Part 1189

The account of Chilean affairs given in volume 1 (pages 411-415) ends with the overthrow and suicide of the dictatorial usurper, Balmaceda (September 20, 1891), the triumph of the Congress party, and the election to the Presidency of Admiral Jorge Montt. During the civil war which had this termination, the representative of the United States, Minister Egan, showed marked favor to Balmaceda and his party, which irritated the Chileans and produced among them a hostile feeling towards Americans and the American government. This was increased by the action of Mr. Egan, after the defeat of the Balmacedists, in sheltering a large number of refugees of that party within the walls of the American legation. {3695} The same was done by other foreign representatives, but to no such extent, except in the case of the Spanish legation. A telegram sent by Mr. Egan on the 8th of October to the State Department at Washington stated: "80 persons sought refuge in his legation after the overthrow of the Balmaceda government; about the same number in the Spanish legation, 8 in the Brazilian, 5 in the French, several in the Uruguayan, 2 in the German and 1 in the English. Balmaceda sought refuge in the Argentine. All these have gone out except 15 in his own legation, 1 in the German and 5 in the Spanish." Not venturing to violate the privileges of the American Minister's residence, the Chilean authorities placed it under police surveillance, and arrested a number of persons entering the premises. The Minister complained, and was supported in his complaints at Washington, causing further irritation in Chile. This was again greatly increased by his claiming the right, not only to shelter the refugees in his residence, but to protect them in their departure from the country. In that, too, he was sustained by his government, and the refugees were safely sent away. Meantime a more serious cause of quarrel between the two countries had risen. A party of sailors on shore at Valparaiso, from the United States ship Baltimore, had been assailed by a mob, October 16, and two were killed, while eighteen were wounded. The United States demanded satisfaction, and much angry correspondence ensued, made particularly offensive on the Chilean side by an insulting circular which Señor Matta, the Chilean Foreign Minister, issued December 13, and which he caused to be published in the Chilean newspapers. But Señor Matta disappeared from the Foreign Department soon after and his successor made apologies. "On January 16th the Chilean authorities notified Mr. Egan that they would withdraw any offensive passages in the Matta circular, and had instructed their Minister in Washington to express regret. The apology, thus expressed both in Washington and Santiago, was stiff and ungraceful, perhaps inadequate; but it was made in good faith. On January 20th, evidently feeling that all was now serene, the Chileans ventured, acting on a hint of Mr. Blaine's, to ask for Egan's withdrawal as a 'persona non grata.' What, therefore, must have been the dismay of the Chileans on January 23d, to receive an official notice, which the newspapers dubbed an 'ultimatum,' containing the statement that the United States Government was not satisfied with the result of the judicial investigation at Valparaiso and still asked 'for a suitable apology;' that for the Matta note there must be still another 'suitable apology,' without which the United States would terminate diplomatic relations; and that the request for Mr. Egan's withdrawal could not at that time be considered. It was a bitter draught for any government; but threats of war were resounding through the United States; American naval vessels were hurriedly being made ready; coal and supplies were going into the Pacific. There was power behind the note, and Chile prepared to bend to the storm. The 'ultimatum' appears to have reached the Chileans on Saturday, January 23d. On Monday, January 25th, they sent an answer which could not possibly be read as anything but a complete and abject apology on all the three points." But on the same day on which this answer was being forwarded, the President of the United States sent a warlike message to Congress. "It rehearsed the whole controversy at great length, submitted copious correspondence, and ended with the significant phrase: 'In my opinion I ought not to delay longer to bring these matters to the attention of Congress for such action as may be deemed appropriate.' … It is an unprofitable controversy as to whether the authorities in Washington knew that an answer was on its way: if they had read the correspondence they knew that an answer must come, and that the Chilean Ministry must sent a peaceful answer. It is therefore difficult to understand the purpose of the President's message. … The effect … was to inflict an unnecessary humiliation on Chile. Spanish-Americans have good memories. Mexico still cherishes resentment for the war begun against her forty-five years ago; and forty-five years hence the Chileans are likely to remember the Balmaceda affair as Americans remembered the impressment of American seamen by Great Britain. We have the apology, but with it we have the ill-will."

_A. B. Hart, Practical Essays on American Government, essay 5._

CHINA, Education in.

See EDUCATION (pages 675 and 724).

CHINA, Imperial Library of.

See LIBRARIES, MODERN: CHINA (page 2024).

CHINA, Mediæval trade with India and the West.

See (in this Supplement) COMMERCE, MEDIÆVAL.

CHINA, Paper Money, ancient.

See MONEY AND BANKING: CHINA (page 2200}.

CHINA, War with Japan.

See (in this Supplement) COREA.

CHOLERA, Asiatic, The visitations of.

See PLAGUE: 19TH CENTURY (page 2543).

CHRISTIAN BROTHERS, The.

See EDUCATION, MODERN (page 739).

CHRISTIAN SOCIALISM.

See SOCIAL MOVEMENTS: A. D. 1816-1886 (page 2939).

CID, The.

See (in this Supplement) SPAIN: A. D. 1034-1090.

CIVIL SERVICE REFORM: Progress in the United States.

See UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1895 (page 3586).

CLARK UNIVERSITY, The founding of.

See EDUCATION, MODERN (page 738).

CLEVELAND, Grover. Message on the Tariff question.

See TARIFF LEGISLATION: A. D. 1884-1888 (page 3083).

Special Message on the National Finances.

See UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1895 (page 3586).

COCHIN-CHINA.

See TONKIN(page 3141).

CODES, New York.

See LAW, COMMON: A. D. 1848-1883, and 1848 (page 1979).

COINAGE.

See MONEY, &c. (page 2198).

COLET, John, and St. Paul's School.

See EDUCATION, RENAISSANCE (page 707).

COLLECTIVISM.

See SOCIAL MOVEMENTS: DEFINITION OF TERMS (page 2933).

COLLEGES.

See EDUCATION (page 673) and the same in this Supplement.

COLUMBIA COLLEGE, The founding of.

See EDUCATION, MODERN (page 730).

COMENIUS, and Educational Reform.

See EDUCATION, MODERN (page 739).

{3696}

COMMERCE: Start--------

COMMERCE: Ancient. The Earliest Records of Trade.

Probably the oldest commercial record that exists was found sculptured on the rocks in the valley of Hammamat, east from Koptos on the Nile. It relates to an expedition which was sent out by the Pharaoh Sankh-ka-ra, to trade in the "land of Punt." Dr. Brugsch fixes the reign of Sankh-ka-ra at about 2500 B. C., which is five or six centuries before the time when Abraham is supposed to have lived. The "land of Punt" he considers to have been the Somali coast of Africa, south of the extremity of the Red Sea, on the Gulf of Aden. Other writers maintain that it was southern Arabia. It was the "Holy Land" of the Egyptians, from which their gods were supposed to have anciently come. The trading expedition of Sankh-ka-ra was commanded by one Hannu (a name which has a Phœnician sound) and it is he who tells the story of it in the inscription at Hammamat. "I was sent," he says, "to conduct ships to the country of Punt, to bring back odoriferous gums." He then describes the army of 3,000 men which accompanied him, and narrates their march from Koptos to the Red Sea, through the desert, at several stations in which they dug reservoirs for water. "I arrived," he continues, "at the port Seba [believed to be the harbor now called Koseir or Quosseir] and I made transport vessels to bring back all kinds of products. I made a great offering of oxen, cows and goats. When I returned from Seba I executed the order of his Majesty; I brought him back all kinds of products which I met with in the ports of the Holy Land. I came back by Uak and Rohan. I brought back precious stones for the statues of the temples. Never was a like thing done since there were kings." It would seem from this that Hannu's expedition opened the first direct trade of the Egyptians with the land of Punt. But it is evident that they already had knowledge of the country and of its products, and it is probable they had formerly been receiving its gums and precious stones through the traders of some other country. Some seven or eight centuries after Hannu's voyage to Punt was made, we obtain in the Bible a most interesting glimpse of the trade then going on between Egypt and surrounding countries. It is found in the story of Joseph. When Joseph's brethren threw him into a pit, intending that he should be left there to die, their plans were changed by seeing a "Company of Ishmaelites from Gilead with their camels bearing spicery and balm and myrrh, going to carry it down to Egypt." Then Judah said, "let us sell him to the Ishmaelites," and when these "Midianites, merchantmen," as they are called in the next verse, came near, the heartless brothers of Joseph drew him out of the pit and sold him, to be taken as a slave into Egypt. Now this story is found to agree well with other facts that have been learned, and which go to show that some, at least, among the ancient tribes in northern Arabia—the Ishmaelites of the Bible—were great traders between the richer countries that surrounded them. The Midianites and Edomites, who occupied the region near the head of the Red Sea, were especially the masters of that trade. Their poor land, which gave them little to subsist upon, had one gift for its people that went far toward making up for its barren poverty. It gave them the camel—that strange and homely beast, which is better fitted than any other for bearing burdens and for making long journeys without food or drink. At a later day they acquired the horse, from Media or from Mesopotamia, and bred that noble animal to such perfection that Arabia was long supposed to be its native home. But in Joseph's time the horse can hardly have been in use among the Arabs, since it seems to have been unknown in Egypt, which they constantly visited, until a considerably later day. However that may be, the camel was always the Arab's most useful servant—his carrier, his patient burden-bearer, his "ship of the desert," as Eastern poets have fitly named it. By the poverty of their country, by their wandering disposition, by their possession of the camel, and by their geographical situation, intermediate between several of the richest regions of antiquity, these Arabs of the olden time must have naturally been made a trading people, as early as it became possible for trade to exist. To the west of them was Egypt, with its fertile basin of the Nile and its remarkable people, probably first among all races that we know to rise out of barbarism and acquire order and industrial arts. To the east, in the valley of the Euphrates and Tigris, were the fertile plains of Mesopotamia, where the second oldest civilization that Is known was growing up. To the north were Canaan and Gilead, the Scripture "land of promise," full of vineyards, of pastures and of harvest fields, with wide Syria beyond, and with Phœnician merchant cities just rising along the coast of the sea. To the south, in their own peninsula, was Arabia Felix, or Arabia the Blest, a famous land of pleasantness and plenty in ancient days. With their caravans of camels they traveled back and forth, very busily, no doubt, through the desert, which needed no building of bridges or making of roads. In one direction they carried the barley, wheat, millet, flax and woven goods of Egypt; in another, the honey, wine, wax, wool, skins, gums, resins and asphalt of Canaan and Syria; in still another the more costly freight of gold ornaments, precious stones, pearls, ivory, ebony, spices and fragrant gums from the south. In all directions, it is probable, they dragged poor unfortunates like Joseph, whom they bought or kidnapped from home and friends, to sell as slaves.

COMMERCE: Babylonia.

"The industry of the Babylonians quickly attained great skill and wide development. They were famous for their weaving in wool and linen. The nations of the West agree in acknowledging the excellence of the cloths and coloured stuffs of Babylonia. Their pottery was excellent and the manufacture active; the preparation of glass was not unknown; the ointments prepared in Babylon were famous and much sought after, and the stones cut there were highly valued. The products of Babylonian skill and industry were first brought to their kinsmen in Syria, who could offer oil and wine in exchange. In the Hebrew scriptures we find Babylonian cloaks in use in Syria before the immigration of the Hebrews into Canaan. … The rough material required by Babylonian industry was supplied in the first place by the Arabs, who exchanged their animals, skins, and wool for corn and weapons. {3697} Wine, and more especially wood, of which there was none in Babylonia, were brought by the Armenians from their valleys in the north down the Euphrates to Babylon. Before 1500 B. C. the commerce of the Arabs brought the products of South Arabia, the spices of Yemen, and even the products and manufactures of India, especially their silks, which reached the coasts of Southern Arabia, to Babylon. The Babylonians required the perfumes of Arabia and India to prepare their ointments. … When the cities of Phenicia became great centres of trade which carried the wares of Babylonia by sea to the West in order to obtain copper in exchange, the trade between Babylonia and Syria must have become more lively still. It was the ships of the Phenicians which brought the cubic measure, and the weights, and the cubit of Babylonia to the shores of Greece, and caused them to be adopted there."

_M. Duncker, History of Antiquity, book 2, chapter 3 (volume 1)._

See, also, MONEY AND BANKING (page 2199).

COMMERCE: Egypt.

"In ancient Egypt agricultural counted for more than manufactures, and manufactures were of more importance than commerce. The trade which existed was brisk enough as far as it went, but it aimed at little more than the satisfaction of local wants by the more or less direct exchange of commodities between producers. The limited development of internal traffic was due to two principal causes: the natural products of different parts of the country were too much alike for much intercourse to be necessary for purposes of exchange, and the conformation of the country, in itself scarcely larger than Belgium, was such as to give the longest possible distance from north to south. … The Nile was the only known highway, so much so that the language scarcely possessed a general word for travelling; going southward was called 'going up stream,' and a journey to the north, even by land into the desert, was described by a term meaning to sail with the current. … While internal traffic was thus brought to a minimum by natural causes, foreign commerce can scarcely be said to have existed, before the establishment of peaceable intercourse with Syria under the new empire. The importation of merchandize from foreign countries was a political rather than a commercial affair. Such foreign wares as entered the country came as tribute, as the spoil of war, or as memorials of peaceful embassies. … The list of the spoil taken by Thothmes III. gives a tolerably exhaustive account of the treasures of the time. It includes, of course, bulls, cows, kids, white goats, mares, foals, oxen, geese, and corn; then follow strange birds, negroes, men and maid-servants, noble prisoners and the children of defeated kings, chariots of copper, plated with gold and silver, iron armour, bows, swords and other accoutrements, leather collars ornamented with brass, gold and silver rings, cups, dishes and other utensils, vessels of iron and copper, statues with heads of gold, ell-measures with heads of ivory, ebony, and cedar inlaid with gold, chairs, tables and footstools of cedar wood and ivory, a plough inlaid with gold, blocks of bluestone, greenstone and lead, 'a golden storm-cap inlaid with bluestone,' jars of balsam, oil, wine and honey, various kinds of precious woods, incense, alabaster, precious stones and colours, iron columns for a tent with precious stones in them, bricks of pure brass, elephants' tusks, natron, and, finally, by way of curiosity, from the land of the kings of Ruthen, three battle-axes of flint."

_E. J. Simcox, Primitive Civilizations, book 1, chapter 3, section. 1 (volume 1)._

See, also, MONEY AND BANKING (page 2199).

COMMERCE: India.

"It is said in the Rig-Veda that 'merchants desirous of gain crowd the great waters with their ships.' And the activity in trade, thus early noted, has continued ever since to be characteristic of the country. Professor Lassen considers it remarkable that Hindus themselves discovered the rich, luxurious character of India's products. Many of the same beasts, birds, and fragrant oils are produced in other countries, but remain unnoticed until sought for by foreigners; whereas the most ancient of the Hindus had a keen enjoyment in articles of taste or luxury. Rajas and other rich people delighted in sagacious elephants, swift horses, splendid peacocks, golden decorations, exquisite perfumes, pungent peppers, ivory, pearls, gems, &c.; and, consequently, caravans were in constant requisition to carry these, and innumerable other matters, between the north and the south, and the east and the west, of their vast and varied country. These caravans, it is conjectured, were met at border stations, and at out-ports, by western caravans or ships bound to or from Tyre and Egypt, or to or from the Persian Gulf and the Red Sea. To the appearance of India goods in Greece, Professor Lassen attributes the Greek invasion of India. … The indirect evidence afforded by the presence of India's products in other ancient countries, coincides with the direct testimony of Sanskrit literature, to establish the fact that ancient Hindus were a commercial people. The code of Manu requires the king to determine the prices of commodities, and also the trustworthiness of the weights and measures used. And that the transactions contemplated were not restricted to local products is evident from reference to the charges for freight for articles in river boats, and the undetermined and larger charges to which sea-borne goods were liable. The account of King Yudhishthira's coronation in the Mahâbhârata affords an instance of precious articles from distant lands brought into India. So also in the Ramayana, we read that when Rama and his brothers were married, the brides were clad in silk from China. … Merchants are constantly being introduced into Sanskrit fiction, and equally often into Buddhist legend. They seem to have been always at hand to give variety and movement to the monotony of daily life."

_Mrs. Manning, Ancient and Mediæval India, chapter 40 (volume 2)._

COMMERCE: Phœnicians and Carthaginians.

"The Phœnicians for some centuries confined their navigation within the limits of the Mediterranean, the Propontis, and the Euxine, land-locked seas, which are tideless and far less rough than the open ocean. But before the time of Solomon they had passed the pillars of Hercules, and affronted the dangers of the Atlantic. Their frail and small vessels, scarcely bigger than modern fishing-smacks, proceeded southwards along the West African coast, as far as the tract watered by the Gambia and Senegal, while northwards they coasted along Spain, braved the heavy seas of the Bay of Biscay, and passing Cape Finisterre, ventured across the mouth of the English Channel to the Cassiterides. {3698} Similarly, from the West African shore, they boldly steered for the Fortunate Islands (the Canaries), visible from certain elevated points of the coast, though at 170 miles distance. Whether they proceeded further, in the south to the Azores, Madeira, and the Cape de Verde Islands, in the north to the coast of Holland, and across the German Ocean to the Baltic, we regard as uncertain. It is possible that from time to time some of the more adventurous of their traders may have reached thus far; but their regular, settled and established navigation did not, we believe, extend beyond the Scilly Islands and coast of Cornwall to the north-west, and to the south-west Cape Non and the Canaries. The commerce of the Phœnicians was carried on, to a large extent, by land, though principally by sea. It appears from the famous chapter [xxvii] of Ezekiel which describes the 'riches and greatness of Tyre in the 6th century B. C., that almost the whole of Western Asia was penetrated by the Phœnician caravans, and laid under contribution to increase the wealth of the Phœnician traders. … Translating this glorious burst of poetry into prose, we find the following countries mentioned as carrying on an active trade with the Phœnician metropolis:—Northern Syria, Syria of Damascus, Judah and the laud of Israel, Egypt, Arabia, Babylonia, Assyria, Upper Mesopotamia, Armenia, Central Asia Minor, Ionia, Cyprus, Hellas or Greece, and Spain."

_G. Rawlinson, History of Phœnicia, chapter 9._