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MANUFACTURES AND TRADE 



FOREIGN COMMERCE OF THE UNITED STATES. 



From official sources we collect the fol- 

 lowing statistics showing the volume of 

 our foreign commerce for a series of years: 



Exports. 



1889 $ 742,401,375 



1890 857,828,684 



1891 884,480,810 



1892 1,030.278,148 



1893 847,665,194 



18!>4 892.140,572 



1895 808,059,419 



Total 



Imports. Commerce. 



$745,131,052 $1.487,533,027 



789,310,409 1,647,139,093 



844,916,190 1,729,397,000 



827,402,462 1,857,680,610 



866,400,922 1,714,066.116 



654,994,622 1,547,135,195 



743,742,849 1,551,802,259 



The figures given are for the fiscal 

 years ending with June 30, and it will be 

 seen that our foreign commerce attained 

 high water mark during the year ending 

 with June, 1892. A change of tariff 

 schedules has taken place during the time 

 under review, and a violent convulsion in 

 the financial world has also occurred; yet 

 all causes combined have not so very seri- 

 ously crippled our foreign trade, as the 

 above figures will testify. The ultimate 

 effects of recent tariff legislation cannot 

 yet be foreseen, but they are almost cer- 

 tain to increase the imports if they do not 

 diminish the exports. 



SOUTH AFRICAN MINING IN A NUTSHELL. 



Probably not since the days of John 

 Law and his celebrated "Mississippi 

 Scheme," has the general public of Eng- 

 land and France especially, gone into 

 wilder or more hopelessly reckless specu- 

 lation. The mining stocks of the 

 Johannesberg region in Southi Africa 

 formed the basis of innumerable wildcat 

 concerns which have drained dry the stock 

 markets of both England and France. 

 Beyond a certain point, however, sensible 

 people who stop to think a bit, know the 

 whole business to be insane folly. Any- 

 one reading the following figures from the 

 London Statist, reprinted here from Brad- 

 street's of recent date, can see at a glance 

 how hopeless is the prospect of dividends 

 from West Kaffir mining shares: "At 

 the end of 1893 the capitalization of the 

 Witwatersrandt mines, on the basis of the 

 market price of the shares, was about 

 17,500,000, the return in dividends 1,- 

 000,000. At the end of 1894 the capi- 



260 



talization was about. 55,000,000, aud the 

 return in dividends about 1,500,000. 

 The present capitalization of the whole of 

 the mining companies having their field of 

 operations in South Africa cannot be' far 

 short of 300,000,000, while the actual 

 dividends for 1895 were not more than 

 2,500,000." Certainly, dividends of 

 only five-sixths of one per cent, should not 

 be very enticing to investors, even in these 

 days of low interest. 



SOMETHING ABOUT BANANAS. 



It is believed by many lovers of bananas 

 that if they could only eat the fruit di- 

 rectly from the plant they would find it 

 incomparably more delicious. This is an 

 error. Even on the plantations where 

 grown, bananas are never allowed to ripen 

 on the stalk. Like our pears, the banana 

 is much better if taken from the stalk 

 when mature, but not ripe, and allowed to 

 ripen elsewhere. The banana stalk bears 

 but one bunch of fruit, and is always cut 

 down in harvesting that bunch. " Suck- 

 ers " continually spring up from the roots 

 of the banana, hence the crop goes on, 

 one sucker after another coming up to bear 

 its bunch of fruit after those preceding it 

 have been cut down in the process of har- 

 vesting. The main sources of supply for 

 bananas coming to the United States are 

 Jamaica and the eastern coast of Central 

 America. From Port Limon, in Costa 

 Rica, a good many thousand fine bunches 

 come in every year, and also from the 

 region of Bluefield and the Escondido 

 river, in Nicaragua. But the largest ship- 

 ments are from Jamaica. For the year 

 1894 the value of bananas imported was 

 $4,960,747; and for 1893 it was $5,386,- 

 029. 



FREE ENTRY OF FOREIGN FRUIT BOXES MADE OF 

 AMERICAN MATERIAL. 



Everything seems to be interpreted in 

 favor of the foreigner when it comes to 

 the construction of our present tariff law. 

 Not long since the Board of Appraisers at 

 New York, who knocked the duty off 

 Grecian currants recently, made the fol- 



