We may be permitted to quote another great writerDefoe-who, in 1728, showed his full appreciation of the upbuilding powers of Commerce. He wrote:

“Are we a rich, a populous, a powerful nation, and in some respects the greatest in all those particulars in the world, and do we not boast of being so? 'Tis evident it was all derived from trade. Our merchants are princes, greater and richer and more powerful than some sovereign princes; and in a word, as is said of Tyre, we have made the kings of the earth rich with our merchandise,' that is with our trade.

"If usefulness gives an addition to the character, either of men or of things, as without doubt it does, trading men will have the preference in almost all the disputes you can bring. There is not a nation in the known world but have tasted the benefit and owe their prosperity to the useful improvement of Commerce. Even the self-vain gentry, that would decry trade as a universal mechanism, are they not everywhere depending upon it for their most necessary supplies? If they do not all sell, they are all forced to buy, and so are a kind of trader themselves; at least they recognize the usefulness of Commerce, as what they are not able to live comfortably without. Trade encourages manufacture, prompts invention, employs people, increases labour and pays wages.

"As the people are employed they are paid, and by that pay are fed, clothed, kept in heart and kept together.

"As the consumption of provisions increases, more lands are cultivated, waste grounds are enclosed, woods are grubbed, forests and common lands are tilled and improved. By this, more farmers are brought together, more farm-houses and cottages are built, and more trades are called upon to supply the necessary demands of husbandry.

"In a word, as land is employed the people increase of course, and thus trade sets all the wheels of improvement in motion; for, from the original of business to this day, it appears that the prosperity of a nation rises and falls just as trade is supported or decayed."

How truly this great essayist wrote on this vital subject and how excellently he reflected the public mind nearly two hundred years ago. years ago. That same branch of human activity to which nations owe their progress and strength

с

is to-day as necessary as then. It carries with it in this twentieth century the same charm, excitement, and interest, but it is a greater science now than then, made so by increased world-competition. It may also be made broader, because the opportunities are greater.

A generation after Defoe, began the wonderful developments in the iron industry. Necessity for a better product was the mother of inventions in steel. Many books have been written on the romance of this tremendous step, and that, and the application of steam as a motive power, have done more for Commerce than all other forces of the world put together, except the discovery of printing. We of this age have been given tools with which to work and accomplish of which our merchant forefathers never dreamed. Machinery-steamelectricity, have made one day's work equal to ten or a hundred, and the experience of all of our predecessors is ours if we choose to take it. Man's mind is finite, but it should be no more limited now than five hundred or two thousand years ago. If, then, we enter the lists with the same virility, determination, nerve, and imagination, it would seem that the twentieth century man of Commerce should far surpass the merchants of Phonicia, Venice, or Augsburg.

II

THE COMMERCE OF THE ANCIENT
CIVILIZATIONS

CHINA

HE romance of Far-Eastern commerce is of the same colour in the twentieth century as in the first, or, for that matter, in the twenty centuries before our era began. The scraps of their commercial history which have sifted down through the many centuries are not unlike the experiences of to-day. Our knowledge of the trading ability and achievements of the ancient nations of the East are meagre, yet we are unwilling to omit them entirely, brief and disconnected as our notes must be.

Let China claim our attention first, though it must be remembered that it is quite impossible for the Occidental to think upon the same lines as the man of the yellow kingdom. It is almost as if we lived upon a planet different from his, and a newer one, for his people have been a nation for a far greater length of time than any of which the West can boast.

The Chinese do almost everything in the opposite way to the Occidental. They saw wood upwards instead of downwards as we do; they scratch the heel instead of the head when perplexed; their night-watchmen indicate their presence to possible thieves by ringing a bell as they go their rounds, and in a hundred ways they perform their duties in a manner most strange to us.

But the Chinese people have been for thousands of years clever traders and money-makers through trade, and the history of early Chinese commerce, incomplete though it is, presents many interesting points. Even to-day the Chinese merchant's word is as good as his bondan unusual thing in the Oriental-and with a few exceptional periods Commerce has been considered with extreme respect and has attracted the well-educated Chinamen to its inviting embrace.

If China were not the most conservative nation in the world her position might have been commercially a most dominating one. But China seems to prefer not to change. She has thought of more inventions than most nations have ever known, but she has forgotten them too, though how she could allow such things as movable type or the mariner's compass to be forgotten once they had been discovered is beyond our ability to understand.

It would almost seem as if the policy or proverb, "What was good enough for our grandfathers is good enough for us," must have originated in that part of the world: it is certainly unfortunate that such a maxim should ever have been adopted by the nations of the West.

China still trades to-day over her vast territoryroughly once and a half times as large as the United States-much as she has always done. Her merchants, since man can remember, have had their caravans, their trade routes, and their far-away customers. Japan has fully equipped Department Stores, similar in arrangement and system to those in London. China has and will have none until some man of the West or of Japan organizes one for her.

Nevertheless it must be admitted that though apparently lacking in ambition, China has in the course of time achieved notable results, and a short summary of her development demands a record here.

The beginning of Chinese history is vague and legendary. It is said by some students that the race started