Mr. Adams to Mr.
Seward.
No. 792.]
Legation of the United States,
London,
October 6, 1864.
Sir: I have to acknowledge the reception of
despatches from the department, numbered from 1084 to 1101 both
inclusive. I have likewise a circular, dated September 12, instructing
me to collect five dollars for every passport issued from this legation;
a note of the same date, respecting the case of Mr. T. T. Tunstall; two
marked private, of the 16th and 17th of September; and another of the
17th instant, in regard to the temporary services of Mr. H. B. Adams in
this legation; lastly, a box came to hand containing the gold watch
referred to in No. 1085, as intended for Captain Hardy.
Nothing has occurred here during the last week to break the ordinary
monotony of affairs at this season. Some apprehension has been excited
by the commercial derangement consequent upon the serious decline that
has taken place in the price of cotton. This was alluded to in my
despatch No. 777, of September 8, as caused by the fear then generally
entertained of an approaching pacification in America. It now appears,
however, to have a deeper root. The fall in price, which has not been
less in the whole than tenpence per pound, is mainly occasioned by the
fact, which is now becoming apparent, that the general supply is so
rapidly increasing as to be likely, for the future, to be more than
equal, to the demand. In other words, the maximum of price has been
reached, so that further speculation is no longer safe. On the contrary,
an opposite risk is incurred of loss from a falling rate, from which
many persons have been already ruined, and more have suffered or may
suffer.
The probable operation of this novel state of things upon the sole
remaining financial resource of the rebels is obvious. Each reduction of
price is pro tanto equivalent to a corresponding
diminution of the means which they have at command to pay for the
supplies from here upon which they so materially depend. There is little
doubt that for some time past the government has endeavored, so far as
they can, to monopolize the business of running the blockade. It
purchases the vessels, and it loads them with goods both ways, on its
own account. Although the gross amount of cotton exported by this means
is not considerable, the very high price which it has thus far fetched
has compensated, to a material extent, for the deficiency. How much aid
has thus been afforded to the procrastination of resistance is plain
enough. But there is strong reason for believing that henceforward
serious deduction must be made from this last resource. It appears from
the estimates that the average annual supply of cotton to be expected
from other sources than America will very soon equal or exceed the
highest gross amount received from every quarter in any year preceding
the outbreak of the rebellion. Thus the ruin which these infatuated men
invoked upon themselves, when they entered on this deplorable struggle,
bids fair to be ere long complete-Nothing but a prompt resumption of
their forms of industry, under the shelter of a restored government,
giving peace and protection to improved forms of labor, can avail
against the stern progress of events which must otherwise shut them out
from all hope of further control of the market of the world.
I have the honor to be, sir, your obedient servant,
Hon. William H. Seward, Secretary of State, &c., &c., &c.
[Page 322]
[From the New York Times—enclosed with Mr. Adams’s despatch No.
792.]
COTTON—THE TREMENDOUS LEVER.
The speech of Mr. Alexander H. Stephens, wherein he declared that
“cotton is the tremendous lever by which we can work out our destiny
under Providence,” has a singular illustration in the latest returns
of the British cotton market.
During the first eight months of 1862, the British market was
supplied with 2,208,783 cwts. of cotton. This had increased in 1863
to 3,174,282 cwts.; and in 1864, to 4,670,000 cwts. The supply has
thus more than doubled in amount from 1862 to 1864. The value of the
supply has increased from forty-six millions of dollars in the first
seven months of 1862, to two hundred and twenty-one millions in the
first seven months of 1864.
A little more than double the amount of cotton brought into the
British market for the first seven months in 1862 was imported into
the same market within the first seven months of the present year;
but the value of the current year’s importations was as nearly as
possible five to one of those of 1862.
Where did the supply come from? In the first eight months of the past
three years, Egypt, India, and China supplied the British market as
follows :
|
1862. |
1863. |
1864. |
| Egypt |
£2,372,755 |
£5,443,278 |
£10,192,905 |
| India |
4,883,899 |
11,950,999 |
17,816,147 |
| China |
8,302 |
994,425 |
4,216,584 |
It thus appears that while Egypt, India, and China supplied cotton to
the value of but $36,000,000 in the first three quarters of 1862,
they supplied cotton within the same period of 1864 to the tune of
$160,000,000.
This rate of increase can probably be best appreciated by recalling
the fact, that the most reliable economists were wont to value the
increase of the supply of cotton in the slave States of the American
republic at the average rate of about three per cent, a year, or
about the same as the increase of the slave population. Taking
Egypt, India, and China in comparison with the cotton-growing
States, we can see what the productive capacity of a free and slave
labor system might be. We do not say that the comparison, in all its
points, is perfect. But we have sufficient evidence in the baldest
statement of the case to show that the civilized world will be
dependent upon no particular social or
political structure, call it a republic or a confederacy, for the
great staples of international commerce. It is well that the
delusion should be exploded. Whether the test is applied at Shanghai
or at Savannah; whether it be in the exchange of teas for calicoes,
or cotton for corduroys; it is well that the question should be
settled now, and for all time, that a political community, calling
itself such, cannot obstruct the course of commerce, the interests
of civilization, and the progress of the human race, by making “a
tremendous lever” for its own selfish purpose of any product of the soil. We see even in this bare
three-years’ experiment what has come of the “tremendous lever” of
the confederate conspirators. Its application has proved the social
ruin of several hundreds of thousands of people in the revolted
States of the Union. But its application has not essentially
retarded the commercial prosperity of the outside world. Possibly
Mr. Stephens, whose statesmanship is so loudly bepraised on all
hands, will begin to see this before Sherman has done with
Georgia.
