 

 from America, but rarely to the value of $2OO,ooo. 104 Rattans, 

 pepper, nutmegs, tin from the Straits Settlements cochineal,&quot; 

 cloves, and coral, are all articles which appear with more or less 

 regularity in the list of minor imports, 105 but none of them were 

 of great importance. It is hard to tell just when their importa 

 tion began. 



One last group of American imports to China, British manu 

 factures, needs more than passing mention, partly because of its 

 value, 100 partly because it illustrates American enterprise, but 



101 Ch. Rep., 2:463. Letters and Recollections of J. M. Forbes, 1:70. 



102 Chinese Repos., 2 : 471. 



1113 Phipps, China and Eastern Trade, p. 313. 

 104 Pitkin, Stat. View., ed. 1835, p. 49. 



103 Phipps, China and Eastern Trade, p. 313, and Chinese Rep. 6:284-286. 



106 Parl. Papers, 1820, 5 : 183. Testimony of Charles Everett, an Ameri 

 can Commission Merchant. He gave as the amounts shipped in this way 

 through him, for 1818, 1,809 Ibs. sterling, for 1819, 26,448 Ibs. sterling, 

 for 1820, 139,639 Ibs. sterling, 1821, 190,190 Ibs. sterling, 1822, 28,468 Ibs. 

 sterling, 1823, 67,048 Ibs. sterling, 1824, 125,681 Ibs. sterling, 1825, 7,408 

 Ibs. sterling, 1826, 168,354 Ibs. sterling, 1827, 45,696 Ibs. sterling, 1828, 

 51,481 Ibs. sterling. Joshua Bates, Ibid., 6:365, testified that one firm 

 (probably Perkins and Company) had exported in 1826, 120,000 Ibs. 

 sterling, in 1827, 82,000 Ibs. sterling, in 1828, 98,000 Ibs. sterling, in 1829, 

 147,000 Ibs. sterling. The East India Company estimated the amount 

 for 1823 as 107,531 Ibs. sterling, of which 32,614 Ibs. sterling were in 

 cottons, and 73,083 Ibs. sterling were woolens. Ibid., pp. 724-727. Parl. 

 Papers, 1833, E. India Co. Papers relating to trade with India and China, 

 from S. Cabell, Accountant General of E. India Co., give the figure 

 for 1829-30 as $11,122,066, for 1830-1 as $781,429, for 1831-2 as $637,822, 

 and of the E. India Co. for these years, as $2,675,371, $2,818,766, and 

 $2,956,209 respectively. 



