SOME SUPPOSITIONS ABOUT SALT.

Exports of Chemical Manures from the UK(By permission of the Proprietors of the “Daily Graphic.”)

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 theirGermany. They can make salt there, too. It is not so good as the Cheshire product, but it is salt, and it is much cheaper than that sold by the Salt Union. When that syndicate’s price went up the German manufacturers pushed into the world market, and that to a purpose which is strikingly illustrated in the case of our great Dependency. India needs much foreign salt, and the Indian ryot needs it cheap: for the salt he uses has to bear the burden of a tax. The natural result followed: German salt to a large extent ousted English from the Indian market.”

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.

1886188718881889189018911892189318941895Quantities—thousand tons805819899667726671654636769741Values—thousand £’s588525486539653596539505604546

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:—

Thousands of Tons.

Years ending March 31st.From U.K.From Germany.1891273611892222103189324147189426948189531582

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 17·0rupees per ton. In other words, German salt was of the two slightly the dearer. So much for the salt bogey which Mr. Williams had conjured up.

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:—

1886188718881889189018911892189318941895Thousands of £’s483499469492531524443452415473

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.”

If this paragraph means anything at all, it means that even in the soap industry our manufacturers are being beaten by the foreigner. To what extent foreign soap is imported into the United Kingdom it is impossible to ascertain, for no separate entry under that head is kept at the Custom House. But from the German Green Books one may learn that in 1895 Germany sent to Great Britain soap valued at £35,700. The amount sent by France may have been as much, and probably the United States also sent us a little. The total export of German soap to all parts of the world in 1895 was valued at £197,000. Now for the British side of the case! As to the total production and consumption of soap in this country, no figures are available, but everyone knows how enormous is the consumption of soap produced by English firms whose names are household words. In addition to their providing for the wants of probably ninety-nine out of a hundred of their own countrymen, our soap manufacturers do an enormous and rapidly growing business abroad.

Here are the figures:—

188118821883188418851886188718881889189018911892189318941895Quantities—thousd. cwts.354409392476402427453500493497524541605577728Values—thousd. £’s.398458450548472447452482503534571586644621757

The following diagram illustrates the almost continuous increase in the value of our soap exports during the last ten years:—

(By permission of the Proprietors of the “Daily Graphic.”)

Looking at the above figures, it will be seen that in the last six years alone we have added to our exports a sum greater than the total yet attained by Germany. Is it necessary to say more? What pessimistic madness could have led Mr. Williams to “black-list” such a splendidly-thriving and notoriously profitable industry as this, just because he finds a few thousand hundredweight of foreign soap creeping into the country?

Attentionwas called in the last chapter to some of the picturesque exaggerations—to use the mildest possible term—in which Mr. Williams had indulged in dealing with the chemical trades. We now pass to the two chapters which he devotes to the iron and steel and their “daughter trades.” And at the outset let it be clearly understood that I do not for a moment deny that in some of these trades the progress of Germany has been relatively more rapid than our own. A child, if it is to grow at all, must move faster than an adult. An infant four weeks old doubles its age in a month; an adult takes thirty or forty years to double his. Nor can we expect that the whole world will stand still while Great Britain goes on every year adding to her strength. All that I do argue is that the shooting-up of the German infant does us on the whole no harm, and that there is nothing whatever in the figures of our trade to suggest that full-grown England is approaching senile decay.

With this general prelude let us turn to what Mr. Williams has to say about the industries connected with iron and steel. He opens by referring to a visit of the English Iron and Steel Institute to Düsseldorf in 1880:—

“And when the time of feasting and talk and sight-seeing was over, they returned to their native land, and there, in the fulness of time, they perused the fatuous reports of the British Iron Trade Association, which bade them sleep on, sleep ever. And they did as they were bid, until the other day, when they awoke to the fact that their trade was gone.”

Another paragraph, headed “Ichabod!” begins:—

“And now all that is changed. The world’s consumption (of iron) is greater than ever before. Yet our contribution in the years since 1882 has dropped at a rate well nigh unknown in the history of any trade in any land. From the 8,493,287 tons of 1882 pig iron has gone hustling down to the 7,364,745 tons of 1894.”

Truly Mr. Williams is an ingenious person. By picking out the two years 1882 and 1894 he has cunningly obscured the fact that the production of pig iron, as of everything else, is subject to fluctuations, and that 1894, following worse years than itself, will in all probability be followed by better. Here are all the figures for the last fifteen years for which statistics are available, with the German figures set beside them:—

In Millions of Tons.

188018811882188318841885188618871888188918901891189218931894In the United Kingdom7·78·18·68·57·87·47·07·68·08·37·97·46·77·07·4In Germany2·72·93·43·53·63·73·54·04·34·54·74·64·95·05·4

These figures show that Germany has without doubt been rapidly gaining upon us, but it is the grossest exaggeration to say that our trade “has gone.” As a matter of fact the output of pig iron in the United Kingdom rose to 7·9 million tons in 1895, and—according to theEconomistof November 11th—the estimated output for the present year (1896) is 8·7 million tons. If that figure is realised it will be the largest on record. So much for Mr. Williams’s “Ichabods,” and all his talk of departed glory!

Turning to another paragraph headed “Odious Comparisons,” we find—

“Under the general heading of iron, wrought and unwrought, the returns of our German exports exhibit a fall from 374,234 tons in 1890 to 295,510 tons in 1895.... Of unenumerated iron manufactures Germany supplied us with 219,841 cwt. in 1890 and with 311,904 cwt. in 1895.”

Had Mr. Williams taken the trouble to convert the German figures from cwts. into tons he might have found this comparison somewhat less “odious.” If we send Germany 295 thousand tons against 15 thousand tons she sends us, our iron manufacturers have not much to grumble at. But, as a matter of fact, no reliance can be placed upon these particular figures, because, as was pointedout in a previous chapter, much of the stuff that we get from Germany is credited in our Blue Books to Holland and Belgium, and these countries in the same way are debited with a large amount of British stuff that ultimately finds its way to Germany. Exactly the same causes of error vitiate the figures published in the German Green Books, and it may safely be asserted that there is no means of ascertaining with even approximate accuracy how much British iron and steel goes to Germany and how much German steel and iron comes to Great Britain. What can be ascertained is the total export of German iron from Germany to all parts of the world, and the total export of British iron from the United Kingdom to all parts of the world. This comparison, which is one of the best means of testing the relative progress of Great Britain and Germany, is worked out in the following table:—

In Millions of Tons, Metrical and British.[A Metrical Ton = 2,204 lb.; a British Ton = 2,240 lb.]

18841885188618871888188918901891189218931894Total Exports from Germany (Metrical Measure)·8·7·8·8·7·7·6·8·8·8·9Total Exports from Belgium (Metrical Measure)·4·3·3·4·4·5·4·4·4·4·4Total Exports from United Kingdom (British Meas.)3·53·13·44·14·04·24·03·22·72·92·6

The above figures undoubtedly show a distinct decline in British exports of iron and steel, but they also show that that decline is not due to the increased invasion of our own or of neutral markets either by Germany or by Belgium. It is due to a decline which subsequent events have shown to be temporary in the world’s demand for iron and steel goods. Even were this decline permanent, it would not be the fault of our manufacturers, nor—except as a device for reducing their personal expenditure—is there any reason why these gentlemen should sit in sackcloth and ashes.

We pass to the subject of shipbuilding. Mr. Williams is good enough to admit that England is actually at the head of the shipbuilding trade. But having made this admission, a pang of regretcomes over him, and he tries to show that he is justified in putting even the British shipbuilding trade on his “black list.” This is his argument:—

“In 1883 the total tonnage built in the United Kingdom was 892,216; in 1893 it reached only 584,674; in 1894, ’tis true, it rose to 669,492, but this is much below the total even of 1892, which was 801,548.”

Again one can only admire Mr. Williams’s ingenuity. Reading his paragraph, who would dream that between the years so skilfully selected for comparison the trade had experienced an enormous drop, and afterwards, to all intents and purposes, completely recovered itself; that then a smaller drop had occurred, and that this in turn was being fast made good? The best way to expose the above piece of statistical legerdemain is to give without further comment the whole of the figures for the past fifteen years. They will be found in the following table. With figures such as these before him—and they must have been before him—it is astounding that Mr. Williams should have ventured to put shipbuilding on his black list.

Total Output of British and Irish Yards.In Thousands of Tons.

188118821883188418851886188718881889189018911892189318941895609783892588441331377574855813809801585669648

These figures may be illustrated as follows:—

Fifteen Years of British Shipbuilding(By permission of the Proprietors of the “Daily Graphic.”)

But his perverse ingenuity does not end with the paragraph quoted. A few lines lower down he says:—

“All these figures include vessels built for foreigners as well as those for home and the Colonies. The year in which we built most vessels for other nations was 1889, when we supplied them with 183,224 tons. The four following years showed a progressive decrease, getting down as low as 89,386 tons in 1893; and though 1894 showed an increase to 94,876 tons, their upward movement was slight compared with the successive decreases of the previous years.”

The man who wrote these sentences obviously intended to convey to his readers the impression that our trade in the building of ships for foreign purchasers was a declining trade. That impression is false, and it is a little hard to understand how Mr. Williams could fail to see its falsity. The following figures show—what to most persons would be sufficiently obvious on reflection—that the tonnage of ships launched at our great yards varies largely from year to year. To pick out the year 1889, as Mr. Williams does, and declare that since that year there has been a decline in our sales to foreigners, is as grossly unfair as it would be, on the other hand, to pick out the year 1885, and say that since then there had been a fourfold increase.

Thousands of Tons.

18811882188318841885188618871888188918901891189218931894189510811612491363970911831611391098995128

The above figures include war-ships as well as merchant-ships built by us for foreigners, and, noting this fact, Mr. Williams is distressed to find what he calls a drop in our output of foreign war-ships. He writes:—

“Still more remarkable is the drop in our supply of foreign war-ships from 12,877 tons in 1874 to 2,483 in 1894.”

What is even more remarkable still is the fact that Mr. Williams should have dared to put such a statement before the public, knowing, as he must have known, how completely it misrepresents the truth. I wonder what he would have said of me if I had spoken of the remarkablegrowthin our output of foreign war-ships as evidenced by anincreasefrom 14 tons in 1876 to 4,152 tons in 1895! Yet this statement would have been every bit as justifiable as his own. The whole truth of the matter of course is, that such an industry as the construction of foreign war-ships must vary enormously from year to year, and a comparison between any two single years can prove nothing, except the folly or themala fidesof the person who makes it. In order that the reader may see for himself the source from which Mr. Williams drew his “remarkable” statement, I append all the figures since 1870:—

Years.Tons.Years.Tons.Years.Tons.1870970187971618881,8991871801880385188972618724018815,33818903,437187328018824471891300187412,877188327018922,792187512,28018842,33918932,47118761418855,46218942,48318773,435188684018954,15218782,48218873,966

It is becoming monotonous to follow Mr. Williams in detail through his ingenious misrepresentations. I will therefore hastily pass over the many pages which he devotes to “black-listing” sundry iron and steel manufactures. His black list, which includes “steam engines,” “other machinery,” and “tools and implements” of industry, is arrived at by giving only the figures for 1890 onwards and ignoring the preceding years. The unfairness of this procedure need not be again pointed out. The figures for a decade, or for a longer period, show that trade moves up and down, and that a depression in one year or group of years is succeeded by an elevation a few years later. Throughout his book, in instances too numerous to be especially mentioned, Mr. Williams has persistently ignored this obvious fact. Again and again he has picked out years favourable to his argument, while even a cursory glance at a series of years must have shown him that the truth was the exact opposite to his representation of the facts. Here are the figures for the last fourteen years, showing the relative progress of Great Britain and Germany in the export of all kinds ofmachinery, including the domestic sewing machine and the locomotive engine.

(Including Steam Engines and Sewing Machines.)In Millions Sterling.

18821883188418851886188718881889189018911892189318941895From United Kingdom11·913·513·211·210·211·112·915·316·415·713·913·814·215·0From Germany3·13·32·82·52·42·62·83·13·33·33·13·23·9—

To our textile industries Mr. Williams has devoted a chapter which is one of the gloomiest in his book. Let it be at once admitted that we are no longer the monopolists of the textile industries of the world to the extent to which we once were. Nor could any sane man expect that we should for ever retain our former exceptional position. Other nations move as well as we. They buy the machines which we invent and make; they employ our foremen to teach them the arts we have acquired, and in time they learn to weave and spin for themselves instead of coming to us for every yard of cloth or every pound of yarn. This relative advancement of foreign nations and, too, of our own Colonies and Dependencies was and is inevitable. It is part of the general industrialization of the world. But what we have to note with satisfaction is that this process has involved little or no positive loss to us, that we are still far ahead of all other nations in the production of textiles, and that even in those cases, notably the woollen industry, where our export has fallen off we can point to an increased demand by our own people for the goods we manufacture. It is not in this spirit that Mr. Williams will look at any British industry. Even where he has a fairly good case, he spoils it by gross exaggeration and by the suppression of counterbalancing facts.

Dealing first with cotton, he follows his usual device of picking out bumper years, and then exclaiming, “See what a fall since then!” he goes on:—

“A consideration of moment is that this decline in values does not signify a corresponding decline in quantities. On the contrary, in yarn manufactures, with an actual increase in the exported weight, there is a decrease in the cash return. Thus in bleachedand dyed cotton yarn and twist there was a qualitative rise between 1893 and 1895 from 36,105,100 lb. to 40,425,600 lb., with a fall in the value thereof from £1,862,880 to £1,832,477. Between 1865 and 1895 the average price per lb. of cotton yarn declined from 23·98d. to less than 8·85d. ’Tis a good enough explanation of the vanishing dividends, the low wages, the lack of enterprise and initiative.”

Mr. Williams must either be very innocent, or expect his readers to be. He apparently has forgotten that the most important element in the price of cotton yarn is the price of the raw cotton out of which the yarn is spun. What the Lancashire spinner cares about is not the absolute price of yarn or the absolute price of raw cotton, but the margin between the two. If that be satisfactory his profit is secure. Therefore, the mere statement that the prices of yarn have fallen so much in so many years, by itself explains nothing. As a matter of fact the price of cotton yarn has followed, and continues to follow, very closely the price of raw cotton, the spinners’ margin remaining fairly constant. It is useless to go back to 1865, when the most careless economist might surely have remembered that the American war made cotton dear, and machines were less efficient than they now are. But I have taken the trouble to work out for the last ten years, from figures kindly supplied by the Manchester Chamber of Commerce, the average margin between the price of a pound of standard yarn (32’s twist) and a pound of standard cotton (middling American). The result shows that while the spinners’ margin was slightly less in 1895 than in 1893, it stood at practically the same figure as in 1892 and 1894, and was a good deal higher than it had been in 1886. So that here again there is no real foundation for Mr. Williams’s statement.

It is undoubtedly true that big fortunes are no longer made in the cotton trade, or at any rate not so rapidly as in the days when cotton spinners waxed fat on the labour of tiny children who had to be flogged to keep them awake. It is also true that many joint-stock spinning companies have paid no dividends, and that many have collapsed altogether. But those who know anything of Lancashire know that a very large number of these companies were not started in response to any real increase in the demand for cotton goods, nor on account of any genuine anticipation of such an increase. They were started, as a good many companies are started in a county south of Lancashire, in order to put money into the promoters’ pockets.Having served that purpose they were allowed quietly to collapse. Lancashire does not miss them. That the cotton trade, as a whole, is in a healthy condition in spite of these manœuvres of the company-promoter will be seen from the figures relating to cotton in the following table, and from the diagram that illustrates them:—

Yarns.Ten Years’ Exports. In Millions of Lbs.

1886188718881889189018911892189318941895Cotton254251256252258245233207236252Jute31242734343326293535Linen16161514151515161617Silk·6·6·6·8·81·0·7·8·8·7Woollen46404345414145505361

1886188718881889189018911892189318941895Cotton4,8504,9045,0385,0015,1254,9124,8734,6525,3125,033Jute216244232265274284266265233255Linen164164177181184159171158156204Silk778101066667Woollen[2]273281264268253223213194168242

[2]Includes “Woollen Tissues,” “Worsted Coatings and Stuffs,” “Damasks, Tapestry, and Mohair Plushes,” “Flannels,” and “Carpets and Druggets.”

The figures for cotton piece goods may be illustrated as follows:—

Cotton Piece Goods Exported(By permission of the Proprietors of the “Daily Graphic.”)

So much for cotton! With regard to linen, it is unnecessary to follow in detail what Mr. Williams says, for he himself admits that the decline which has taken place since the ’sixties is largely due to a change in fashion, jute and cotton goods taking the place of linen. In the last decade, however, as will be seen from the above table, the linen industry has held its own. With regard to silk, the figures show that there is no cause for serious alarm. In woollens, on the other hand, there is apparently better ground for Mr. Williams’s mourning. The table on the preceding page points to a distinct downward tendency in our export of woollen manufactures, a tendency which has been only partly checked by the inflation of 1895. If this were the whole truth about our woollen trade, it might be conceded that here at any rate Mr. Williams had made out his case. But it is not the whole truth. Almostpari passuwith this decline in our export of woollens, which began some twenty years back, there has been a steady increase in the consumption of our woollen manufactures by our own people, and this increased home demand hasmore than made goodthe decline in the foreign demand.

The proof of this statement will be seen in the following figures. During the five years, 1870 to 1874, the average yearly import of raw wool into the United Kingdom was 342,000,000 lb.; during the years 1890-94 the average was 475,000,000. That gives the measure of the enormous increase in the amount of the raw material worked up by our woollen manufacturers. Take next the question of the amount of labour employed. Unfortunately, there are no official figures since 1890, but that year will serve. Here is the comparison:—

Men.Women.Children.187094,000116,00024,0001890118,000156,00023,000

These figures are doubly satisfactory, for they point, first, to a large increase in the adult labour employed; and, secondly, to a small but gratifying decrease in child labour.

To still further reassure politicians and others who have been alarmed by Mr. Williams’s book, I may quote two passages from lectures on German competition recently delivered in the West Riding. The first is from a lecture by Professor Beaumont, delivered in the Yorkshire College in October last. From the report in theLeeds Mercuryof October 10th, I take the following:—

“In the woven fabrics imported from Germany we have examples of the standard of workmanship attained in German mills. These textures chiefly comprise low mantle cloths and cloakings, and limited quantities of dress stuffs composed of mixed materials, showing that almost invariably it was the price which caused these goods to sell in British markets. Viewed from this standpoint, there is an impregnable argument in favour of our industrial pursuits; for in all classes of fancy fabrics of a high quality, whether in woollen, worsted, cotton, linen, or jute materials, the manufacturers of the United Kingdom have scarcely felt the effects of German competition.”

My second quotation is from a lecture delivered by Mr. Swire Smith, of Keighley, at the Bradford Technical College, and reported in theBradford Observerof November 27th last:—

“Those who tell us that our English worsted industry is being ruined by the competition of Germany, must be unaware of the fact that the German worsteds, whose increasing exports were creating such alarm among the Fair-traders, are mainly composed of yarns ‘made in Bradford.’ Indeed, Bradford afforded a concrete example of the effect of German competition, for it would be difficult to say which country had benefited most by it. The export of woollen, worsted, and alpaca yarns to Germany in the average of the following periods of years amounted in 1880-85 to 41,500,000 lb. per year; 1890-95, to 63,800,000 lb. per year; and 1895, to 78,900,000 lb. Bradford had been the greatest contributor to German success in the weaving of worsteds and alpacas, and Germany had been the greatest contributor to the success of the spinning industry of Bradford by buying its yarns. To put a tax on German worsteds that would shut them out of England would stop the sale of Bradford yarns in Germany.”

That is enough about woollens. About jute a couple of sentences will suffice. In order to make the facts in this trade look worse than they are—there is nothing really bad about them—Mr. Williams first places German figures in marks side by side with English figures inpounds sterling, and then plays what can only be called the “percentage trick.” The German increase in eleven years, he says, is at the rate of 1,100 per cent., while the British is only 19 per cent. Remarkable! Yet Mr. Williams might have discovered from his own figures, if he had only taken the trouble to turn marks into pounds, that the German increase in eleven years was only £107,000, while the British increase was £412,000. In other words, our increase was almost four times as great as Germany’s, and our total is now £2,588,000, against their total of £117,000. Exactly the same percentage trick is employed by Mr. Williams in comparing German and English trade with Japan. In this case there is also an important error in his arithmetic; but let that pass. The trick consists in deluding the uncritical reader into the belief that German trade with Japan is increasing faster than our own, whereas during the period selected by himself for comparison our increase has been almost exactly double the German increase. It is by devices such as these that Mr. Williams has succeeded in filling his pages with gloomy statements and gloomier prophecies. To track him further along his tortuous path would be profitless. “Here ends,” he writes at the close of one of his most despairing and most deceptive chapters, “the tale of England’s industrial shame.” If candour should be an essential to fair controversy, there is other shame than England’s to be ended.

Havingnow shown, both generally and in detail, how absolutely void of foundation are many of the most gloomy statements in “Made in Germany,” we can dismiss Mr. Williams and his fanciful forebodings, and examine instead the direct and abundant evidence of the growing prosperity of our country. The first point to notice is the immense development of our shipping industry. In the last quarter of a century the tonnage of shipping engaged in foreign trade entering our ports has more than doubled, and this increase has been steady and persistent, with no retrogression worth noticing in any year. But that is not all. Twenty years ago the proportion of British ships engaged in this foreign trade of ours was only 67 per cent. of the total; it is now well over 72 per cent. In the same period the number of tons of shipping per hundred of the population, taking entries and clearances together, has risen from 130 tons to 200 tons. No other country can point to such figures. Germany, starting from small beginnings, has improved rapidly, but her totals are insignificant compared with our own. Only 43 per cent. of her foreign trade is carried in her own ships, as against nearly 73 per cent. in our case, while per hundred of the population the shipping to and from her ports is less than a quarter of ours. If we turn to France we find that while the total shipping to and from French ports has increased as rapidly as with us, the proportion carried under the French flag has appreciably fallen. In the case of the United States there has been a still greater fall. Twenty years ago 33 per cent. of the foreign trade of the United States was carried in United States ships, now the proportion is only 23 per cent. The following table shows the growth of shipping of all kinds to and from British ports:—

Entries and Clearances together, in Millions of Tons.

Average of Five Years.Foreign Trade.Coasting Trade.Under BritishFlag.Total.In this Trade practically allthe Shipping is British.1870-742842381875-793551461880-844361501885-894967541890-94557558Year 1895598161

In order to further compare our progress with the progress of other countries the following table has been prepared to show the relative position of the principal countries now and twenty years ago. If we consider merely the rate of progress, the German percentage of increase is undoubtedly better than ours. But in national life, as in individual, it is not percentages but amounts that are important, and the table shows that while Germany has added 6,000,000 tons to her shipping, we have added 27,000,000 tons to ours. As long as anything similar to that proportion is maintained we have no need to fear German rivalry.

In Millions of Tons.

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