Of cloves, which
bought in India for ninepence, sold in England for six shillings:
- 150,000
lbs. of nutmegs, bought for four-pence, sold for two shillings and
sixpence: - 50,000 lbs. of mace, bought for eightpence, sold for six
shillings: - 200,000 lbs. of indigo, bought for one shilling and twopence,
sold for five shillings: - 107,140 lbs. of China raw silk, bought for seven
shillings, sold for twenty shillings: - and 50,000 pieces of calico, bought
for seven shillings a piece, sold for twenty-six shillings.
In a third table he gives the annual consumption of the following India
goods, and the lowest prices at which they used to be sold, when procured
from Turkey or Lisbon, before England traded directly to India. There was
consumed of pepper, 400,000 lbs., which used to be sold at three shillings
and sixpence per lb.; of cloves, 40,000, at eight shillings; of mace,
20,000, at nine shillings; of nutmegs, 160,000, at four shillings and
sixpence; and of indigo, 150,000, at seven shillings. The result is, that
when England paid the lowest ancient prices, it cost her 183,500_l_. for
these commodities; whereas, at the common modern prices, it costs her only
108,333_l_. The actual saving therefore to the people of England, was not
near so great as might have been expected, or as it ought to have been,
from a comparison of the prices at Aleppo and in India.
There are some other particulars in Mr. Munn's Treatise relating to the
European Trade to the East at this period, which we shall select. Speaking
of the exportation of bullion to India, he says that the Turks sent
annually 500,000_l_. merely for Persian raw silk; and 600,000_l_. more for
calicoes, drugs, sugar, rice, &c.: their maritime commerce was carried on
from Mocha; their inland trade from Aleppo and Constantinople. They
exported very little merchandize to Persia or India. Marseilles supplied
Turkey with a considerable part of the bullion and money which the latter
used in her trade with the East, - sending annually to Aleppo and
Alexandria, at least 500,000_l_. and little or no merchandize. Venice sent
about 400,000_l_. and a great value in wares besides. Messina about
25,000_l_., and the low countries about 50,000_l_., besides great
quantities of gold and dollars from Germany, Poland, Hungary, &c. With
these sums were purchased either native Turkish produce and manufactures,
or such goods as Turkey obtained from Persia and other parts of the East:
the principal were camblets, grograms, raw silk, cotton wool and yarn,
galls, flax, hemp, rice, hides, sheeps' wool, wax, corn, &c. England,
according to Mr. Munn, did not employ much bullion, either in her Turkey or
her India trade; in the former she exported vast quantities of broad cloth,
tin, &c. enough to purchase nearly all the wares she wanted in Turkey,
besides three hundred great bales of Persian raw silk annually.
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