Commercial Geography Part 28

The export trade of Great Britain consists almost wholly of the articles manufactured with British coal as the power. These are made from the raw materials purchased abroad, and the stamp of the British craftsman is a guarantee of excellence and honesty. Of the total export trade, amounting yearly to about one billion, two hundred million dollars, nearly one-third consists of cotton, woollen, linen, and jute textiles; one-fifth consists of iron and steel manufactured stuffs made from British ores. About one-third goes to the colonies of the mother-country, with whom she keeps in close touch; Germany, the United States, and the South American states are the chief foreign buyers.

For the handling and carriage of these goods there is an admirable system of railways reaching from every part of the interior to the numerous ports. The rolling stock and the locomotives are not nearly so heavy as those used in the United States; the railway beds and track equipment, on the whole, are probably the best in the world. Freight rates are considerably higher than on the corresponding cla.s.ses of merchandise in the United States. The public highways are most excellent, but the means of street traffic in the cities are very poor.

The harbor facilities at the various ports are of the best. The docks and basins are usually arranged so that while the import goods are being landed the export stuffs are made ready to be loaded. The facilities for the rapid transfer of freights have been improved by the reconstruction of the various river estuaries so as to make them s.h.i.+p-channels. The estuaries of the Clyde, Tyne, and Mersey have been thus improved, while Manchester has been made a seaport by an artificial ca.n.a.l. The British merchant marine is the largest in the world, and about ninety per cent.

of the vessels are steams.h.i.+ps.

_London_ is the capital; it is also one of the first commercial and financial centres of the world. The Thames has not a sufficient depth of water for the largest liners, and these dock usually about twenty miles below the city. The colonial commerce at London is very heavy, especially the India traffic, and it is mainly for this trade that the British acquired the control of the Suez Ca.n.a.l.

_Liverpool_ is one of the most important ports of Europe, and receives most of the American traffic. The White Star and Cunard Lines have their terminals at this port.

_Southampton_ is also a port which receives a large share of American traffic. The American and several foreign steams.h.i.+p lines discharge at that place. _Hull_ and _s.h.i.+elds_ have a considerable part of the European traffic. _Glasgow_ is one of the foremost centres of steel s.h.i.+p-building. _Cardiff_ and _Swansea_ are ports connected with the coal and iron trade. _Queenstown_ is a calling point for transatlantic liners.

_Manchester_ is both a cotton port and a great market for the cotton textiles made in the nearby towns of the Lancas.h.i.+re coal-field. _Leeds_ and _Bradford_ and the towns about them are the chief centres of woollen manufacture. _Wilton_ and _Kidderminster_ are famous for carpets.

_Birmingham_ is the centre of the steel manufactures. _Sheffield_ has a world-wide reputation for cutlery. In and near the Staffords.h.i.+re district are the potteries that have made the names of _Worcester_, _Coalport_, _Doulton_, _Copeland_, and _Jackfield_ famous. _Belfast_ is noted for its linen textiles, and also for some of the largest steams.h.i.+ps afloat that have been built in its yards. _Dundee_ is the chief centre of jute manufacture.

=The German Empire.=--The German Empire consists of the kingdoms of Prussia, Bavaria, Saxony, and Wurtemburg, together with a number of small states. The "free" cities of Hamburg, Bremen, and Lubeck, whose independence was purchased in feudal times, are also incorporated within the empire. The present empire was formed in 1871, at the close of the war between Germany and France. The merging of the states into the empire was designed as a political step, but it proved a great industrial revolution as well.

The plain of Europe which slopes to the north and the Baltic Sea, the flood-plains of the rivers excepted, is feebly productive of grain. It is a fine grazing region, however, and the dairy products are of the best quality. Among European states Russia alone surpa.s.ses Germany in the number of cattle grown. The province of Schleswig-Holstein is famous the world over for its fine cattle. Cavalry horses are a special feature of the lowland plain, and the government is the chief buyer. The wool product has. .h.i.therto been important, but the sheep ranges are being turned into crop lands, on account of the increase of population in the industrial regions.

The midland belt, however, between the coast-plain and the mountains, is the chief food-producing part of Germany. Rye and wheat are grown wherever possible, but the entire grain-crop is consumed in about eight months. The United States, Argentina, and Russia supply the wheat and flour; Russia supplies the rye.

[Ill.u.s.tration: GERMANY AND SCANDINAVIAN COUNTRIES]

The sugar-beet is by far the most important export crop, and Germany produces yearly about one million, eight hundred thousand tons, or nearly as much as Austria-Hungary and France combined. This industry is encouraged by a bounty paid on all sugar exported.[68] A considerable amount of raw beet-sugar is sold to the refineries of the United States; Great Britain also is a heavy buyer. The home consumption is relatively small, being about one-third per capita that of the United States.

Silesia, the Rhine Valley, and the lowlands of the Hartz Mountains are the most important centres of the sugar industry.

Germany is rich in minerals.[69] Zinc occurs in abundance, and the mines of Silesia furnish the world's chief supply. Most of the lithographic stone in use is obtained in Bavaria. Copper and silver are mined in the Erz and Hartz Mountains. During the sixteenth century the mines of the latter region brought the states then forming Germany into commercial prominence and thereby diverted the trade between the North and Mediterranean Seas to the valleys of the Rhine and Elbe Rivers.

These two metal products made Germany a great financial power. The Franco-Prussian War added to Germany the food-producing lands of the Rhine and Moselle, and the provinces of Alsace and Lorraine. At the same time it gave the Germans organization by welding the various German states into an empire. As a result there has been an industrial development that has placed Germany in the cla.s.s with the United States and Great Britain.

By unifying the various interstate systems of commerce and transportation, the iron and steel industry has greatly expanded. The chief centre of this industry is the valley of the Ruhr River.

Coal-measures underlie an area somewhat larger than the basin of the river. To the industrial centres of this valley iron ore is brought by the Rhine and Moselle barges from Alsace-Lorraine and Luxemburg, and also from the Hartz Mountains.

In the importance and extent of manufactures, Germany ranks next to Great Britain among European states, and because of the extent of their coal-fields the Germans seem destined in time to surpa.s.s their rivals.

The manufacture of textiles is one of the leading industries, and, next to Great Britain, Germany is the heaviest purchaser of raw cotton from the United States. The Rhine district is the chief centre of cotton textile manufacture. Raw cotton is delivered to the mills by the Rhine boats, and these carry the manufactured product to the seaboard. Central and South America are the chief purchasers.

Woollen goods are also extensively manufactured, the industry being in the region that produces Saxony wool. In Silesia and the lower Rhine provinces there are also extensive woollen textile manufactures, but the goods are made mainly from imported wool. Argentina and the other Plate River countries are the chief buyers of these goods. There is a considerable linen manufacture from German-grown flax, and silk-making, mainly from raw silk imported from Italy.

The great expansion and financial success of the manufacturing enterprises is due very largely to the admirable organization of the lines of transportation. The rivers, with their connecting ca.n.a.ls, supplement the railways instead of competing with them. They are utilized mainly for slow freights, while the railways carry the traffic that demands speed. The possibilities of both inland water-ways and railway transportation have been utilized by the Germans to the utmost, with the result of a very low rate both for coal and ore, and for structural iron and steel. The latter is carried from the various steel-making plants in the Ruhr Valley to the seaboard at a rate of eighty to ninety cents per ton.[70]

[Ill.u.s.tration: LuBECK]

[Ill.u.s.tration: BREMEN]

All this has resulted in a wonderful commercial expansion of the empire. In 1875 Germany was neither a maritime nor a naval power. At the close of the century it ranked about with the United States as a naval power, and far surpa.s.sed that country in the tonnage of merchant marine.

The German steams.h.i.+p fleet includes the largest and fastest vessels afloat.

German trade may be summed up as an export of manufactured goods and an import of food-stuffs and raw materials. At the close of the century the annual movement of industrial products amounted to nearly two and one-half billion dollars. About one-half the trade of the empire is carried on with Great Britain, the United States, Austria-Hungary, and Russia. A large part of the foreign trade is carried on through the ports of Belgium and Holland.

_Berlin_, the capital, is one of the few cities having a population of more than one million. It is not only a great centre of trade, but it is one of the leading money-markets of Europe; it is also the chief railway centre. _Hamburg_ and _Bremen_ are important ports of German-American trade, the former being the largest seaport of continental Europe.

_Breslau_ is an important market, into which the raw materials of eastern Europe are received, and from which they are sent to the manufacturing districts. The art galleries of _Dresden_ have had the effect of making that city a centre of art manufactures which are famous the world over. _Lubeck_ is one of the free cities that was formerly in the Hanse League.

The twin cities, _Barmen-Eberfeld_, in the Ruhr coal-field, form one of the princ.i.p.al centres of cotton manufacture in the world. _Dortmund_ is a coal-market. At _Essen_ are the steel-works founded by Herr Krupp.

They are the largest and one of the most complete plants in the world.

The output includes arms, heavy and light ordnance, and about every kind of structural iron and steel used. About forty thousand men are employed. _Chemnitz_ is an important point, not only of cotton manufacture, but also of Saxony wools, underwear and shawls being its most noteworthy products. At _Stettin_, _Danzig_, and _Kiel_ are built the steams.h.i.+ps that have given to Germany its great commercial power.

QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION

In what ways are Great Britain and Germany commercial rivals?

What are the advantages of each with respect to position?--with respect to natural resources?

From the Statesman's Year-Book make a list of the leading exports of each;--the leading imports of each. What exports have they in common?

From the Abstract of Statistics find what commodities the United States sells to each.

FOR COLLATERAL READING AND REFERENCE

Adams's New Empire--Chapter III.

Gibbins's History of Commerce--Book III, Chapters III-V.

CHAPTER XXVI

EUROPE--THE BALTIC AND NORTH SEA STATES

These states, like Great Britain and Germany, belong to Germanic Europe, and their situation around the North and Baltic Seas makes their commercial interests much the same. From the stand-point of commerce Holland might be regarded as an integral part of Germany, inasmuch as a large part of the foreign commerce of Germany must reach the sea by crossing that state.

=Sweden and Norway.=--Sweden and Norway occupy the region best known as the Scandinavian peninsula. The western side faces the warm, moist winds of the Atlantic, but the surface is too rugged to be productive. The lands suitable for farming, on the other hand, are on the east side, where, owing to the high lat.i.tude, the winters are extremely cold.

The plateau lands are in the lat.i.tude of the great pine-forest belt that extends across the two continents. The forests of the Scandinavian peninsula are near the most densely peopled part of Europe, and they are also readily accessible. Moreover, the rugged surface offers unlimited water-power. As a result Norway and Sweden practically control the lumber-market of Europe, and their lumber products form one of the most important exports of the kingdom. Norway pine competes with California redwood in Australia. The "naval stores," tar and pitch, compete with those of Georgia and the Carolinas. The wood-pulp from this region is the chief supply of the paper-makers of Europe. Next to Russia, Sweden has the largest lumber-trade in Europe. The Mediterranean states are the chief buyers.

The mineral products are a considerable source of income. Building stone is s.h.i.+pped to the nearby lowland countries. The famous Swedish manganese-iron ores, essential in steel manufacture, are s.h.i.+pped to the United States and Europe. For this purpose they compete with the ores of Spain and Cuba. The mines of the Gellivare iron district are probably the only iron-mines of consequence within the frigid zone. The ore is sent to German and British smelteries.

The fisheries are the most important of Europe, and this fact has had a great influence on the history of the people. Centuries ago the people living about the _vigs_ or fjords of the west coast were compelled to depend almost wholly on the fisheries for their food-supplies. As a result they became the most famous sailors of the world. They established settlements in Iceland and Greenland; they also planted a colony in North America 500 years before the voyage of Columbus.

Herring, salmon, and cod are the princ.i.p.al catch of the fisheries, and about four-fifths of the product is cured and exported to the Catholic European states and to South America.

South of Kristiania farming is the princ.i.p.al industry. Much of the land is suitable for wheat-growing, but the productive area is so small that a considerable amount of bread-stuffs must be imported from the United States. On account of the high lat.i.tude the winters are too long and severe for any but the hardiest grains. Dairy products are commercially the most important output of the farms, and they find a ready market in the popular centres of Europe--London, Hamburg, Paris, and Berlin.

The lumber, furniture, matches, fish, ores, and dairy products sold abroad do not pay for the bread-stuffs, coal, petroleum, clothing, and machinery. In part, this is made up by the carrying trade of Norwegian vessels; the rest of the deficit is more than met by the money which the throngs of tourists spend during the summer months.

The United States buys from these countries fish and ores to the amount of about three million dollars a year; it sells them cotton, petroleum, bread-stuffs, and machinery to the amount of about twelve million dollars.