Trade and the Flag 5 



reason — geographical situation — the United States secures the 

 larger part of French Tahiti's trade; 10 although the trade of the 

 Society Islands with the United States was somewhat less in 

 1906 than in 1905, owing to the San Francisco earthquake, yet 

 48 per cent of the imports were drawn from the United States, 

 and 44 per cent of the exports went thereto. 11 Japan's geograph- 

 ical position in turn gives her an advantage over her western 

 rivals, in trade as well as in strategic position. 12 Formosa's trade 

 with China is larger than with any other foreign country, 13 for 

 though the island is politically Japanese, it continues commercially 

 Chinese, since; according to Parker, 95 per cent of the trade is 

 either with the mainland or with Honkong. 14 Later returns, how- 

 ever, show that part of the Formosan trade with China is being 

 transferred to Japan. 15 



The strength of custom as a factor in trade 16 is well shown in 

 German Southwest Africa. The natives there had been accus- 

 tomed to buy of the English, and the early German traders found 

 it necessary, in order to sell their goods, to substitute English 

 trade marks for their own. 17 The strength of the hold of custom, 

 however, varies according to the temperament of people. The 

 restless spirit, such as we find in the United States, -buys, now 

 here and now there, always in the hope of betterment. 



10 Cf. Statesman's Y ear-Book, 1903, 640. 



11 Dreher, " Society Islands," in U. S. Consular Reports, September, 

 1907, 103. 



12 Cf. Stead, Great Japan, 204; Stead, Japan To-day, 231. 



13 Cf. Colquhoun, Mastery of the Pacific, 395. 



14 Parker, China, 142. 



15 " A change has already taken place in that the Japanese goods which 

 have hitherto been imported through Hong Kong and Amoy, now come 

 direct from Japan, and many of the exports to foreign countries are now 

 sent by way of Japan. The natives, who used to wear clothes of Chinese 

 manufacture, and live on food grown in China, are now beginning to use 

 Japanese manufactures. The trade relations between Formosa and Japan 

 are becoming closer and closer." — Takekoshi, Japanese Rule in Formosa, 

 271-272. 



19 Cf. Parkin, Imperial Federation. 290. 



,7 Cf. Keller, Colonization, 569 



l8l 



