From 1815 To 1819 The Productions Registered At The Custom-House Of That Port Only (Sugar, Rum, Molasses, Coffee, Wax And Butter) Amounted, On The Average, To The Value Of 11,245,000 Piastres Per Annum.

In 1823 the exportation registered two-thirds less than their actual price, amounted (deducting 1,179,000 piastres in specie) to more than 12,500,000 piastres.

It is probable that the importations of the whole island (lawful and contraband), estimated at the real price of the articles, the merchandize and the slaves, amount at present to 15,000,000 or 16,000,000 piastres, of which scarcely 3,000,000 or 4,000,000 are re-exported. The Havannah purchases from abroad far beyond its own wants, and exchanges its colonial articles for the productions of the manufactures of Europe, to sell a part of them at Vera Cruz, Truxillo, Guayra, and Carthagena.

On comparing, in the commercial tables of the Havannah, the great value of merchandise imported, with the little value of merchandise re-exported, one is surprised at the vast internal consumption of a country containing only 325,000 whites and 130,000 free men of colour. We find, in estimating the different articles, according to the real current prices: in cotton and linen (bretanas, platillas, lienzos y hilo), two and a half to three millions of piastres; in tissues of cotton (zarazas musulinas), one million of piastres; in silk (rasos y generos de seda), 400,000 piastres; and in linen and woollen tissues, 220,000 piastres. The wants of the island, in European tissues, registered as exported to the port of the Havannah only, consequently exceeded, in these latter years, from four millions to four and a half millions of piastres. To these importations of the Havannah we must add: hardware and furniture, more than half a million of piastres; iron and steel, 380,000 piastres; planks and great timber, 400,000 piastres; Castile soap, 300,000 piastres. With respect to the importation of provisions and drinks to the Havannah, it appears to me to be well worthy the attention of those who would know the real state of those societies which are called sugar or slave colonies. Such is the composition of those societies established on the most fruitful soil which nature can furnish for the nourishment of man, such the direction of agricultural labours and industry in the West Indies, that, in the best climate of the equinoctial region, the population would want subsistence but for the freedom and activity of external commerce. I do not speak of the introduction of wines at the port of the Havannah, which amounted (according to the registers of the custom-house), in 1803, to 40,000 barrels; in 1823, to 15,000 pipas and 17,000 barrels, to the value of 1,200,000 piastres; nor of the introduction of 6000 barrels of brandy from Spain and Holland, and 113,000 barrels (1,864,000 piastres) of flour. These wines, liquors and flour are consumed by the opulent part of the nation.

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