  It has now been shown, first that there is nothing in the general figures of our import and export trade to warrant the alarmist view expressed in “Made in Germany,” and secondly, that the country whose rivalry is supposed to be ruining us is one of the best of all our customers. What I propose to do in the present chapter is to examine some of the detailed statements in Mr. Williams’s book and to show that in many cases the inferences he draws are so seriously exaggerated as to amount to a positive misrepresentation of the facts. For the purposes of this examination we cannot do better than begin with the chapter which Mr. Williams devotes to chemicals. “The chemical trade,” he tells us, “is the barometer of a nation’s prosperity.... The discomforting significance of the appearance of chemicals in this Black List of mine will, therefore, be at once apparent.” More follows about a “Bottomless pit for capital,” and “Germany seizing the occasion while England has let hers slide,” and so on. THE ALKALI TRADE.Thus much for generalities with regard to the chemical trade; now for details. Let us begin with alkalies, which Mr. Williams selects for special comment. He says:— “Here we are confronted with the damning fact that whereas fresh uses and (owing to the growth of manufactures abroad) fresh markets for alkali products are continually being found, the export of the greatest alkali trader of the world was last year of little more than half its value in the early seventies. Nor do the latest years show any sign of recuperation. The decline since 1891 has been continuous.... There is no question here of an insidious advance. The matter is simply that our trade has gone to the devil, while the Germans are piling up fortunes.” To the average reader this paragraph would certainly suggest that at least half our trade in alkali had already disappeared, and that the remainder would soon be gone to the devil or elsewhere. I have not verified Mr. Williams’s statement with regard to the early seventies, but it is quite sufficient to point to the course of the trade during the Exports of Alkali from the United Kingdom.
These figures show that our alkali trade has been on the whole remarkably steady, except for the slight ups and downs in successive years to which all trades are liable. To show these ups and downs more graphically, I have drawn the following diagram, covering the last ten years’ exports:— Diagram of the Quantities of British Alkali Exported.If the reader will examine this diagram and the more complete figures given above he will be able to see how completely misleading are Mr. Williams’s sensational statements about the British alkali trade. I do not for a moment deny that the German alkali trade has made remarkable progress; I only assert that there is no evidence that “our trade has gone to the devil.” CHEMICAL MANURES.We turn next to chemical manures. On this subject Mr. Williams remarks:— “Every farmer will testify to the exceeding value of these stuffs. ’Tis a modern means of fertilising the soil, and there can be no It may be true—probably is true—that the industry of Germany is expanding in this as in almost every other branch of the chemical trades. It is also true that the value of chemical manures sent by Germany to this country—still only a quarter of what we send to Germany—is increasing. What is not true is the statement that England’s grip on the trade is “obviously relaxing.” The figures are given below. They do not look much like a relaxed grip. Exports of Chemical Manures from the United Kingdom.In Millions Sterling.
The figures for the past ten years are illustrated in the following diagram:— Salt is the next subject to which Mr. Williams turns. What he has to say about it is more picturesque than accurate:— “The story is worth study. The Salt Union was formed in England in 1889, and the manufacture of salt thereby converted into a big monopoly.... The directors reckoned without their Most impressive! if only it were true. So far as the world market is concerned, the figures below give no indications of the havoc alleged to have been wrought by the machinations of the Salt Union. Exports of British Salt.
So far as India is concerned, Mr. Williams is doubly wrong. In the first place, German salt has not “to a large extent ousted English.” During the past five years—it was only in 1889 that the wicked Salt Union came into being—Indian imports of salt have been as follows:— Indian Imports of Salt.Thousands of Tons.
This does not look as if English salt were being ousted by German. In the second place, it is not true that German salt is much cheaper than Cheshire, at any rate so far as the Indian market is concerned. It will be found by reference to the Indian Blue Books that the price of German salt imported into India in 1894-5 works out to 17·6 rupees per ton, and the price of English salt only to 17·0 CHEMICAL DYE STUFFS.We next pass to chemical dye stuffs. It is undoubtedly true that in this branch of manufacture Germany has gone ahead at a remarkable rate, and it is also probable that some of our manufacturers have allowed themselves to be passed in the race by neglecting the scientific methods which Germans employ. But that is no reason why Mr. Williams should exaggerate his case. In order to magnify the fall in our trade, if such there be, he picks out the year of highest export (1890) and says, Lo! since 1890 our export of dye stuffs has dropped from £530,000 to £473,000. One cannot tell whether this is a real drop in trade, or merely the consequence of a fall in price, but this we do know—that the value of our exports fluctuates largely from year to year, and that 1895 was a good average year. The figures for ten years are given below:— Values of Dye Stuffs Exported.
FANCY SOAPS AND FANCY ASSERTIONS.The last point in Mr. Williams’s chapter on the chemical trades with which it is worth while to deal is what he says about soap:— “In the old days, when brown Windsor was a luxury, Englishmen washed with soap of English make; and those who could not afford ‘scented’ cleansed themselves with ‘yellow’ or ‘mottled.’ Thanks (partly) to Continental chemistry, we have changed all that.... The progress of practical chemistry has evidently reached a point at which the manufacture of agreeable toilet soaps at a low figure is possible. But why should this manufacture be so largely in foreign hands? They twit us with our debased fondness for the tub, and they do but add injury to insult when they send us soap for use therein. The Germans—a non-tubbing race—have not yet invaded the English soap market so victoriously as is their wont, though even here the Teuton hand may be discerned by the expert in forged trade marks.” Here are the figures:— Exports of Soap from the United Kingdom.
The following diagram illustrates the almost continuous increase in the value of our soap exports during the last ten years:— |
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