=237. Relative share of different continents in English commerce.=—An indication of the direction of the trade, and of the relative importance of different elements in it, is given in the following tables, the figures again being simplified to round _millions_. The commerce of England was distributed as follows: =========+============+===========+===========+===========+=========== | Europe | America | Asia | Africa | Total ---------+------------+-----------+-----------+-----------+----------- 1698-1701| £ 9.2 $ 46 | £ 1.7 $ 8 | £ 0.8 $ 4 | £ 0.1 $ .5|£ 12.0 $ 60 1749-1755| 13.8 69 | 4.5 12 | 1.8 9 | 0.2 1 | 20.4 102 1784-1792| 19.6 98 | 10.8 54 | 4.9 24 | 0.9 4 | 36.2 181 1802 | 39.4 197 | 23.3 116 | 8.7 43 | 1.3 6 | 72.8 364 =========+============+===========+===========+===========+=========== The student may perhaps need the caution that he should not attempt to learn outright such statistics as are given here; the attempt would be a waste of energy. The figures give more concisely than any other method of description the measurement of a country’s commerce, and are valuable for reference. They must, however, be translated into a more simple expression of facts before an ordinary student can grasp their significance and hold it permanently in mind. In the few lines of text following the first table the author has suggested the most obvious conclusions to be drawn from it, and will point out others applicable here. The trade with Europe was still by far the most important part of English commerce, being equal to more than all the rest of the trade together. It grew steadily throughout the eighteenth century, as the figures show, but still it was a less important part of the whole in 1800 than it had been in 1700. At the earlier date other continents furnished but one fourth of the total; in 1800 they furnished nearly one half. The two most important, America and Asia, were coming up with nearly equal speed, their commerce increasing roughly fivefold in the course of the century. America had a clear lead over its older rival, while Africa counted for very little in the total. QUESTIONS AND TOPICS 1. Town life and trade about 1500. [Soc. Eng., 3: 131-145.] 2. Economic and social conditions in England in the sixteenth century. [Harrison’s Description, ed. by L. Withington, London, 1902, readable but too diffuse for a student who has not learned to select what he needs from a book.] 3. Significance of the “enclosures” in English agriculture. [Soc. Eng., 3: 544-550; 4: 114-118, 239-241.] 4. Development of the manufacturing system, as seen in the cloth trade. [Ashley, Eng. econ. hist., vol. 2, chap. 3.] 5. Political conditions about 1500. [Seebohm, Prot. rev., 46-55.]