The state rights democrat. [volume] (Albany, Linn County, Oregon) 1865-1900, 1869-10-30
THE PARsEE LETTERS.
| No. 8.
To Horace Greeley

10 horace UTeetCy
4 SAHIB Some fourteen or fifteen
years ago, when shipping came direct
from the United States to India. we
sometimes got corrugated iron frame
houses. There are some of these
houses now to be seen on the Island
OF Salsette. The neatness and SIM
plicity of the American design in the
arrangement of these little houses
have always found great favor in India,
and / was ready TO buy in this country
ten or twelve of them for shipment to
Bombay. / had, however, made in
quiries, when was in England, of
Marewood IL Rogers and others, as
to the price, and kept the estimate for
comparison. My inquiries here re-
suited in the total disability of ship
ping any. The cost of these little
houses was at least sixty per cent. more
than in Europe. The sahib who man
ufacturcs corrugated iron and used to
get up these houses for foreign coun-
tries told me that the foreign trade III
them has become extinct.
''All this is owing to our tariff on
iron, said he. 'If we try to roll iron
into sheets in this country, we are met
by the first difiiculty-the high price
OF pig iron, which is just 100 per cent.
dearer here than III England. If we
try to import the common sheet-iron.
with view Of corrugating it here, the
duty thereon il, on No. % wire g,Iage,
] cents per pound, or 10 per cent
How, then, il it possible for us to
think for moment to produce any
Thing in iron for foreign countries p
We have only one market now left us :;
that il our own. But there is no sat
isfaction or profit in it. The enhan-
ced price of iron engages Just double
the capital We formerly had IN our
trade, and we certainly earn less
money. If, for instacce, we made in
1858 on pound of worked up sheet
iron, which cost 81 cents, cent profit.
We certainly cleared over l5 per cent.
The price now il 81 cents q pound,
and If We do clear cent per pound,
| it only is . per cent. Besides, the
high price prevents the consumption,
and we cannot produce as much as in
1858"
"Why, then, said I, edo you clam
or for this tariff which Injuries YOU ?"
do You think, +" said he, "that iron
rollers or sheet-iron makers wish for
this monstrosity called tariff? No,
sir I; not we, who employ the most la
Dor, both skilled and unskiIled, want
it. We are included IN the truly odt-
ous cliqe called monopoly : but it is
only mere faction, a small faction, as
far Us iron is concerned, who are the
authors of and benefit by the iron mo-
nopoly. Give me cheap pig-iron and
viii build you cheap iron houses. We
are simply working to swell the gains
and ill-got riches of the pig-iron man
ufdcfurers and were it not for the
hope of soon seeing justice done us,
/, for one, would give oven working in
sheet or corrugated iron"
am truly sorry, o Greeley, sahib |
that | cannot reconcile this true state of
affairs with your admirable theory that
high protection and monopoly only
tend to promote trade and commerce.
May YOU not, after all, be wrong p
See, o sahib and take example from
our parsee people. Tor more than a
thousand years we adored the cow
No doubt, as cow-worship is pure Hin
doc, our ancestors, when driven from
Persia, who took refuge in India, were
by force made to worship it; but so
strong is the habit now that we still
linger and keep up the alteration yet
own it is stupid and wrong, and
have long since emancipated myself
from this superstition. You and your
school would, indeed, be worthy our
true fire-worshippers but, instead of
worshipping the cow even, you adore
a set of domestic wolves who only
seem bent on devouring a peaceful and
industrious people.
With great respect, yours,
A CURyosBHoY,
Parsee of Apollo street. Bombay.