III. An Account of all Silks and Ribands (separately) imported from July, 1826, to the present Time.-(Report from Select Committee of Silk Trade, p. 13. For Rates of Duty, see TARIFF.) Silk Manufactures imported into the United Kingdom for Hone Consumption.

Note. The distinction in the rates of duty between silks and ribands having ceased to exist in 1829, on the passing of the act 10 Geo. 4 c. 23., both articles have since been entered at the Custom house under the general denominations of silk or satin, gauze and velvet, and are necessarily stated in the same manner in the above return.

IV. Account of the Official and of the Declared or Real Value of British Manufactured Silks exported from the United Kingdom since 1820, with the Bounty or Drawback paid thereon.

Official Value.

L.

1820

203,666

The United States is our best customer for silk goods. Of the total quantity exported in 1831, they took nearly 1-2, or to the amount of 237,9851. of real value. During the same year, the exports to the British North American colonies, were 93,0131.; to the British Wes Indies, 27,5081.; to France, 43,4621.; to Spain, 24,8531., &c,

Sources of the Supply of Silk.-The following Table shows the sources whence we directly derive our supplies of raw and of foreign thrown silk, and the quantities brought from each in 1831 and 1832.

Turkey

::

112 701

Total of thrown silk

629,281

177,166

It is necessary, however, to observe that this account does not exhibit the countries which really furnish us with silk, and the quantities we import from them. It merely exhibits the sources whence we immediately derive our supplies, without tracing them to their source. Hence it makes the imports of silk from China and Italy appear very much less than they really are, and those from India and France much larger. With respect to China, it would appear from this account that only 8,374 lbs. were imported from it in 1831; whereas it appears from another parliamentary paper, that the imports of Chinese silk in that year really amounted to 466,692 lbs.; and even this last is, we believe, underrated (see vol. i. p. 304.). The reason is, that by far the largest portion of the Chinese silk imported into England is carried, in the first instance, to Singapore, or to some port in India, and is thence im ported under the name of Indian silk. During the year 1831-32, there were exported from Canton, in British ships, 8,451 piculs, or 1,126,800 lbs., of silk, costing at the port of shipment (Canton) 2,654,688 dollars; and of this, by far the largest portion came to England. (See vol. i. p. 301.) The silk exported from Canton consists of two leading varieties, known in commerce by the names of Canton and Nanking. The first which is raised principally in the province of Canton, is divided into 5 sorts. At average, the picul of Canton silk brought at Canton, in 1831-32, 158 dollars. The Nanking silk, pro duced in the province of Kiangnan, is divided into 2 sorts, known in commerce by the names of Tsal lee and Taysaam. It is very superior to the other, and usually fetches more than double its price. cost at Canton, in 1831-32, 368 dollars a picul. We have no doubt, now that the trade to China is thrown

open, that the exports of Chinese silk will be materially increased; and that it will become an article of great commercial importance.

East India native silk comes wholly from Bengal. About the year 1760, the East India Company introduced the Italian mode of reeling silk, which was productive of a very great improvement in the quality of the article; but we are not aware that any subsequent improvement has been effected. According to the Parliamentary Paper, No. 425. Sess. 1833, the imports of raw silk from all places to the eastward of the Cape of Good Hope, except China, were, in 1830, 1,736.231 lbs.; in 1831, 1,725,650 Ibs.; and in 1832, 1,814,819 lbs. But, notwithstanding this exception, we believe that a very considerable quantity of the silk so imported was the produce of China; being brought to us partly from Singapore, and partly from the Indian ports. Some of it was also the produce of Persia, shipped, in the first instance, from Bushire for Bombay. The silk goods brought from India are not only inferior, in point of quality, to those of Europe, but also to those of China. The quantity imported of late years is specified in the Table, No. III.

A good deal of the silk brought from Turkey is supplied by Persia. Some considerable part of the Persian silk that used to be exported from Bushire and other ports on the Persian Gulf, is now exported by way of Trebisond; which promises to become an important emporium for Persian and Turkish silk -(See TREBISOND.)

By far the greatest part of the raw and thrown silk that comes to us from France, is not the growth of that country, but of Italy; being principally conveyed by the canal of Languedoc and the Garonne to Bordeaux, whence it is shipped for England. So much is this the case, that it appears from the official accounts published by the French government, that while the aggregate value of the French and foreign raw and thrown silk exported from France in 1831 amounted to 45,102,054 fr., the value of the portion which was of French origin was only 2,092,776 fr.!- (Administration des Douanes, for 1831, p. 39.)

The reader will find, under the article VENICE, an account of the exports of silk from the Venetian provinces in 1829, 1830, and 1831. Since the article NAPLES was printed, we have obtained the following authentic statement of the exports of silk from that city during the 6 years ending with 1833, and of the stocks on hand :

[The following account of the silk culture in the United States, from the third report of the Agricultural Society of Massachusetts, will be interesting to the American reader.

The production of silk in this country has been repeatedly brought before the public; and presented in various forms as a subject of general interest to the agricultural community. When the state of Georgia was settled, silk and wine were recommended as particular objects of culture. In Virginia, measures were taken as early as 1663 to encourage the general production of silk; and the failure to plant mulberry trees at the rate of ten for every hundred acres, was made by the laws a penal offence. In 1760, the society in London for the encouragement of arts, manufactures, and commerce, offered liberal premiums for the production of silk in Georgia, Pennsylvania, and Connecticut. "The society propose to give for every pound weight of cocoons produced in the Province of Connecticut in the year 1759, of an hard, weighty, and good substance, wherein one worm only has spun, three pence; for every pound weight of cocoons of a weaker, lighter, spotted, or bruised quality, though only one worm has spun in them, two pence; for every pound of cocoons, produced in the same year, wherein two worms are interwoven, one penny. These premiums will be paid on condition that a public filature be established in Connecticut, and that each person bring his or her balls to such public filature." This invitation, says Jared Eliot, in his remarkable essays on Field Husbandry in New England, is not to a business to which we are wholly strangers; it is not to an empty, airy, and untried project; for there has been something of this manufactory carried on for sundry years, and by a number of our people in divers of our towns, by which we are assured that it is practicable. As early as 1747, the governor of Connecticut, Mr. Law, wore the first coat and stockings made of New England silk; and in 1750, his daughter wore the first silk gown of domestic production.

In an almanac of Nathaniel Ames, for the year 1769, it seems the subject had been matter of much public discussion, and "a gentleman, whom posterity will bless, deposited one hundred dollars in the hands of the selectmen of Boston; forty dollars to be given to the person who, in the year 1771, shali have raised the greatest quantity of mulberry trees; thirty dollars to him that shall have the next greatest number; twenty to the next; and ten to the next; certificate being produced from a justice of the peace of the number, and that they belong to Massachusetts Bay."

*

*

*

It is further stated by Eliot, in 1762, "that by a late account from Georgia, it appears that the silk manufactory is in a flourishing way. In the year 1757, the weight of silk balls received at the filature, was only 1,050; last year produced 7,010, and this year already about 10,000; and it is very remarkable that the raw silk exported from Georgia, sells at London from two to three shillings a pound more than that from any other part of the world." It is stated by president Stiles, that in 1762 Georgia exported to London 15,000 lbs. cocoons, deemed sufficient to make 1500 lbs. of silk.

Other remarks of Eliot, considering the time when he wrote, are particularly deserving of attention. He commends especially the cultivation of silk to the northern colonies, "who are destitute of any staple commodity by which they could make an immediate and direct return to England, for such goods as we want, and must always want, more abundantly than we have means at present by which we can refund. This seems to be the state of Georgia, Pennsylvania, and Connecticut." The cultivation of the great staple of cotton was not pursued then to any extent in the southern states.

He goes on to say that, "those among us, who raise silk, say, that it is more profitable than other ordinary business. Some years past, I asked a man of good faith and credit, who had then made the most silk of any among us, what profit might be made of it. His reply was, that he could make a yard of silk as cheap as he could make a yard of linen cloth of eight run to the pound. A woman of experience in this business told me, that, in the short time of feeding the worm and winding the silk balls, she could earn enough to hire a good spinner the whole year. I have not the least scruple of the informer's veracity, but how far their capacity might serve for an exact calculation, I know not." **

*Two lbs. avoirdupois are equal to about 2 7-9 libri Napolitani.

In 1772, as appears from the manuscript journal of President Stiles of Yale College, his family engaged, to some extent, in the culture of silk, and their production was sent to England to be manufactured, a sample of which cloth, presenting a singularly beautiful fabric, together with the journal itself, is now in my possession.

About the year 1770, a filature was established in Philadelphia, and it is a remarkable fact, from the 25th of June to the 15th of August 1771, 2,300 pounds of cocoons were brought to the filature to be reeled, or were bought by the managers. These came from Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and Dela

ware.

About the year 1760, the culture of silk was introduced into Mansfield, Conn., and some of the neighbouring towns. It has been pursued ever since that time, to a small extent, in several other places in New England; but it cannot be said to have maintained its foothold in any other situation than in Mansfield. In other places, where it planted itself with every favourable prospect of success, it presently expired. In Mansfield, Conn., it has continued to be pursued to the present time. The largest amount of raw reeled silk reported to have been produced in any one year in Mansfield, as was stated to me in that town, has been about seven thousand pounds. In general, however, it has not exceeded three thousand pounds per year. The inhabitants of Mansfield have been wholly dependent upon the white mulberry for feed for their worms; and a large proportion of these were destroyed by the severe winter of 1834-5.

The silk culture became again strongly the subject of public attention in 1826. Congress encouraged it, by the publication and distribution of large editions of manuals and treatises, prepared with great care and fulness, and giving all the directions and details necessary to the prosecution of the business, from the raising of the trees, to the preparation of the article for use. The vast amounts of money annually sent abroad for the purchase of this article of universal use and almost of necessity, the increasing use of the article among all classes of people, and to an extent probably not known in any other country; and, at the same time, the acknowledged capacity of the country to produce silk, and of the best quality, gave new prominence to the subject in the community, and drew the public attention to it with an intense interest; but with no greater interest than in an economical view, in the opinion of many intelligent men, its national importance may justly claim.

In 1830, the introduction of a new plant into the country, (the Perottet mulberry, or morus multicaulis,) which promised, from its extraordinary capacity of rapid multiplication, and its productiveness of foliage, to furnish superior advantages for the prosecution of the silk culture, gave a new impulse to the cause, and aroused public enthusiasm to a high degree of fervour. The disappointment occasioned by the almost universal destruction of these plants by the frosts, produced a revulsion in public feeling; and the progress of the silk culture was again arrested and set back in a strong ebb. It does not fall within my province to detail more particularly the history of events in relation to this subject. The introduction of this extraordinary variety of the mulberry, the morus multicaulis, or many stalked mulberry, or, as I think it should be called after the name of the spirited individual who brought it into Europe, the Perottet mulberry, led to the introduction of other valuable varieties. About this time the erection of a cocoonery at Northampton, in Massachusetts, of extraordinary dimensions and expense, and the reiterated and extravagant calculations of profit, which were to follow from the culture of silk, continually given to the public in the most imposing forms, and the establishment of societies in all parts of the country, with large capitals for this object, kept the curiosity and interest of the public constantly upon the stretch. The announced introduction of varieties of the mulberry, of such hardihood as to brave the severity of our climate, and especially the adoption of a plan for taking up the tender varieties and resetting them, or laying them down in the spring; and the practicableness in this way of obtaining in the same season from trees thus managed, an ample supply of food for the worms, seemed to give strong assurance that the bright hopes which had been indulged on this subject, were, at least in some degree, on the point of being realized.

In the year 1838, a new chapter in the history of the silk culture was to be unfolded. There is little reason to doubt, that, at this time, a conspiracy or combination of some principal individuals, deeply interested in the multicaulis in the United States, was formed, in order to force the sales of this tree at high prices. By every species of finesse, and by the grossest impositions, the public pulse was quickened to a rapidity and intensity of circulation almost unparalleled in the history of the excitements of the human mind. The selling of spurious seed, the disposal of trees under false names, the selling for multicaulis that which did not even belong to the species of the mulberry, and especially the villany, for it deserves no milder name, and should shut out its perpetrators from all community with honest men, of getting up extensive auction sales of multicaulis trees, which were purely fictitious, and this with no other view than that of fraudulent wholesale imposition upon the public, present facts in the history of our community equally remarkable and disgraceful., They are instructive monuments to mark the extremes to which, under the influence of an unbridled avarice, the cunning of some men will proceed, and the credulity of others may be led. In these circumstances the public attention was directed exclusively to the growing of trees. The production of silk did not enter into the calculation. Thousands and thousands of acres were planted with the Perottet mulberry; and immense importations of these trees have been made from foreign countries.

By the caprices and fluctuations incident to all human affairs, and by no means unexpected in a case of such violent and extravagant speculation, as that of which I have been speaking, it has happened that the ebb has gone down in proportion to the elevation of the flood. This speculation is at an end; and though all the growers and speculators in morus multicaulis from Florida to Maine should pump at the bellows together, they are much more likely to blow out the last embers that remain on the hearth, than to fan them into a flame. It is feared that in too many cases the exposure of the speculation, as it was termed, would present only humiliating examples of fraud and credulity; and it would be an invidious and ungrateful task to rake open the ashes for the sake of seeing the burnt bones and carcasses of those who have perished in the flames. The multicaulis is no longer in quick demand, and may be purchased at a price far below its actual and intrinsic value. The tree having ceased to be an object of speculation, it is now hoped that public attention will be directed to the production of silk. The best trees of the best descriptions being obtainable, even by persons of the most limited means, it becomes matter of important inquiry, whether, to what extent, and under what circumstances, the silk culture may be conducted and encouraged as a profitable branch of agriculture.-Am. Ed.]

SILVER (Ger. Silber; Du. Zilver; Da. Sölv; Sw. Silfver, Fr. Argent; It. Argento; Sp. Plata; Port. Prata; Rus. Serebro; Pol. Srebro; Lat. Argentum, Gr. ägyugos; Arab. Fazzeh), a metal of a fine white colour, without either taste or smell; being in point of brilliancy inferior to none of the metallic bodies, if we except polished steel. It is softer than copper, but harder than gold. When melted, its specific gravity is 10-474; when hammered, 10-51. In malleability, it is inferior to none of the metals, if we except gold. It may be beaten out into leaves only of an inch thick. Its ductility is equally remarkable it may be drawn out into wire much finer than a human hair; so fine, indeed,

150000

.

that a single grain of silver may be extended about 400 feet in length. Its tenacity is such, that a wire of silver 0.078 inch in diameter is capable of supporting a weight of 187-13 lbs. avoirdupois without breaking. Silver is easily alloyed with copper by fusion. The compound is harder and more sonorous than silver, and retains its white colour even when the proportion of copper exceeds . The hardness is at a maximum when the copper amounts to one fifth of the silver. The standard or sterling silver of Britain, of which coin is made, is a compound of 12 parts silver and 1 copper. Its specific gravity is 10 2. The specific gravity of Paris standard silver, composed of 137 parts silver and 7 copper, is 10-175. The French silver coin during the old government was not nearly so fine, being composed of 261 parts silver and 27 copper, or 93 parts silver to 1 part copper. The Austrian silver coin contains of copper. The silver coin of the ancients was nearly pure, and appears not to have been mixed with alloy.-(Thomson's Chemistry.)

288

The most productive silver mines are in America, particularly in Mexico and Peru. There are also silver mines in Hungary, Saxony, and other parts of Europe, and in Asiatic Russia. (See PRECIOUS METALS.)

Besides being used as coin, or money, silver is extensively employed in the arts. The value of the silver plate annually manufactured is very considerable. Large quantities are also used in plating. (See PLATE.) For an account of the quantity of silver coined at the British mint, since 1790, see vol. i. p. 389.

SINGAPORE, an island and recent British settlement at the eastern extremity of the Straits of Malacca. The town is in lat. 1° 17′ 22′′ N., lon. 103° 51′ 45′′ E.

The island is of an elliptical form, about 27 miles in its greatest length, and 15 in its greatest breadth, containing an estimated area of 270 square miles. The whole British settlement, however, embraces a circumference of about 100 miles; in which is included about 50 desert islets, and the seas and straits within 10 miles of the coast of the principal island. Singapore is separated from the main land by a strait of the same name, of small breadth throughout, and scarcely, indeed, ‡ of a mile wide in its narrowest part. In the early period of European navigation, this channel was the thoroughfare between India and China. Fronting the island, on its southern side, and at the distance of about 9 miles, is an extensive chain of islands, all desert, or at least inhabited only by a few wild races, of which nothing is known but their mere existence. The intervening channel is now the grand route of the commerce between the eastern and western portions of maritime Asia; the safest and most convenient track being so near to Singapore, that ships in passing and repassing approach close to the roads. The town is on the south side of the island, and is situated on a river, or rather salt creek, navigable by lighters for about of a mile from the sea. Ships lie in the roads, or open harbour, at the distance of from 1 mile to 2 miles from town, according to their draught of water. The assistance of a number of convenient lighters, which are always in readiness, enables ships to load or unload, with scarcely any interruption, throughout the year. The river or creek is accessible to the lighters, and the goods are taken in and discharged at convenient quays, at the doors of the principal warehouses.

The climate of Singapore is hot, but healthy. Fahrenheit's thermometer ranges from 71° to 89°. In a place only about 80 miles from the equator there is, of course, very little variety in the seasons. There is neither summer nor winter; and even the periodical rains are short, and not very well marked-moderate showers of rain falling for about 150 days each year. The settlement of Singapore was formed in February, 1819, and its sovereignty and property, in their present extent, confirmed to the British government in 1825, by a convention with the king of the Netherlands, and a treaty with the Malay princes of Johore, to whom it belonged. When taken possession of by the English, it had been inhabited for about 8 years by a colony of Malays, half fishermen and half pirates. When the first census of the population was taken, in January, 1824, it was found to amount to 10,683. In 1828, it had increased to 15,834: in both cases, exclusive of troops, camp followers, Indian convicts, and a floating population of about 3,000. The following statement of the censuses taken on the 1st of January, 1832, and on the 1st of January, 1833, shows the different classes of inhabitants, and their proportions to each other :—

The principal merchants and agents are Englishmen, of whom also there are a few shopkeepers, auctioneers, &c. There are also some respectable Chinese merchants; and the bulk of the shopkeepers, with the most valuable part of the labouring population, consist of Chinese. About 5,000 adult males arrive annually from China by the junks; about 1,000 of whom remain at Singapore, the rest

dispersing themselves among the neighbouring Dutch, English, and Malay settlements. The boatmen are chiefly natives of the Coromandel coast; and the Malays employ themselves as fishermen, in cutting timber, and in supplying the settlement with the rude produce of the neighbourhood. There are 2 good daily markets, open at all hours, and well supplied with vegetables, fruits, grain, fish, pork, and green turtle; the latter the cheapest animal food that can be procured. At Singapore there are no export or import duties levied, nor anchorage, harbour, light-house dues, or any fees; but a register is kept of all exports and imports. Reports must be made to the master attendant by the masters of vessels, and invoices delivered to the superintendent of imports and exports.

Commodities and Prices-Singapore is chiefly an entrepôt, having, with the exception of pearl sago, manufactured on the spot from the raw material imported from the north coast of Sumatra, implements of agriculture, and some others fabricated by the Chinese from European iron, and gambier or catechu grown and manufactured on the island, few commodities of its own exportation. The following price current of the 22d of August, 1833, will convey the best idea of the miscellaneous articles of which the commerce of the port consists:

The following are the rates of commission and warehouse rent charged at Singapore, except in cases of special agreement :-

Commission.

1. On all sales or purchases, except the following, 5 per cent.

2. On purchases of goods or produce for returns, 2 1-2 per cent.

3. On sales or purchases of opium, 3 per cent.

4. On sale or purchase of ships, vessels, houses, or lands, 2 1-2 per

cent.

5. On sale, purchase, or shipment of bullion, 1 per cent.

6. On sale or purchase of diamonds, jewels, &c., 2 per cent.

7. On returns in treasure, bullion, or bills, 1 per cent.

8. On all goods consigned and withdrawn, 1.2 commission.

9. On sale, purchase, or negotiating of bills not serving for purchase of goods or produce, 1 per cent.

0. On all goods sold by auction by the agents themselves in addition to the above, 2 1-2 per cent.

11. On del credere, or guaranteeing sales when specially required, 2 1-2 per cent.

12. Shroffrage, 1 per cent, per mille.

13. On all advances of money for the purpose of trade, whether the goods are consigned to the agent or not, and where a commission of 5 per cent. is not charged, 2 1-2 per cent.

14. On ordering goods, or superintending the fulfilment of contracts whence no other commission is derived, 2 1-2 per cent.

15. On guaranteeing bills, bonds, or other engagements, and on be coming security for administrations of estates, or to govern. ment or individuals for contracts, agreements, &c., 2 12 per cent.

16. On acting for the estates of persons deceased as executors or administrators, 5 per cent.