The Sun.
London, England, 1829-11-21 00:00:00

1818-19
1819-20
1820-21
1821-22
1822-23
1823-24
1824-25
1825-26
1826-27

Drs. Dr. Drs.
2,603,151 7,414,000 10,017,151
1,861,961 6,2117,000 8,158,961
not stated
3,074,741
2,046,558
2,217,126
2,137,515
2,050,g31
2,002,549

9,041,755
8,182,015

5,125,000 8,199,741
6,292,840 8,339,398
4,096,000 6,313,126
6,524,500 8,962,045
5,705,200 7,756,031
1,841,168 3,843,717

7,058,741
7,523,492
5,677,149
8,5(11,121
8,752,562
4,363,788

What our petitioners would say to this state-
'mein we are curious to know. According to
their representations, the effect of excluding the
British merchant from the trade with China has
been to throw that highly profitable commerce
entirely into the hand of the Americans. It
would appear then, that, with a magnanimous
degree of self-denial, they have not merely re-
frained from seizing upon the proffered advan-
tage, but have voluntarily reduced the amount
of their trade with China from ten millions and
a half of dollars, its extent so early as 1805-6,
to little more than eight millions ! The ac-
count from which this statement is taken is sup-
plied by the East India Company ; its accuracy
may, therefore, probably be disputed. Let us
take, then, another account, furnished by the
authorities in the United States to the British
Consul General at Washington, of the number
of vessels belonging to the United States which
cleared out from their ports for ports beyond the
Cape of Good Hope in each year since 1813.
Years. Ships. Tons. Years. Ships. Tons.
1814 .. 5 1,995 1822
1815
1816
1817
1818
1819
1820
1821

•
From this official statement it appears that the
average annual tonnage in the first four years
(excluding 1814), was 33,664 tons ; in the en-
suing five years it sunk to 24,485 tons ; and in
the next five years, to 19,661 tons, whilst in the
last year, which, according to the hypothesis of
our petitioners, ought to be the largest of this
diminished average at least, the tonnage is only
14,112 tons, little more than one-third of what
it was in 1817 ! Since 1821, it appears, from
the same statement, several of the American
States have given up the eastern trade altoge-
ther. Now, surely there is something supremely
ridiculous, to say nothing harsher, in the allega-
tions of the petitioners, and in the assertions of
those who support them in Parliament, that by
our own ladies and false policy the Americans
are aggrandizing their trade with India and
China, when we find that trade to be diminish-
ing every year in so striking a degree, instead of
increasing in a greater ratio than our own. But
these petitioners have, with some tact and dex-
terity, selected one particular commodity, namely,
tea. The Americans, they tell us, have now the
exclusive supply, not of their own market only,
but that of the whole European continent ; and
we were prepared to find, in reality, that their tea
trade, foreign and domestic, had greatly increas-
ed. The official papers afford us ample data
upon this point ; and the result shows that, sus-
picious as we were of the allegations of these pe-
titioners, we have exercised too little distrust.
It appears that, even upon this topic, they have
reasoned not upon facts, to which they had pro.
bably no access, but upon their own eager and
erroneous presumptions. The following is a
statement of, the quantity of tea exported from
Canton by the English East India Company,
and by the American traders respectively, from
the year 1815-16 to the year 1826-27 :