470 



REPORT 1879. 



were, without the application of capital and labour, of simply nominal value. All 

 the resources of such a State are applied to production, and transport is a condition 

 without which production can merely supply local food, without producing ex- 

 changeable commodities. With the development of the means of transport by 

 railways, new communities are no longer in a position to be self-sufficing in com- 

 munications, and are dependent on the supply of external capital for rails, machinery, 

 and works. These must be furnished by credit, and where credit cannot be ob- 

 tained the country must remain undeveloped. This resource of credit has been 

 unduly neglected in many States of the American Union, and in those of Central 

 and South America. To ascertain the statistical value of this credit, he took the 

 amount expended by the State, by municipalities, and by companies on public works, 

 supplementing this by a further sum where the credit was unexhausted. Thus, Mr. 

 Clarke estimated the minimum credit of Canada at 50,000,000/., of New South Wales 

 at 30,000,000/., of Victoria at 30,000,000/., of South Australia at 15,000,000/., of 

 Queensland at 20,000,000/., of Tasmania at 5,000,000/., of Natal at 4,000,000/. 

 At zero, he estimated Bolivia, Costa Bica, Ecuador, Greece, Guatemala, Hayti, Hon- 

 duras, Mexico, Persia, Peru, San Domingo, Venezuela. The cultivation and main- 

 tenance of credit he urged as an essential provision in the administration of a 

 State, and as an immense resource. He contrasted England, the United States, 

 Germany, and France, with Russia and China. 



FRIDAY, AUGUST 22, 1879. 



The following Papers were read : — 



1. On the Decay m the Export Trade of tjie United Kingdom. 

 By S. Bourne, F.S.S. 



The question whether the diminution in the value of the exports of British and 

 Irish produce and manufacture, which has undoubtedly taken_ place in recent years, 

 is solely one of price and not in quantity, has given rise to considerable discussion. 

 The Prime Minister, in his place in Parliament, has, on the authority of a 

 report from the head of the Statistical Department of the Board of Trade — in 

 which the trade of 1877 was compared with that of 1873 — taken comfort from 

 the thought that had the prices of 1873 been realised in the valuation of 1877, 

 the two years would only have differed by a million of money instead of the 

 apparent difference of forty-five millions, and most of the leadiug political 

 economists have adopted the same view for other years. Yet there is reason to 

 doubt whether the decay has not been to a great extent in volume as well as 

 value — in quantity as well as price. 



There is no difficulty in determining to which cause this is owing in the case of 

 any single article of which we possess records, of both quantity and value ; but 

 where some have increased and others decreased it is only by analysing the 

 returns, assigning to each item its relative proportion, and combining the results, 

 that it can be ascertained to which or in what degree the preponderance of either 

 cause is on the whole to be awarded. Tables are compiled for the seven principal 

 articles of export, viz. : Cotton, jute, linen and woollen manufactures, coal, copper, 

 and iron, contrasting the several periods — 1877 with 1873, 1878 with 1872, and 

 the first six months of 1879 with 1872 — bringing out the followins; results. 



