As instances of the aptitude of the Koreans for taking to foreign articles which suit their needs, it may be mentioned, on the authority of a report from the British Consul-General to the British Foreign Office on Trade and Finance in Korea for 1896, presented to Parliament July, 1897, that the import of lucifer matches reached the figure of £11,386,[49] while that of American and Russian kerosene exceeded £36,000. In 1896 the export of gold increased, and was $1,390,412, one million dollars’ worth being exported from Wön-san alone. The gold export included, the excess of Korean imports over exports was only about £50,000, and as it is estimated that only one half of the gold actually leaving the country is declared, it may be assumed that Korea is able to pay for a larger supply of foreign goods than she has hitherto taken. The statistics of Korean Foreign Trade which are to be found in the Appendix are the latest returns, supplied to me by the courtesy of the Korean Customs’ Department,[50] the returns of shipping and of principal articles of export and import being taken from H.B.M.’s Consul-General’s Report for 1896, presented to Parliament July, 1897.[51] With reference to the shipping returns, it must be observed that the British flag is practically unrepresented in Korean waters, even a chartered British steamer being rarely seen. The monopoly of the carrying trade which Japan has enjoyed has only lately been broken into by the establishment of a Russian subsidized line as a competitor. In addition to the trade of the three ports open to Foreign Trade in 1896, to which the returns given refer exclusively, there is that carried on by the non-treaty ports, and on the Chinese and Russian frontiers. In concluding this brief notice of the Foreign Trade of Korea, I may remark that Japanese competition, so far as it consists in the ability to undersell us owing to cheaper labor, is likely to diminish year by year, as the conditions under which goods can be manufactured gradually approximate to those which exist in England; the rapidly increasing price of the necessaries of life in Japan, the demand for more than “a living wage,” and an appreciation of the advantages of combination all tending in this direction.