COMMERCE, INTERNATIONAL. 



175 



000 barrels; 1864-'68, 15,140,176; 1869-78. 

 80.010,119; and 1874-78, 67,568,775; total 

 production for the twenty years, 111,082,070 

 barrels. The exports of petroleum from the 

 United States in the year 1876, in barrels of 

 cniilo oil or their equivalent, the barrel con- 

 taining 42 gallons, were 7,497,856 bbls. ; tho 

 home consumption for the same year, 2,677,- 

 158 bbls.; in 1877, exports 10,175,014 bbls., 

 home consumption 2,761,574 bbls. ; in 1878, ex- 

 ports 10,853,774 bbls., home consumption 

 8,769,226 bbls. Of the production of 1878, 

 66-4 per cent, was shipped abroad, 24'2 per 

 cent, went into consumption in the United 

 States, and 9 4 4 per cent, went to increase the 

 surplus stock. The total production in 1878 

 was 15,165,462 bbls., against 13,135,671 in 

 1877, and 8,968,906 in 1876. The daily aver- 

 age consumption in 1878 was 38,494 bbls., 

 against 84,351 in 1877, an increase of over 12 

 per cent. The shipments to New York from 

 the oil regions in 1876 were 24 per cent, of 

 the total shipments, in 1877 35 per cent., and 

 in 1878 43 per cent. The Cleveland refineries 

 consume 20 to 24 per cent, of the total ship- 

 ments, and 14 to 19 per cent, goes to Pitts- 

 burgh ; the Oil Creek refiners, who in 1876 and 

 1877 took 13 or 14 per cent, of the oil shipped, 

 in 1878 consumed but 2 per cent. 



In England the evils of declining prices and 

 a contracted trade have made themselves felt 

 with greater severity in each succeeding year. 

 In 1877, as in 1876, the English money market 

 was in a languishing condition. The Bank's 

 mean rate of discount for the year was 2|- per 

 cent., against 2J per cent, in 1876 ; the rate ia 

 the open market was about the same as in the 

 preceding year, averaging 2J per cent. The 

 financial situation of the country was seriously 

 impaired by a rise in the price of wheat of 

 about 20 per cent. ; the advance from 46s. 2d. 

 to 56. 9J. in this period of stagnation ag- 

 gravated greatly the general distress. The in- 

 crease in the cost of living, happening at a 

 time of feeble business and low markets for 

 manufactured goods, excited numerous conflicts 

 between labor and capital : there occurred not 

 less than 161 separate strikes within the year 

 1877. Pauperism increased 11 per cent, this 

 year, comparing it with the last. Owing to 

 the unusual requirements for food, the importa- 

 tions were largely in excess of those of the 

 preceding year, increasing the total commerce 

 from 698,449,631 to 723,716,620, or 3;6 per 

 cent. ; yet the export trade continued in the 

 same downward course which commenced in 

 1873. 



The year 1878 was marked by deepening 

 financial gloom in England, and the appearance 

 of serious distress among the working popula- 

 tion. The situation was aggravated by disas- 

 trous financial failures. A crisis in the cotton 

 trade occurred, in which the manufacturers, 

 who had been keeping their mills working at a 

 loss for several years, until many of them stood 

 on the brink of bankruptcy, and had kept up 



tho stock of manufactured goods beyond any 

 present demand, and underbid each other till 

 prices were at the lowest ebb, were threat- 

 ened with a double danger by a dearth in the 

 supply of raw cotton, which kept up tho price 

 of the material, while the failure of several 

 manufacturers and the critical situation of 

 others threw their stocks of cotton goods on 

 the market and depressed the prices of manu- 

 factures. In the coal and iron industries the 

 situation was equally gloomy, and there can 

 be no doubt that the substitution of steel for 

 iron will cause a gradual decay of those trades, 

 extended as they had been by the sudden and 

 enormous demand for iron before 1878. In 

 the stock market there has been a large un- 

 loading of American State securities, which 

 have returned to America, and of Russian 

 securities, which went to Germany and France. 

 The great Glasgow failure caused less distress 

 in the money and loan market than in the in- 

 dustrial districts of the north. 



The failure of the City of Glasgow Bank, 

 which closed its payments on the 2d of Octo- 

 ber, 1878, amounted almost to a national dis- 

 aster, reducing hundreds and thousands of 

 families in the south of Scotland to beggary. 

 The investigation of the affairs of this gigantic 

 institution after its collapse revealed a degree 

 of willful deceit and criminal recklessness on 

 the part of its managers which set the public 

 to reflecting anew on the justice of the reputa- 

 tion for integrity formerly deserved and long 

 enjoyed by the British merchant. The bank 

 was established in 1839. Its paid-up capital 

 was 1,000,000. It had one hundred and 

 thirty-one branches, distributed all over Scot- 

 land. Although its bills had never stood A 1 

 in Lombard Street, the public had no suspicion 

 of its condition until the day it was closed ; on 

 the very preceding day its shares stood at 2'35i 

 in the market. For years before the published 

 statements of the condition of the bank were 

 made up of a tissue of falsehoods and forgeries. 

 All the books were falsified. The statement 

 published four months before the failure, when 

 a dividend of 12 per cent, was voted, gave the 

 amount of bills receivable over a million pounds 

 too high ; the good securities were overstated 

 by nearly the same amount ; and a couple of 

 hundred thousand pounds were fictitiously add- 

 ed to the account of cash in the vaults. In the 

 June statement the liabilities to the public were 

 given as ten millions ; in October the liquida- 

 tors found them twelve millions. In June the 

 assets balanced the liabilities and capital ac- 

 count ; after the failure they were found to be 

 7,213,314, leaving a deficit of 6,783,079. 

 The City of Glasgow Bank, like all the Scot- 

 tish banks of issue except the three oldest, was 

 incorporated under the provision of the unlim- 

 ited liability of the shareholders. The deluded 

 shareholders, beyond the loss of their invest- 

 ment in the stock, which they had bought 

 mostly at prices far above par, were therefore 

 holden each and all of them, to the extent of 



