Page:Tales in Political Economy by Millicent Garrett Fawcett.djvu/109

 trade with the island was established, gave a pair of boots for five yards of matting; a pair of boots, after the trade is set up, exchanges for ten yards of matting, so they now obtain their matting in exchange for one-half of the labour and trouble that they had formerly to give for it.

The whole secret of the advantage of foreign trade is, that it enables each country to apply its labour and capital as far as possible to those industries in which its advantages are the greatest, or in which its disadvantages are the least. Considered in this way, free trade between nations is an extension of the principle of division of labour. It sets nations free to do those things which they can do best; just as division of labour sets individual men and women free to do that kind of work which they can do best. England can obtain wine, tea, silk, and many other foreign products, at a much less sacrifice on her own part, by producing iron and manufactured cotton goods, than she would have to give if