Page:History of the Indian Archipelago Vol 3.djvu/345

 INTERCOLONIAL COMMERCE. 329 lead, each at 46/ifo Spanish dollars per picul, of L.8, 15s. 4d. per cwt., and block tin at L.ll per cwt. In the time of Kaempfer, the Dutch appear to have exacted enonnous profits for their goods. China raw silk they sold at 651 i taliils the picul, or 33s. 3d. the pound, which is little less than 300 per cent, advance on the present prices in China. Bengal and Tonquin silks were sold at similar rates. Cloves were sold at lis. 2d. the pound. The clear gain made at this time on the ex- port and import cargos is reckoned by Kaemp- fer for each at 60 per cent, gross profit, or 40 to 45 per cent, neat profit, which, on the whole transaction, made from L.80,000 to L. 90,000 Sterling. After this statement, there can be no denying that a free trade and a fair competition, such as would enable the Japanese to obtain foreign com- modities at a reasonable rate, and insure to them a proper price for their own, with abstaining from all interference in the affairs of the government, were alone necessary to have perpetuated the most valu- able branch of commerce which the east ever offered to European enterprise. After the early miscon- duct of the Portuguese and Dutch, the European nations would have had many obstacles, indeed, to contcndwith, but none that free commerce would not have surmounted. The regulations of the Dutch not