160 REPORT—1858. 
Foreign and Colonial Wool Imported and Exported. 
Foreign and 
Y Foreign wool | Colonial wool Total colonial woo] | Left for home 
eer imported. imported. imported, exported. consumption. 
1766 | 1,926,000 1,926,000 voce 1,926,000 
1799 | 2,263,666 olor 2,263,666 soroe 2,263,666 
1800 | 8,609,368 S00 8,609,368 2A 8,609,368 
1820 | 9,653,366 122,239 9,775,605 64,585 9,711,020 
1840 | 36,585,522 12,850,762 | 49,436,284 1,014,625 | 48,421,659 
1850 | 26,102,466 | 48,224,312 | 74,326,778 | 14,888,674 | 59,938,104 
1857 | 44,522,661 82,868,224 {127,390,885 | 36,487,219 | 90,903,666 
The changes which had taken place in the sources of supply were shown in the 
following Table :— 
Imports of Wool from the Principal Countries. 
Year, Spain. Germany. Australia. South Africa. | East Indies, 
Ibs. Ibs. Ibs. Ibs. Ibs. 
1800 6,062,824 412,394 jae vee 
1810 5,952,407 778,835 167 Pishalls sees 
1816 2,958,607 2,816,655 13,611 9,623 ae 
1820 3,936,229 5,113,442 99,415 29,717 ee 
1830 1,643,515 26,073,882 1,967,279 33,407 tee 
1834 2,343,915 22,634,615 3,558,091 141,707 67,763 
1840 1,266,905 21,812,099 9,721,243 751,741 2,441,370 
1850 440,751 9,166,731 39,018,221 5,709,529 3,473,252 
1857 383,129 5,993,380 | 49,209,655 14,287,828 19,370,741 
Here we see the decline in the quantity of Spanish wool imported from 6,062,824 
Ibs. in 1800, to 383,129 lbs, in 1857 ; the increase of German wool from 412,394 lbs, 
in 1800, to 26,073,882 lbs. in 1830; and its subsequent decline to 5,993,380 Ibs. in 
1857; the increase of Australian wool from 167 Ibs. in 1810, to 49,209,655 Ibs. in 
1857; the increase in South African or Cape wool from 9623 lbs, in 1816, to 14,287,828 
Ibs. in 1857; and the increase in East India wool from 67,763 lbs. in 1834, to 19,370,741 
Ibs. in 1857. These were remarkable commercial changes, and they warranted the 
hope that we might ere long find in the East Indies, Australia, and Africa, sources 
of supply for the still more important raw material of cotton, produced by the labour 
of freemen, instead of being so dangerously and perniciously dependent on the slave- 
raised cotton of the United States. ‘The imports of German wool had fallen off even 
to a greater extent than appeared from the above Table, inasmuch as there was now 
a large quantity of rag-wool, called shoddy and mungo, imported from Germany; and 
he was assured by Mr. Fonblanque, of the Statistical department of the Board of 
Trade, that no distinction was made at the Custom-house between the entries of the 
finest Saxon wool, which was of the value of 3s. per Ib., and those of shoddy, which 
was only worth a few pence per Ib. Since this paper was written, the Hon. Stephen 
Rice, Deputy-chairman of the Board of Customs, had assured him that shoddy should 
in future be entered separately from wool. Of the annual production of wool in the 
United Kingdom, there were, as had been said, no reliable statistics whatever, and 
the judgment of those engaged in the trade varied very widely. The balance of 
authority would dispose us to conclude that the annual produce of domestic wool must 
be between 150,000,000 Ibs. and 200,000,000 Ibs. If we took the medium, namely, 
* 175,000,000 Ibs. at 1s. 3d. per lb., which was about the average price of the last thirty 
years, the value of this great raw material produced at home would be £10,937,500. 
The judgment thus formed from a comparison of authorities had been exactly and 
unexpectedly confirmed by the result of careful inquiries and calculations, founded 
on the number of hands employed, the power of the machinery, and the estimated 
value of the goods manufactured. That result was that 160,000,000 lbs. is used by the 
