NO. 37.— 1888.] INDUSTRIES OP CEYLON. 



337 



a comparatively isolated and independent position, its 

 inhabitants accommodating their wants to their own local 

 resources. In some the avenues of access were closed against 

 all foreigners, except a favoured few, on whom they depended 

 for some necessary exchange of commodities. In modern 

 times, however, such exclusiveness has become impossible. 

 Steam navigation, railways, and telegraphs, have brought 

 nearly every habitable part of the earth into direct inter- 

 course with all the rest. Keen traders issue forth, laden 

 with the products of countries where industry has fructified 

 abundantly, to find markets for the surplusage of their 

 productions. Thus an almost universal interchange of com- 

 modities has been established. Old barriers have been 

 broken down, until at length few hindrances remain to 

 prevent free access to the recesses of even the most jealously 

 guarded countries. The special resources and requirements 

 of each, what it can most cheaply supply, and what it most 

 urgently wants, thus become generally known, and commerce 

 sets up a process of distribution and equalisation which 

 seems to be destined to eventuate in a general equilibrium. 

 With this knowledge every country might turn to account 

 its special capabilities and advantages to the purposes for 

 which it is best adapted. Many industries which were 

 formerly pursued under adverse conditions, in certain places, 

 have already been superseded by new ones more suitable to 

 the circumstances. A still more comprehensive re-adjust- 

 ment will doubtless be effected by a greater freedom of 

 intercourse, which, if carried out to its natural results, will 

 eventuate in each country's producing the commodities for 

 which it is best adapted. In the meantime, however, this 

 natural tendency of universal competition is being checked 

 by means of artificial expedients, such as prohibitive or pro- 

 tective tariffs whereby local advantages are nullified and 

 adverse conditions perpetuated. The good of the many is 

 sacrificed for the benefit of a few, and the natural tendency 

 is perverted. This old fashioned method of interfering with 

 natural growth, though still maintained extensively, must 



