tradesmen who carry it on. I shall proceed with a brief discourse of the
trade itself.

FOOTNOTES:

[37] [We have here a pleasing trait of the superior sagacity of Defoe,
in as far as it was a prevalent notion down to his time, and even later
(nor is it, perhaps, altogether extinguished yet), that the prosperity
of a country was marked by its excess of exports over imports. Defoe
justly ranks the amount of importation on a level with that of
exportation, as indicative of the well-being of the country.]

CHAPTER XXIII

OF THE INLAND TRADE OF ENGLAND, ITS MAGNITUDE, AND THE GREAT ADVANTAGE
IT IS TO THE NATION IN GENERAL

I have, in a few words, described what I mean by the inland trade of
England, in the introduction to this work. It is the circulation of
commerce among ourselves.

I. For the carrying on our manufactures of several kinds in the several
counties where they are made, and the employing the several sorts of
people and trades needful for the said manufactures.

II. For the raising and vending provisions of all kinds for the supply
of the vast numbers of people who are employed every where by the said
manufactures.

III. For the importing and bringing in from abroad all kinds of foreign
growth and manufactures which we want.

IV. For the carrying about and dispersing, as well our own growth and
manufactures as the foreign imported growth and manufactures of other
nations, to the retailer, and by them to the last consumer, which is the
utmost end of all trade; and this, in every part, to the utmost corner
of the island of Great Britain and Ireland.

This I call inland trade, and these circulators of goods, and retailers
of them to the last consumer, are those whom we are to understand by the
word tradesmen, in all the parts of this work; for (as I observed in the
beginning) the ploughmen and farmers who labour at home, and the
merchant who imports our merchandise from abroad, are not at all meant
or included, and whatever I have been saying, except where they have
been mentioned in particular, and at length.

This inland trade is in itself at this time the wonder of all the world
of trade, nor is there any thing like it now in the world, much less
that exceeds it, or perhaps ever will be, except only what itself may
grow up to in the ages to come; for, as I have said on all occasions, it
is still growing and increasing.

By this prodigy of a trade, all the vast importation from our own