--but few
American manufactures, let it be plainly stated, will penetrate China
through a gateway so controlled.

America's seeming indifference to Chinese trade, let it plainly be
stated, is the only solace that commercial Europe is finding in our
wonderful national growth. The subject is almost never referred to in
the columns of British journals, nor in those of Germany, France, or
Belgium. But manufacturers and exporters of these countries need no spur
from their newspapers--without the accompaniment of beating drums all
are seeking to make the Chinese their permanent customers. And,
buttressed by undeniable advantages, Japan takes up the quest and means
to spread her goods, largely fabricated from Uncle Sam's raw products,
wherever the tenant of the earth be a Mongol.

[Illustration: CHINESE BUDDHIST PRIESTS]

Could a human being be more complaisant, more materially philanthropic,
than the United States manufacturer or other producer? He surely cannot
be blind to the undebatable fact that America cannot always wax
opulent on home trade alone; he must know that in time we are certain to
reach a period of overproduction, when it will aid the nation to have
alien peoples for customers of our mills and workshops. Every land in
Asia east of Singapore can be commercially exploited by the United
States more easily, and with greater success, than by any other people,
if the task be gone about systematically and practically.

The Chinese envoy of a few years ago to Washington, Minister Wu, said
many wise things, and no epigram fell from his lips containing a
profounder sermon for the American people than when he remarked that two
inches added to the length of the skirts of every Chinese would double
the market value of every pound of cotton.

Small as it was, our commerce in China was severely lessened last year,
not alone by the boycott, but through the enterprise shown by other
nations having a share in Celestial trade. The cotton cloth exports of
the United States to China and Manchuria for the nine months ending
September 30 fell off by over ten million dollars as compared with the
same period of 1905. The respective amounts were $15,416,152 and
$25,566,286. The Chinese buyers gave preference to the British, taking
$34,245,129 worth of cotton fabrics from the United Kingdom for the
first nine months of 1906, a decrease of $3,770,584 from last year. The
British loss on bleached and gray goods was about half that of