While, Therefore, British And American Commerce
Have Been Increasing, The General Commerce Of The Whole Civilized World,
And Even Of
Parts hardly civilized, have been increasing; but in no country
nearly to the extent to which it has reached in
Britain and the United
States, because none are blessed with the political advantages they enjoy,
or have the improved machinery and capital of the one, or the almost
inexhaustible land of the other.
In the details which we are now about to give, we shall confine ourselves
to the statement of any particular circumstance which may have been
favourable or otherwise to the commerce of any country during the last
hundred years, and to an enumeration of the principal ports and articles of
import and export of each country. We shall not attempt to fix the value of
the imports and exports in toto, or of any particular description of them,
because there are in fact no grounds on which it can be accurately fixed.
We shall, however, in the arrangement of the order of the goods exported,
place ihose first which constitute the most numerous and important
articles.
1. The countries in the north of Europe, including Russia, Sweden, Norway,
Denmark, and the countries generally on the south shores of the Baltic.
From the geographical situation of these countries, and their consequent
climate, the chief articles of the export commerce must consist in the
coarsest produce of the soil. These, and the produce of their mines, are
the sources of their wealth, and consequently of their commerce.
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