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On the whole, despite the prosperous condition of the German live-stock farming, the consumption of meat exceeds the amount rendered available by home production, and prices can only be kept down by a steady increase in the imports from abroad. Fisheries.-The German fisheries, long of little importance, have been carefully fostered within recent years. The deep-sea fishing in the North Sea, thanks to the exertions of the German fishing league (Deutscher Fischereiverein) and to government support, is extremely active. Trawlers are extensively employed, and steamers bring the catches directly to the large fish markets at Geestemünde and Altona, whence facilities are afforded by the railways for the rapid transport of fish to Berlin and other centres. The fish mostly caught are cod, haddock and herrings, while Heligoland yields lobsters, and the islands of Föhr, Amrum and Sylt oysters of good quality. The German North Sea fishing fleet numbered in 1905 618 boats, with an aggregate crew of 5441 hands. Equally well developed are the Baltic fisheries, the chief ports engaged in which are Danzig, Eckernförde, Kolberg and Travemünde. The principal catch is haddock and herrings. The catch of the North Sea and Baltic fisheries in 1906 was valued at over £700,000, exclusive of herrings for salting. The fisheries do not, however, supply the demand for fish, and fresh, salt and dried fish is imported largely in excess of the home yield. Mines and Minerals.-Germany abounds in minerals, and the extraordinary industrial development of the country since 1870 is largely due to its mineral wealth. Having left France much behind in this respect, it now rivals Great Britain and the United States. Germany produces more silver than any other European state. and the quantity is annually increasing. It is extracted from the ores in the mines of Freiburg (Saxony), the Harz Mountains, upper Silesia, Merseburg, Aix-la-Chapelle, Wiesbaden and Arnsberg. Gold is found in the sand of the rivers Isar, Inn and Rhine, and also, to a limited extent, on the Harz. The quantity yielded in 1905 was. of silver, about 400 tons of a value of £1,600,000, and gold, about 4 tons, valued at about £548,000.

Lead is produced in considerable quantities in upper Silesia, the Harz Mountains, in the Prussian province of Nassau, in the Saxon Erzgebirge and in the Sauerland. The yield in 1905 amounted to about 153,000 tons, of which 20,000 tons were exported.

Copper is found principally in the Mansfeld district of the Prussian province of Saxony and near Arnsberg in the Sauerland, the ore yielding 31.713 tons in 1905, of which 5000 tons were exported. About 90% of the zinc produced in Europe is yielded by Belgium and Germany. It is mostly found in upper Silesia, around Beuthen, and in the districts of Wiesbaden and Aix-la-Chapelle. In 1905 no less than 198,000 tons of block zinc were produced, of which 16,500 tons were exported.

Of other minerals (with the exceptions of coal, iron and salt treated below) nickel and antimony are found in the upper Harz; cobalt in the hilly districts of Hesse and the Saxon Erzgebirge; arsenic in the Riesengebirge; quicksilver in the Sauerland and in the spurs of the Saarbrücken coal hills; graphite in Bavaria; porcelain clay in Saxony and Silesia; amber along the whole Baltic coast; and lime and gypsum in almost all parts.

Coal-mining appears to have been first practised in the 14th century at Zwickau (Saxony) and on the Ruhr. There are six large coaf Coal. fields, occupying an area of about 3600 sq. m., of which the most important occupies the basin of the Ruhr, its extent being estimated at 2800 sq. m. Here there are more than 60 beds, of a total thickness of 150 to 200 ft. of coal; and the amount in the pits has been estimated at 45.000 millions of tons. Smaller fields are found near Osnabrück, Ibbenbüren and Minden, and a larger one near Aix-la-Chapelle. The Saar coal-field, within the area enclosed by the rivers Saar, Nahe and Blies (460 sq. m.), is of great importance. The thickness of 80 beds amounts to 250 ft., and the total mass of coal is estimated at 45.400 million tons. The greater part of the basin belongs to Prussia, the rest to Lorraine. A still larger field exists in the upper Silesian basin, on the border. land between Austria and Poland, containing about 50.000 million tons, Beuthen is the chief centre. The Silesian coal-fields have a second centre in Waldenburg, east of the Riesengebirge. The Saxon coal-fields stretch eastwards for some miles from Zwickau. Deposits of less consequence are found in upper Bavaria, upper Franconia, Baden, the Harz and elsewhere.

The following table shows the rapidly increasing development of the coal production. That of lignite is added. the provinces of Saxony and Brandenburg being rich in this product ~

This production permits a considerable export of coal to the west and south of the empire, but the distance from the coal-fields to the German coast is such that the import of British coal cannot yet be dispensed with (1905, over 7,000,000 tons). Besides this, from 7,000,000 to 8,000,000 tons of lignite come annually from Bohemia. In north Germany peat is also of importance as a fuel; the area of the peat moors in Prussia is estimated at 8000 sq. m., of which 2000 are in the north of Hanover.

The iron-fields of Germany fall into three main groups: those of the lower Rhine and Westphalia, of which Dortmund and Düsseldorf are the centres; those of Lorraine and the Saar; and those of upper Silesia. The output of the ore has enormously increased of recent years, and the production of pig iron, as given for 1905, amounted to 10,875,000 tons of a value of £28,900,000.

Germany possesses abundant salt deposits. The actual production not only covers the home consumption, but also allows a yearly increasing exportation, especially to Russia, Austria and Scandinavia. The provinces of Saxony and Hanover, with Thuringia and Anhalt, produce half the whole amount. A large salt-work is found at Strzalkowo (Posen), and smaller ones near Dortmund, Lippstadt and Minden (Westphalia). In south Germany salt abounds most in Württemberg (Hall, Heilbronn, Rottweil); the principal Bavarian works are at the foot of the Alps near Freilassing and Rosenheim. Hesse and Baden, Lorraine and the upper Palatinate have also saltworks. The total yield of mined salt amounted in 1905 to 6,209,000 tons, including 1,165,000 tons of rock salt. The production has made great advance, having in 1850 been only 5 million cwts. manufacturing industry made such rapid strides within recent Manufactures. In no other country of the world has the years as in Germany. This extraordinary development of industrial energy embraces practically all classes of manufactured articles. In a general way the chief manufactures may be geographically distributed as follows. Prussia, Alsace-Lorraine, Bavaria and Saxony are the chief seats of the iron manufacture. Steel is produced in Rhenish Prussia. Saxony is predominant in the production of textiles, though Silesia and Westphalia manufacture linen. Cotton goods are largely produced in Baden, Bavaria, Alsace-Lorraine and Württemberg, woollens and worsteds in Saxony and the Rhine province, silk in Rhenish Prussia (Elberfeld), Alsace and Baden. Glass and porcelain are largely produced in Bavaria, lace in Saxony; tobacco in Bremen and Hamburg, chemicals in the Prussian province of Saxony, watches in Saxony (Glashütte) and Nuremberg, toys in Bavaria; gold and silver filagree in Berlin and Aschaffenburg; and beer in Bavaria and Prussia.

Iron

industry.

It is perhaps more in respect of its iron industry than of its other manufactures that Germany has attained a leading position in the markets of the world. Its chief centres are in Westphalia and the Rhine province (auf roter Erde), in upper Silesia, in Alsace-Lorraine and in Saxony, Of the total production of pig iron in 1905 amounting to over 10,000,000 tons, more than the half was produced in the Rhineland and Westphalia. Huge blast furnaces are in constant activity, and the output of rolled iron and steel is constantly increasing. In the latter the greatest advance has been made. The greater part of it is produced at or around Essen, where are the famous Krupp works, and Bochum. Many states have been for a considerable time supplied by Krupp with steel guns and battleship plates. The export of steel (railway) rails and bridges from this part is steadily on the increase.

Hardware also, the production of which is centred in Solingen, Heilbronn, Esslingen, &c., is largely exported. Germany stands second to Great Britain in the manufacture of machines and engines. There are in many large cities of north Germany extensive establish ments for this purpose, but the industry is not limited to the large cities. In agricultural machinery Germany is a serious competitor with England. The locomotives and wagons for the German railways are almost exclusively built in Germany; and Russia, as well as Austria, receives large supplies of railway plant from German works In shipbuilding, likewise, Germany is practically independent. yards having been established for the construction of the largest vessels.

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Cofton

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textiles.

Cotton

Before 1871 the production of cotton fabrics in France exceeded that in Germany, but as the cotton manufacture is pursued largely in Alsace, the balance is now against the former country. In 1905 there were about 9,000,000 spindles in Germany. The export of the goods manufactured amounted in this year to an estimated value of £19,600,000. spinning and weaving are not confined to one district, but are prosecuted in upper Alsace (Mülhausen, Gebweiler, Colmar), in Saxony (Zwickau, Chemnitz, Annaberg), in Silesia (Breslau, Liegnitz), in the Rhine province (Düsseldorf, Münster, Cologne), in Erfurt and Hanover, in Württemberg (Reutlingen, Cannstatt), in Baden, Bavaria (Augsburg, Bamberg, Bayreuth) and in the Palatinate.

GERMANY

Although Germany produces wool, flax and hemp, the home production of these materials is not sufficient to meet the demand of manufactures, and large quantities of them have to be imported. In 1895 almost a million persons (half of them women) were employed in this branch of industry, and in 1897 the value of the cloth, buckskin and flannel manufacture was estimated at £18,000,000. The chief seats of this manufacture are the Rhenish districts of Aix-la-Chapelle, Düren, Eupen and Lennep, Brandenburg, Saxony, Silesia and lower Lusatia, the chief centres in this group being Berlin, Cottbus, Spremberg, Sagan and Sommerfeld.

The manufacture of woollen and half-woollen dress materials centres mainly in Saxony, Silesia, the Rhine province and in Alsace. Furniture covers, table covers and plush are made in Elberfeld and Chemnitz, in Westphalia and the Rhine province (notably in Elberfeld and Barmen); shawls in Berlin and the Bavarian Vogtland; carpets in Berlin, Barmen and Silesia. In the town of Schmiedeberg in the last district, as also in Cottbus (Lusatia), oriental patterns are successfully imitated. The chief seats of the stocking manufacture are Chemnitz and Zwickau in Saxony, and Apolda in Thuringia. The export of woollen goods from Germany in 1905 amounted to a value of £13,000,000.

Although linen was formerly one of her most important articles of manufacture, Germany is now left far behind in this industry by Great Britain, France and Austria-Hungary. This branch of textile manufacture has its principal centres in Silesia, Westphalia, Saxony and Württemberg, while Hirschberg in Silesia, Bielefeld in Westphalia and Zittau in Saxony are noted for the excellence of their productions. The goods manufactured, now no longer, as formerly, coarse in texture, vie with the finer and more delicate fabrics of Belfast. In the textile industry for flax and hemp there were, in 1905, 276,000 fine spindles, 22,300 hand-looms and 17,600 power-looms in operation, and, in 1905, linen and jute materials were exported of an estimated value of over £2,000,000. The jute manufacture, the principal centres of which are Berlin, Bonn, Brunswick and Hamburg, has of late attained considerable dimensions.

Raw silk can scarcely be reckoned among the products of the empire, and the annual demand has thus to be provided for by importation. The main centre of the silk industry is Crefeld and its neighbourhood; then come Elberfeld and Barmen, Aix-la-Chapelle, as well as Berlin, Bielefeld, Chemnitz, Stuttgart and the district around Mülhausen in Alsace.

The manufacture of paper is prosecuted almost everywhere in the empire. There were 1020 mills in operation in 1895, and the exports in 1905 amounted to more than £3.700,000 sterling, as Paper. against imports of a value of over £700,000. The manufacture is carried on to the largest extent in the Rhine province, in Saxony and in Silesia. Prussia, Berlin and Hamburg; the finer sorts of letter-paper in Wall papers are produced chiefly in Rhenish Berlin, Leipzig and Nuremberg: and printing paper (especially for books) in Leipzig, Berlin and Frankfort-on-Main.

The chief seat of the leather industry is Hesse-Darmstadt, in which Mainz and Worms produce excellent material. In Prussia large factories are in operation in the Rhine province, in Leather. Westphalia and Silesia (Brieg). Boot and shoe manufactures are carried on everywhere; but the best goods are produced by Mainz and Pirmasens. Gloves for export are extensively made in Württemberg, and Offenbach and Aschaffenburg are renowned for fancy leather wares, such as purses, satchels and the like.

Berlin and Mainz are celebrated for the manufacture of furniture; Bavaria for toys; the Black Forest for clocks; Nuremberg for pencils; Berlin and Frankfort-on-Main for various perfumes; and Cologne for the famous eau-de-Cologne.

The beetroot sugar manufacture is very considerable. It centres mainly in the Prussian province of Saxony, where Magdeburg is the chief market for the whole of Germany, in Anhalt, BrunsSugar. wick and Silesia. The number of factories was, in 1905, 376, and the amount of raw sugar and molasses produced amounted to 2,643,531 metric tons, and of refined sugar 1,711,063 tons. Beer is produced throughout the whole of Germany. The production is relatively greatest in Bavaria. The Brausteuergebiet Beer. (beer excise district) embraces all the states forming the Zollverein, with the exception of. Bavaria, Württemberg, Baden and Alsace-Lorraine, in which countries the excise duties are separately collected. The total number of breweries in the beer excise district was, in 1905-1906, 5995, which produced 1017 million gallons; in Bavaria nearly 6000 breweries with 392 million gallons; in Baden over 700 breweries with 68 million gallons; in Württemberg over 5000 breweries with 87 million gallons; and in AlsaceLorraine 95 breweries with about 29 million gallons. The amount brewed per head of the population amounted, in 1905, roughly to 160 imperial pints in the excise district; to 450 in Bavaria; 280 in Württemberg: 260 in Baden; and 122 in Alsace-Lorraine. It may be remarked that the beer brewed in Bavaria is generally of darker colour than that produced in other states, and extra strong brews are exported largely into the beer excise district and abroad.

Commerce. The rapid development of German trade dates from the Zollverein (customs union), under the special rules and regulations of which it is administered. The Zollverein

[COMMERCE

emanates from a convention originally entered into, in 1828, between Prussia and Hesse, which, subsequently joined by the Thuringian states, came into operation, as regards the countries Bavarian customs-league, by the kingdom of Saxony and the concerned, on the 1st of January 1834. territorial extensions during the ensuing fifty years, and embracing the grand-duchy of Luxemburg, it had in 1871, when the With progressive with a population of 40,678,000. The last important addition German empire was founded, an area of about 209,281 sq. m., corporated. Included within it, besides the grand-duchy of was in October 1888, when Hamburg and Bremen were inLuxemburg, are the Austrian communes of Jungholz and Mittelberg; while, outside, lie the little free-port territories of Hamburg, Cuxhaven, Bremerhaven and Geestemünde, Heligoland, and small portions of the districts of Constance and Waldshut, lying on the Baden Swiss frontier. Down to year, however, a rigid protective system was introduced by the Zolltarifgesetz, since modified by the commercial treaties between 1879 Germany was, in general, a free-trade country. In this Germany and Austria-Hungary, Italy, Switzerland and Belgium, of the 1st of February 1892, and by a customs tariff law of the 25th of December 1902. of Germany were again altered by the general and conventional The foreign commercial relations The Zolltarifgesetz of the 15th of July 1879, while restricting customs tariff, which came into force on the 1st of March 1906. the former free import, imposed considerable duties. Exempt from duty were now only refuse, raw products, scientific instrunotably beer, vinegar, sugar, herrings, cocoa, salt, fish oils, ments, ships and literary and artistic objects; forty-four articles ether, alum and soda-were unaffected by the change, while duties were henceforth levied upon a large number of articles which had previously been admitted duty free, such as pig iron, cattle and sheep; and, again, the tariff law further increased machines and locomotives, grain, building timber, tallow, horses, the duties leviable upon numerous other articles. Export duties were abolished in 1865 and transit dues in 1861. The law under which Great Britain enjoyed the "most favoured nation treataverage value of each article is fixed annually in Germany under ment expired on the 31st of December 1905, but its provisions were continued by the Bundesrat until further notice. of experts, who receive information from chambers of commerce the direction of the Imperial Statistical Office, by a commission of crossing the frontier For imports the price does not include and other sources. There are separate valuations for imports and exports. The price fixed is that of the goods at the moment includes all charges within the territory, but drawbacks and customs duties, cost of transport, insurance, warehousing, &c., bounties are not taken into account. The quantities are deterincurred after the frontier is passed. For exports, the price the fiscal authorities may actually weigh the goods. For packages an official tax is deducted. The countries whence mined according to obligatory declarations, and, for imports, goods are imported and the ultimate destination of exports are registered. The import dues amounted in the year 1906, the first year of the revised tariff, to about £31,639,000, or about 10s. 5d. per head of population.

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The

imported articles as are liable to duty have, indeed, been known
Statistics relating to the foreign trade of the Empire are necessarily
confined to comparatively recent times. The quantities of such
for many years; and in 1872 official tables were compiled showing
the value both of imports and of exports. But when the results
of these tables proved the importation to be very much greater
imports was placed at £173,400,000 and that of the exports at
than the exportation, the conviction arose that the valuation of the
exports was erroneous and below the reality. In 1872 the value of the
and exports, £292,000,000, including precious metals.
£124.700,000. In 1905 the figures were-imports, £371,000,000,

before the tariff revision of 1906. From 1907 a new classification
has been adopted, and the change thus introduced is so great
Table A following shows the classification of goods adopted
statistics of years subsequent to and preceding the year 1906.
Table B shows imports and exports for 1907 and 1908 according
that it is impossible to make any comparisons between the
to the new classification adopted.

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The following table shows the commercial intercourse in imports and exports, exclusive of bullion and coin, between Germany and the chief countries of the world in 1905, 1906 and 1907.

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The commerce of Germany shows an upward tendency, which progresses pari passu with its greatly increased production. The export of ships from the United Kingdom to the empire decreased during two years, 1903 (£305,682) and 1904 (£365,062), almost to a vanishing point, German yards being able to cope with the demands made upon them for the supply of vessels of all classes, including mercantile vessels and ships of war. In 1905 and subsequent years, however, the degree of employment in German yards increased to such an extent, principally owing to the placing of the Admiralty contracts with private builders, that the more urgent orders for mercantile vessels were placed abroad.

The following tables give the value of trade between the United Kingdom and Germany in 1900 and 1905:

The chief ports are Hamburg, Stettin, Bremen, Kiel, Lübeck, Flensburg, Bremerhaven, Danzig (Neufahrwasser), Geestemünde and Emden; and the number and tonnage of vessels of foreign nationality entering and clearing the ports of the empire, as compared with national shipping, were in 1906:

Foreign Ships.

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Danish
British
Swedish
Dutch
Norwegian
Russian

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Navigation.-The seamen of Frisia are among the best in the world, and the shipping of Bremen and Hamburg had won a respected name long before a German mercantile marine, properly so called, was heard of. Many Hamburg vessels sailed under charter of English and other houses in foreign, especially Chinese, waters. Since 1868 all German ships have carried a common flag-black, white, red; but formerly Oldenburg, Hanover, Bremen, Hamburg, Lübeck, Mecklenburg and Prussia had each its own flag, and Schleswig-Holstein vessels sailed under the Danish flag. The German mercantile fleet occupies, in respect of the number of vessels, the fourth place-after Great Britain, the United States of America and Norway; but in respect of tonnage it stands third-after Great Britain and the United States only.

The following table shows its distribution on the 1st of January of the two years 1905 and 1908:

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The ports of Hamburg and Bremen, which are the chief outlets for emigration to the United States of America, carry on a vast commercial trade with all the chief countries of the world, and are the main gates of maritime intercourse between the United Kingdom and Germany.

The inland navigation is served by nearly 25,000 river, canal and coasting vessels, of a tonnage of about 4,000,000.

Railways.-The period of railway construction was inaugurated in Germany by the opening of the line (4 m. in length) from Nuremberg to Fürth in 1835, followed by the main line (71 m.) between Leipzig and Dresden, opened throughout in 1839. The development of the railway system was slow and was not conceived on any uniform plan. The want of a central government operated injuriously, for it often happened that intricate negotiations and solemn treaties between several sovereign states were required before a line could be constructed; and, moreover, the course it was to take was often determined less by the general exigencies of commerce than by many trifling interests or desires of neighbouring states. The state which was most self-seeking in its railway politics was Hanover, which separated the eastern and western parts of the kingdom of Prussia. The difficulties arising to Prussia from this source were experienced in a still greater degree by the seaports of Bremen and Hamburg, which were severely hampered by the particularism displayed by Hanover.

The making of railways was from the outset regarded by some German states as exclusively a function of the government. The South German states, for.example, have only possessed state railways. In Prussia numerous private companies, in the first instance, constructed their systems, and the state contented itself for the most part with laying lines in such districts only as were not likely to attract private capital.

The development of the German railway system falls conveniently into four periods. The first, down in 1840, embraces the beginnings of railway enterprise. The next, down to 1848, shows the linking-up of various existing lines and the establishment of inter-connexion between the chief towns. The third, down to 1881, shows the gradual establishment of state control in Prussia, and the formation of direct trunk lines. The fourth begins from 1881 with the purchase of practically all the railways in Prussia by the government, and the introduction of a uniform system of interworking between the various Total Shipping.

Number. Tonnage. Number. Tonnage. Number. Tonnage.

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559,436 2567 1.537.563 1657 2,096,999 4224

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516,180 2649 1,981,831 2,498,011

1922 4571

In 1905, 2136 vessels of 283,171 tons, and in 1908, 2218 vessels of 284,081 tons, belonged to Prussian ports, and the number of sailors of the mercantile marine was 60,616 in 1905 and 71,853 in 1908.

578,503 1.774,072 2.352.575

533,652 2,256,783. 2.790.435

state systems. The purchase of the railways by the Prussian government was on the whole equably carried out, but there were several hard cases in the expropriation of some of the smaller private lines.

The majority of the German railways are now owned by the state governments. Out of 34,470 m. of railway completed and open for traffic in 1906, only 2579 m. were the property of private undertakings, and of these about 150 were worked by the state. The bulk of the railways are of the normal 4 ft. 8 in. gauge. Narrow-gauge (24 ft.) lines-or light railways -extended over 1218 m. in 1903, and of these

537 m. were worked by the state.

The board responsible for the imperial control over the whole railway system in Germany is the Reichseisenbahnamt

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