The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1856-1888, 1862-04-17

lookouts, watching them as they pass by on the
horizon, classed among the port statistics ? Com
mon honesty would have excluded them from
being reckoned in our bonafde commercial data.
Deducting these vessels from the list Of merchant
men entering the port, We find the proper and
true exhibit for this year would be:
First quarter, 1852, % vessels, OF 7.36I tons and : whalers.
Showing a decrease of nearly 1000 tons in
merchantmen and Il whalers, an three months; ;
or nearly , merchant vessels and 80 whalers
less than the average of the corresponding period
for the SIX preceding years.
IL may appear to some of very little import
ance to exhibit the delinquencies of our neighbor,
and 50 perhaps it is regarding most topics; but
here is 4 subject pertaining 10 the ommerc and
prosperity of the islands, and it is all important
that correct statistics or none should be published.
We have once before had occasion to show the
errors in the POiyHesian's tables, none of which
are reliable, as the statistics of the Collector
have more than once demonstrated. The reason
OF these errors is ~plain-because incompetent
persons undertake to do what they know nothing
of. All the P0iyneSian'S tables are on a par,
and are evidently got up to amuse employees
vino have nothing else to do. We have RETAINED
from publishing quarterly trade statistics because
1t is next to impossible to do so without mis-
leading the public, and because, it is made the
duty of the Collector to prepare annually au-
thentic data, and he is here, as in other coun-
tries, the only officer of the government who can
do it correctly. We have, moreover, too much
regard for the credit of the Commercial to palm
off on its readers untruthful statistics.
But here we see the government organ,-to
annum are paid, as one would suppose to state
the truth or at least plain facts,-publishing
statements evidently designed to grossly mislead
the public and the government at home, and all
who have an interest in our progress abroad.
We can look upon il in no other light than an
unworthy and base attempt, made through igno-
rance or ~wilfully, to falsify facts in order to sup
port the Ministry or their policy. If the . pres
ent commercial policy of the country can only
be supported by falsehoods, it is time it was
changed. The facts exhibited by us show that
our commerce has dwindled down to the beggar-
" figures OF l9 merchant and ! whalemen-a
falling off of nearly 5000 tons in the merchant
and II ships i'll the whaling service. Look at it
in whatever light we may, apologize for it as we
can, there is no eyading the stern truth that our
has been destroyed, in n great measure
at least, by the present 10 per cent. duty, that
our merchants are suffering severely under its
operation, and that there is no reasonable hope
of any great revival in our mercantile prosperity
while it lasts.
When the government organ again attempts
to charge US with false statements, it would be
well for it to employ some other than one-eyed
critics to do its carping, and find some proofs to
fall back on other than its own unreliable statis-
ties, got ur for political purposes. These statis- ]
have never been correct nor worthy of public
and why the government encourages or
permits such statements to be uttered by its or
gan, the public have yet to learn.