The Sun.
London, England, 1842-04-18 00:00:00

TRADE AND COMMERCE.

Destitute of proper roads or navigable rivers, the trade
of Affghanistan, by reason of its being an inland
country, and mountainous, is carried on entirely by
beasts of burden. Wheeled carriages not being known,
camels are the animals Chiefly employed. The principal
trade is with India, Periia, and Chinese and Independent
Tartan-. The caravans which set out for Tartary con-
sist of horses or ponies, which are alone able to
traverse roads that lie in one part over the
mountainous ridges of the Hindoo Coosh. They set off
from Cashmere and PeShawur. Caubul is the great mart
of Independent Tartary; Candahar and Herat that of
Persia. Merchants ordinarily travel at the rate of about
eight or ten miles a day in large caravans, the roads
often lying through close and craggy defiles and narrow
stony valleys, among bare mountains, or along the beds
of torrents, or over waste plains, where there is neither
water nor provisions. The trade of the north of India
centres in Peshawur. That which crosses the desert,
from .Typore and other countries still further south, comes
to Shikarpoor, Bahawulpoor, and Moultan ; and that
which is carried on by sea comes to Koratchee, and
thence to Shikarpoor and Candahar. The exports to
Hindostan, which form the most considerable trade car-
ried on by the Affghans, consist of horses and ponies,
which chiefly come from Balk, on the northern side of
the Hindoo Coosh mountains : furs, shawls, made at
Cashmere, and fruits. The imports are coarse cotton
cloths, which are worn by all the common people of the
country: muslins, silken cloth, brocade, indigo in great
quantities, ivory, chalk, bamboos, wax, tin, sandal-wood,
sugar, musk, coral, drugs, and spices of all kinds. To
Independent Tartary the exports are chiefly white cloth,
shawls, India turbans, chintz, and indigo previously ex-
ported from India. The imports are horses, gold, and
silver; the latter consist of the gold coin of Bukharia,
Dutch ducats, Venetian sequins, and ingotsof silver from
China: cochineal, cloth, British hardware, looking-
glasses, Russian leather from Bukharia, to which place
they come from Russia ; also a fine cloth, made from
camel's wool. The exports to Persia are shawls and
shawl goods, indigo, carpets of Herat, chintz, Indian_
brocades, muslins, and other cotton cloths. The imports
are raw silk. silken stuffs, a coloured cotton manufacture,
and silken manufactures, which are used in quantities by
all ranks; embroidered satin, velvet, and Persian bro-
cade. which are confined to the rich. Indian chintz,
manufactured at Masulipatam, on the Coromandel coast,
comes by sea to .Bushire, in the Persian Gulf, and is
thence brought by land to Affghanistan, where it is
much used. The . exports to Chinese Tartary are the
sante.---aa 'to "Bnlcharta. The imports are woollens,
Chinese silk and sz.tin, tea in small boxes of thin lead,
_ _

china, porcelain, raw silk, cochineal, crystal, gold dust,
and ingots of gold and silver, with the Chinese stamp.
The inhabitants of the towns differ in their origin and
character from -the cultivators and peasantry. The
greater part of them in the western country consists of a
race called Tanjiks, originally descended from the
Arabs and Persians ; and in the east of Hindikies, who

are of Indian origin. No Affghan ever keeps a shop,
or exercises.any handicraft trade. Those employments
are chiefly left to the classes mentioned above, and to
the Persians, some of whom have acquired great wealth.
The banking business is chiefly prosecuted by the Ilin-
doos. They lend money at an enormous interest by
negotiating bills of exchange ; and they occasionally ac-
commodate Government with loans, for which they re-
ceive bills on the revenues of the provinces. Many of
them are rich, and they conceal their wealth. Mr.
Elphinstone relates that one of them who gave him cash
for bills-on India, would only make his payments in the
dead of night, when he dug up the money, and paid it
with the utmost secrecy. The food of the common people
is leavened bread, rice, flesh, vegetables, sometimes
cheese, and always dried curds, of which all classes
aro fond. Provisions lire cheap, and there is a prodi-
gious abundance of fruit.