chases and engagements. He should be acquainted with the kinds of merchandise found more in one country than another, those which are scarce, their different species and qualities, and the most proper method of bringing them to a good market; to know which are the merchandises permitted or prohibited, as well on entering as going out of the states or country where they are made; to be acquainted with the prices of exchange, and what is the cause of its rise and fall; to know the customs due on importation of merchandises in the places to which he trades; to know the best manner of packing up, embaling, or turning the merchandises; to understand the prices and condition of freighting, and insuring ships and merchandise; to be acquainted with the goodness and value of all necessaries for the construction, repairs, and fitting out of shipping, also with the different manner of their building; to know the wages commonly given to the captains, officers, and sailors, and the manner of engaging with them. It would be useful for him to understand the French, Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, and German languages, or that of any other country with which he has commercial intercourse. Although trade is of so universal a nature that it is impossible for the laws of one country to determine all the affairs relating to it, and all civilized nations show a particular regard to the "Law Mer. chant," or the law made by merchants among themselves, he should be acquainted with the consular jurisdiction, with the laws and customs of different countries, and in general all the ordinances and regulations that have any relation to commerce, both at home and abroad.

MERCANTILE LIBRARY ASSOCIATION.

The Board of Directors take pleasure in acknowledging the receipt of the following donations:

BOOKS-From Charles Anthon, LL. D.; Professor D. Olmsted; Boston Athenæum; President and Fellows of Harvard University, through R. L. Porter, Boston; Albert Brisbane; Thomas Eddy; Common Council, New York; A Friend.

"Herbarium, or a Collection of Botanical Specimens," in five volumes, from G. N. Stebbins.

Manuscript copy of the New Testament, and the Pentateuch, in the Marathé language; the Koran in Arabic; a cash-book in the Guzurathé tongue, illustrating the man. ner in which accounts are kept throughout all India: from Henry P. Marshall, late United States Consul at Muscat.

"Birds of America, from Original Drawings by John James Audubon, F.R.S., &c. &c.," four volumes, folio; accompanied with "Ornithological Biography," by the same, five volumes, octavo: the above valuable work having been purchased for the library by the subscriptions of numerous members of the association, by the contribution of the trustees of Clinton Hall Association, and by the donations of various merchants and others, friends of the institution.

CABINET From R. Nelson, eagle, a bird of South America, and whale's tooth; from David Perry, specimen of "sea-horse;" from Gustavus A. Brett," sea-porcupine ;" from Rev. Charles Fox, Jackson, Miss., a box of shells.

From Edward Newberry, specimen of minerals of New Jersey.

AUTOGRAPHS-Valuable additions to the collection, from William Wood, Canandaigua, N. Y.; from Oscar S. Keeler; A Friend; and Gordon L. Ford.

New York, August, 1841.

By order,

R. E. LOCKWOOD

Corresponding Secretary.

DURATION OF LITERARY COPYRIGHT IN DIFFERENT COUNTRIES. In Prussia, the exclusive right of publication is guaranteed to authors during their lives, and to their heirs for thirty years afterward. This refers only to literary works. In works of art, plays, or music, the duration of copyright extends only to ten years after the author's death. In the Germanic Confederation, literary productions of all kinds, even works of art, are protected for ten years; but this period may be extended to twenty in favor of large works, requiring much labor and expense. The Germanic Confederation intend, however, to take the subject into deliberation next year, with view to extend the minimum duration of copyright in literary works. In Russia, any author or translator of a book has the exclusive property in the work during his life, and his heirs or assigns for twenty-five years subsequent to his decease. In Belgium, the right is conceded to the author during his life, and to his widow and his heirs during their lives; but all right terminates after the death of the first generation of the author's heirs. In the Pontifical States, by an edict dated in 1826, authors and artists have the exclusive right to publish their works during their lives, and their heirs for twelve years after their death. In the United States, by an act of congress, dated in 1831, the copyright, which previously only lasted for fourteen years, was extended to twenty-eight years, with the right to further extension for fourteen years, if the author should survive the first term. In England, by the act of 1814, the copyright in literary works was extended to twentyeight years, to the author and his assigns; and if at the end of that time the author survive, the copyright is extended for the rest of his life.

SPURIOUS TEA.

The manufacture of tea is carried on to a great extent in Great Britain, and persons often fancy themselves indulging in the luxury of sipping the fragrant decoction of the Chinese herb, when perhaps they are swallowing with gusto the ill-flavored juices of the most common and despised plants in Old England. Imagination is a powerful agent in deceiving even intelligent people.

We find in a late English paper an account of a trial of Edward Glover, on a charge for having in his possession 2000 pounds of fabricated tea. An officer testified that having received a warrant to search the defendant's premises, he and two other persons proceeded there, and discovered an immense quantity of leaves closely resembling China tea. Some of it was in sacks and hampers, and a great portion was lying about for drying, for which purpose the place was fitted up with the necessary stoves and utensils. They immediately gave notice to government of the result of their investigation, and Mr. Bird, the surveying examiner-general of excise, was ordered to make a further examination. Mr. Bird stated he received possession of eight sacks of the rubbish, which was so fine an imitation of tea that at first sight any person would have supposed it to be the genuine article. On testing a sample from each sack, he found the whole to be composed of blackthorn, hawthorn, and fern leaves. Mr. Bird produced eight samples of the stuff, and mixed them with pure tea to the extent of one half of each. Mr. Bird observed that he would convince the bench still further of the extent to which the public was imposed on, and he exhibited various infusions of tea with and without the rubbish, and the appearance was so good that any one was liable to be taken in by it. The court observed that the poor, in particular, must have suffered dreadfully by the vile imi. tation. Mr. Bird said it had a very great sale among tea-dealers.

It appeared in the course of the trial, that the leaves which so closely approached the appearance of tea were manufactured expressly for being mixed with pure tea, not only to the injury of the revenue, but to the consumers of tea. Mr. Bird was asked how the stuff was sold to the grocers and tea-dealers. He said at the rate of 1s. 6d. per lb., and they retailed it at 4s. and 4s. 6d. per lb. The court, after consulting, ordered the de

fendant to pay a penalty of £200. The penalties were laid at £1,000. A warrant was issued for the burning of the leaves, and another for the recovery of the penalty. In default of payment, the defendant would suffer imprisonment, with hard labor, for the space of twelve months.

PROGRESS OF THE SUGAR TRADE IN THE UNITED STATES. The amount of sugar shipped from New Orleans in 1830 was trifling. In 1836 the quantity amounted to 6,461,500 pounds. In 1840 it had increased to 47,005,500 pounds. The amount sent to the interior for the Valley of the Mississippi, we have no means of ascertaining; the quantity, however, must be very considerable. This is more than one fifth of all the sugar made of cane, which is consumed in the United States, as there was about 190,000,000 pounds imported in 1839. Should the manufacture of sugar increase for the next five years as it has done for the last five, we shall make all our own sugar. We paid to foreigners, in 1839, for sugar, the sum of $9,924,622, which exceeds in value any one article. of our exports, except cotton. The shipments of molasses, too, from New Orleans to our eastern cities, has increased in the same proportion, they being, in 1836, only 419,358 gallons; and in 1840, 3,830,400 gallons. In 1839, we imported 23,094,677 gallons, valued at $4,364,234.

BOSTON ICE TRADE.

There are now sixteen companies in Boston engaged in the business of shipping ice to the East and West Indies, and to New Orleans and other southern ports. The demand for the article is now so great for exportation, that large contracts have been made for it in Worcester county, to be transported to Boston by railroad. They formerly sold their ice in New Orleans at six cents a pound, but now sell it at one cent; and where they made one dollar at selling it at six cents, they now make four dollars by selling it at one cent a pound. When it sold at six cents, none but the wealthy could afford to purchase, but at one cent all classes buy it, so it is sold before much of it is wasted by melting. The ice is sawed by a machine into square blocks, not less than twelve inches thick, and is packed on board the vessels with straw and hay, boxed with thin lumber, made air tight. One of the Boston companies paid last year $7,000 for the straw and hay they used for packing.

COMMERCIAL RESOURCES OF THE SOUTH.

"The staple productions of the world belong to the south," says the Macon Telegraph," and if she wisely avail herself of the great variety of soil and climate which are in her possession, in a greater degree, we believe, than any other section in the Union, she is destined, ere long, to be the most enterprising and wealthy portion of the confederacy-a mart where men of trade 'will' always congregate.' She will deal out to all with a prodigal, nay even with a liberal hand, her valuable and various products, and while benefiting them she will enrich herself. Her cottons are superior to all others, and form a staple basis which will attract capital to her from almost every quarter. Her tobacco is as rich to her as the opium to the east, and will continue to increase in value. Her vineyards may be made as profitable to her as those of Italy and France. Her sugar plantations will soon be more fruitful and profitable than those of the West Indies. Her immense forests in Georgia, Florida, Alabama, and Mississippi, will also soon give her a decided ascendency in the lumber market, and-her silk establishments will, at no remote day, in their works, vie in beauty, durability, and productiveness, with any quarter of the globe, if, indeed, the south does not excel them in the manufac ture and cultivation of this valuable fabric.

HUNT'S

MERCHANTS' MAGAZINE.

OCTOBER, 1841.

ART. I.-RUSSIA, AND HER COMMERCIAL STRENGTH.

POPULATION AND TERRITORY OF RUSSIA-PHYSICAL RESOURCES-MANUFACTURES-COMMERCIAL RESOURCES OF THE RUSSIAN EMPIRE-COMMERCIAL QUALIFICATIONS OF THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE:

In the spring of 1698, there arrived at Amsterdam a pilgrim from the farthest east, who had placed before him a shrine of a less romantic, though of a more propitious character, than those which are usually the objects of the pilgrim's adoration. As an apprentice in the great shipbuilding manufactory of the town he enrolled himself, and it was not until he had meted his arm with those of his better drilled competitors, and mastered the trade he had come to learn, that his workman's apron slipped off, and he stood forth in the robes of the Czar of Muscovy. He might have thought, as he looked around him in his week-day labors, on the huge timbers and the unshapen trunks which were dragged into the workshop from the forests of Denmark, of a country that lay stretched in vast and inhospitable masses, in a region to which the most enterprising merchants of Amsterdam had not pierced. He might have laid out, also, at the time when he was collecting the tools which were to build up an arm of the national defence, the plan on which the great empire that was intrusted to his care, was to be hewn and moulded, till it was fitted to take its place in the society of nations. With an ambition more holy than is common among his brother monarchs, he entered upon the task of shaping and knitting together the yast though unwieldy materials that were brought before him; and with a workmanship more rapid than that by which European statesmen are generally distinguished, he suffered not a moment to elapse in which a plank was not smoothed, or a nail driven. The hulk had scarcely lain on the stocks long enough to rest her timbers from the strain which they had undergone, before she was launched into the ocean that was spread before her, in the majesty of her complete attire. Russia is now the strongest, as in a few years she will be the most powerful, among European nations; and while from the immensity of her

VOL. V.-NO. IV.

38

frame and the diversity of her climate, she presents capabilities for every species of exertion, she may expect, in the freshness of her youth, to live onward to a period which will place old age at the distance of centuries. As Americans, we stand on a level with her on the platform of nations; from the same century our mutual existence is dated; and from the contiguity of our dominions, and the connection of our trade, we have been joined in a union with her, which will continue to exist when its origin is placed in antiquity. We propose at present to collect from the accounts of travellers who have visited her shores, and from the reports of her own municipal authorities, the data which are laid open of her past growth, and her present condition. The work will be of interest to the theorist, and we may hope, of use to the practical man,

We shall consider at present,

I. The population and territory of Russia.

II. The physical resources of Russia.

III. The manufactures of Russia.

IV. The commercial resources of the Russian empire.
V. The commercial qualifications of the Russian people.*

1. Russia, with regard to its population and territory.

The following table is made up from the computation of 1829, which is the latest that is, as a whole, on hand. There are returns, however, of single provinces, of a much more recent date, which we will make use of under other heads.

Of the whole empire, Russia in Europe, though in itself one half of Europe, forms one fifth; the duchy of Poland, one hundred and seventy

* We make use of the first opportunity of expressing our obligations to a work, from which is taken the greater part of the statistics we shall give, as well as the order in which they are thrown: “Handbuch der Allgemeinen Staatskunde; bei Schubert— Berlin, 1835, 4 Band." It has never yet, as far as we can learn, been translated, though it deserves a place on the table of the merchant, as well as in the library of the political economist.