and experts, representing at least five hundred million people, will be present. This large attendance and the superb exhibits which our chief commercial competitors will present at the exposition, render it obligatory on the United States to use every endeavor to make a display of every natural and manufactured product that will equal that from any other land. It will be the opportunity of the age to show the peoples of every country, through their thousands of representatives present, the actual superiority of American goods, of which even Americans do not know, and of which foreigners have not learned, and cannot learn, unless it is demonstrated to them by placing the goods before their eyes in competition with those of other countries.

Whatever is done to extend American trade is certain to exert a beneficial influence on the general prosperity of the country. Prosaic as trade may be, it is to-day the keynote of international politics. The armies and navies of the world exist but for the purpose of aiding the merchants and manufacturers in their struggle for this extension. Behind the pioneers who blazon their way through hitherto unconquered territory, go the merchants who buy and sell. The victory of Dewey at Manila is recognized as the presage of trade with the Philippines, which will mean dollars and cents in the pockets of the American people. European nations are now armed to the teeth facing each other in Asia, merely to seize trade advantages. The markets of the world are the prizes for which they are constantly contending.

The United States, however, is not compelled to resort to force to obtain trade extensions; it has the advantage of being able to meet and vanquish its competitors in their own home markets, while in many cases they are forced to find colonies whose markets they can only hold by establishing a monopoly. This country is the leading nation of the world in industry, but it has not won for itself the place it should hold in commerce. The eminent statistician, Mulhall, says:

"The United States leads in agriculture, with products greater than Russia and the United Kingdom combined; in manufactures with a product greater than the aggregate output of the factories of the United Kingdom, France, Austria-Hungary and Belgium combined; in machinery with a steam power greater than the United Kingdom, Austria-Hungary and Italy combined; in mining, with a product greater than the United Kingdom and France combined (or nearly one-third that of the entire world); in railway transportation, with a mileage forty per cent. greater than that of all

Europe; in forestry, with products greater than that of all Europe and nearly one-half of the total products of the world; in fisheries, with a greater product than the United Kingdom, Russia and Germany combined."

From the same authority we learn that the United States is $20,000,000,000 richer than Great Britain; yet that kingdom, with one-thirtieth the area and a little more than one-half the population of the United States, enjoys double our foreign trade. Even Germany, which is scarcely to be compared with the United States in any branch of industry, in 1895 had a greater foreign trade. These facts are positively discreditable to the United States and challenge the attention of our statesmen. Commerce is the one thing that has made Great Britain great, and it is the important factor of public wealth.

The growth of the United States during recent years has clearly proven that its commerce is capable of material increase. The exports per capita have grown from $11.37 in 1895 to $12.11 in 1896, and $14.17 in 1897. The exports of manufactured products have been quite as striking in their growth. In proportion to the percentage of total exports, the exports of manufactures have been 15.61 in 1892, 19.02 in 1893, 21.14 in 1894, 23.14 in 1895, 26.48 in 1896 and 26.87 in 1897.

These figures are gratifying, yet they by no means represent the full possibilities of American enterprise. In the exports of the other great commercial nations finished products represent a far greater proportion as compared with raw materials, and the United States should be able to keep pace with them without any diminution in agricultural exports. While the United States produces fifty per cent. more hardware than Great Britain, we export less than one-third as much. Instances of the same sort might be multiplied.

The United States has secured only one-seventh of the exports that go to the countries of Australasia and Asia, with a population of 852,000,000—a little more than one-half of the population of the world-while this country should have one-third of the commerce that goes to this immense field. This is but one illustration to show our trade relations to the rest of the world.

The extensive foreign trade it does enjoy has come almost wholly unsolicited, the producers of the United States having been occupied in filling the wants of home demands. But its production is beginning to vastly exceed its consumption, and it

must go abroad for commerce and take advantage of every agency to secure it.

Mr. Worthington C. Ford, Chief of the Bureau of Statistics in the Treasury Department, has compiled tables which prove conclusively that the international expositions in which the United States has been interested have had an important and direct effect in increasing its exports. Prior to 1876, the year of the Centennial Exposition, the balance of trade had been against the United States to the amount of $2,236,406,610. In the preceding eighty-seven years the United States witnessed but sixteen annual balances of trade in its favor. After the exposition the tide turned in favor of this country, and in the twenty-three years since then it has witnessed but three occasions when the annual balance of trade has been against it. Prior to 1876 the exports amounted to $12,309,653,384, an average of about $141,000,000 per annum, while the imports amounted to $14,546,994,000, an average of about $167,000,000 per annum. Since 1876 the exports have amounted to $18,662,344,445, an average of about $811,000,000 per annum, and the imports amounted to $15,570,903,493, an average of about $677,000,000 per annum. It will be seen that in this period our exports have been more than fifty per cent. in excess of the entire eighty-seven years before the exposition, and that the average annual exportation has been nearly six times the annual exportation prior to that time.

Not only was the continuance of this increase aided by the Columbian Exposition at Chicago in 1893, but American participation at the Paris Expositions of 1878 and 1889 was followed by a material increase of exports.

It is a well-known fact that more American firms have been able to form connections abroad and extend their foreign trade. since 1893 than ever before, and to the Columbian Exposition might easily be traced the beginning of negotiations which have led to the closing of many recent large orders for American goods.

The Consular Reports compiled by Frederick B. Emory, Director of the Bureau of American Commerce, contain many letters that are almost pathetic in their appeals to American merchants to take advantage of the rich trade opportunities which they permit to pass neglected, and which other more enterprising nations have improved.

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Carl Bailey Hurst, United States Consul-General at Vienna, in a letter to the State Department says:

"Everywhere in Europe there is a constantly increasing demand for what are termed "American Goods;" that is, goods made in the United States. In the first place, everything manufactured in the United States is so neatly and trimly made that it at once catches the eye of a foreigner. In the next place the American article is honestly made, and therefore it can stand the closest scrutiny and the test of use.

"It is noticeable that, if Europeans come into possession of an article of American manufacture, they are always proud of it and quick to exhibit it on all occasions, and they are not slow to let the fact be known that it was made in America. They acknowledge the superiority of the American goods every time."

In another report he shows how American glass wins recognition even in Austria, a country noted for its glassware.

"It is frankly admitted here that the American cut-glass is finer, and more elegantly cut than any manufactured on the continent of Europe, or even in England. This matter, it is said, is being taken seriously by the manufacturers here, who are already beginning to look elsewhere for a market for their goods. The same.is true of plate glass, looking-glass plates etc. Heretofore manufacturers and exporters in Central Europe have done a large and lucrative business in this line with the United States, that country affording them their best market, but many of the factories are now closed, or are running on half or quarter time and the plants can be bought for fifty per cent. of the amount they would have brought six or seven years ago."

Reports of a similar nature come from France. Walter P. Griffin, Commercial Agent at Limoges, says that there is a great demand for American agricultural machinery of every kind, as well as for sewing machines. He further says:

"There is probably no tool employed by the American artisans, carpenters, masons, plumbers, lock-smiths, woodworkers, etc., that could not find a ready and profitable sale in France. As these goods are less bulky than, and different in shape from, the French ones, they must be shown, and their excellence proven to the workmen before their superiority is realized.

"There is also an undoubted demand for good cooking stoves and ranges."

Continuing, Mr. Griffin tells of many other American manufactured articles which the French would buy, if the opportunity were offered them.

Frank H. Mason, United States Consul-General at Frankfort, tells of the demand for American leather goods, particularly shoes. He writes:

"The statement is here reiterated, upon the judgment of competent experts, that in every important German city, or large town, there could be established, with practical certainty of success, an American shoe-store. American shoes are offered here as a costly luxury, while it is a fact that

good factory-made boots and shoes are cheaper, quality considered, in the United States, than anywhere else in the world. American lumber and furniture is reported as in good demand, and there should be in Germany a far more extensive market for American mechanics' tools that has yet been developed."

The same story is told everywhere of the demand for American-made goods, but these goods must be shown, and their points of excellence made evident, in order to awaken the natives to a proper appreciation of their advantages. The Consuls, almost without exception, urge that commercial travellers be sent abroad and samples exhibited. It would be futile to expect the natives to buy unless this is done.

"If our manufacturers and business men are desirous of extending their foreign trade, it is indispensable that they deal with it in a proper way," writes Herbert de Castro, United States Consul-General at Rome. "They must do preliminary or missionary work. The merchants and importers of this country will not come to us unless we go to them first, and educate them to the use of our products. Some of our intelligent commercial travelers, supplied with adequate samples, would accomplish more in one month than letters and circulars could in years. The method may be somewhat expensive in the beginning, but the final results could not fail to be gratifying.

"Should our business men pay as much attention to this part of Europe as they have, for instance, to Mexico and some of the South American countries, they would soon reap the benefit of their enterprise. By following in the footsteps of the European exporters, they would soon learn to compete successfully with them. When American products are once introduced on these markets, and are well known and appreciated, they will not fail to command the preference on account of their superiority."

Such methods as are urged by the Consuls are expensive, but the Paris Exposition will offer a cheaper way to achieve the same results, as American goods will be placed side by side with those of European manufacture, for comparison. It will thus be unnecessary to establish warehouses, or salesrooms so extensively in the different countries, and this enormous expense will be entirely avoided. Although American goods will be exhibited only in Paris, and not in the many important cities of the various countries, the thousands of visitors and experts present from those countries will, upon their return home, disseminate the information there obtained of the superiority of our productions. The quality will thus receive the greatest publicity among the people of the different nations in the shortest possible space of time, and at the least possible expense. Besides the millions of Frenchmen, it is estimated that over two million foreigners will visit the exposition, and if the United States is well represented