Our Pacific
States Are Possessed Of Enormous Natural Resources; Their Manufactures
Have Quadrupled In Twenty Years, And Will, In The Course Of Time, Find A
Most Advantageous Market In The Far East.
When the Nicaragua Canal shall
have been dug, the Atlantic States will also be brought into close
connection with China and with the rest of Eastern Asia.
The volume of the
United States traffic with China already represented a considerable part
of the foreign trade of the empire in 1896. While the imports from China
received by the United States have increased but slowly, the exports from
the last-named country to the Middle Kingdom have increased 126 per cent
in ten years, and are more than fifty per cent greater than the exports of
Germany to the same market. The export of American cotton cloths to China
amounted to $7,485,000 in 1897, or nearly one-half the entire value of
cotton cloths sent abroad by the United States. The export of kerosene oil
from the States to China now ranks second in importance to that of cotton
goods, and is likely to increase at a rapid rate. The Chinese demand for
the illuminating fluid is quickly growing, and the delivery of it from the
United States to China has more than trebled in value during the past ten
years. That is to say, it has risen from $1,466,000 in 1888 to $4,498,000
in 1897. The Russian oil has hitherto been the only serious foreign
competitor of the American product, but the Langkat oil is coming to some
extent into use.
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Words from 187276 to 187544
of 191255
