Indian trade

“ II. Upon the white man the effect of the Indian trading post was also very considerable. The Indian trade gave both English and French a footing in America. But for the Indian supplies some of the most important settlements would have perished. [249] It invited to exploration: the dream of a water route to India and of mines was always present in the more extensive expeditions, but the effective practical inducement to opening the water systems of the interior, and the thing that made exploration possible, was the fur trade. ”

“ The severe axioms of commerce had, from the first, caused the Indians to be regarded merely as the medium of a peculiar branch of trade, which was pursued at great hazards, excited deep animosity in the breasts of the respective commercial factors, and gave an absorbing interest to all that took place in the Indian country for two centuries. ”

“ What these causes are he thus explains:—"The export trade to India can never be extended to any degree, proportionate to the wealth and population of the Indian Empire; neither can the returns upon it be very profitable to individuals. Those [Pg 72] who attend to the manners, the manufactures, the food, the raiment, the moral and religious prejudices of that country, can be at no loss to trace the causes why this proposition must be a true one." ”

“ As the method by which India makes her payments in England is that she exports more than she imports, all calculations as to the amount of payments must necessarily be based on the returns of Indian trade, which show by how much the Indian exports exceed her imports. ”

“ July 6th.--My return to the Agency at the Sault was in the midst of its summer business. Indians and Indian traders from remote interior positions, were encamped on every green spot. No trader had yet renewed his license from the government to return. It would be difficult to indicate a place more favorable than this was, to observe the manners and customs of the Indians, and the peculiar questions connected with the Indian trade. I amused myself a few days, by keeping minutes of the visits of the mixed Indian and metif multitude. ”

“ It is said, too, that in the scramble for the Indian trade which now ensued,—at once inundating India with the manufactures of England and England with the produce of India,—the interlopers in general made as scanty profits as the company, so that at last most of them joined in urging upon the government the re-establishment of the old exclusive system. ”

“ They were before in perfect peace with both French and Indians; the troops were not therefore sent for their defence. The trade with the Indians, though carried on in America, is not an American interest. The people of America are chiefly farmers and planters, scarce any thing that they raise or produce is an article of commerce with the Indians. The Indian trade is a British interest; it is carried on with British manufactures, for the profit of British merchants and manufacturers ”

“ Report of the Superintendent of Indian Trade, January 16, 1809, American State Papers, Indian Affairs, I, 756; for the act of 1806 see Annals of Congress, 9th Congress, 1st session, 1287-90.
Another group of restrictions worked injury to the factory system through their failure to accommodate the habits and desires of the Indian. To trade with the government the Indian must come to the factory. The private trader took his goods to the Indian. The red man was notably lacking in prudence and thrift, and was careless and heedless of the future. ”

“ This trade was known as the Indian trade, and was carried on by overland caravans up through Asia and Northern Africa to the Mediterranean coasts. The goods brought into Europe by this means—gold, pearls, spices, rare woods—naturally set Europe to thinking that the lands producing them must be the most favored part of the world, and "the Indies" stood for wealth of all kinds. ”

“ The complicated nature of the Indian trade was such that only individual enterprise and industry was fitted to conduct it with success. Finally the old argument which had been wielded against the initiation of the system, that it was not a proper governmental function, was employed. ”

“ Her supply of gold she obtained not as did Europe from America in the 16th century by conquest or rapine, but by the more natural and peaceful method of commerce, "by the exchange of such of her productions as among the Indians were superfluities but were at the same time not only highly prized by the nations of Western Asia, Egypt, and Europe, but were obtainable from no other quarter except India, or from the farther East by means of the Indian trade." ”

“ The American colonists came to know that the land was worth more than the beaver that built in the streams, but the mother country fought for the Northwest as the field of Indian trade in all the wars from 1689 to 1812. The management of the Indian trade led the government under the lead of Franklin and Washington into trading on its own account, a unique feature of its policy. It was even proposed by the Indian Superintendent at one time that the government should manufacture the goods for this trade. ”

“ Nowadays merchants in India keep for ordinary purposes of trade such large collections of samples that in nine cases out of ten Government Departments could settle at once upon what they want and their orders would be carried out both more quickly and more cheaply. The maintenance of these antiquated regulations, which are very injurious to Indian trade, is attributed by Indians mainly to the influence of powerful vested interests in England. ”

“ The fourth and last cause is the little favor extended to the Indian trade, both in the Indias, and in these kingdoms—either because of the straitness of the times, or because of other accidents—together with the burdens that have fallen upon everything, the imposts and duties increasing, although greater relief was needed as the amount of wealth was less. ”

“ In a benevolent spirit, the United States enacted that certain stores should be conveniently placed within the Indian territory, where factors, having a salary and no interest in the trade, were to keep on hand a constant supply of articles suitable for the Indians, which were to be exchanged with them for peltries, the articles bearing only a fair cost, all expenses included, and the peltries being received at a fair rate. Government thus, out of kindness to the Indians, became a trader, and a competitor with individual traders. ”

“ The shipping is entirely in European hands and it would be interesting to enquire how much does India pay for the shipping of its imports and exports, and how much do the foreigners make by way of insurance and other charges. The exact gain to Great Britain and other European countries from Indian trade is simply incalculable. The great bulk of the foreign trade on both sides is in the hands of foreigners. ”

“ The East Indian trade was very much increased during this reign, so that all things that came from China and India, such as tea, silk, cotton, spices, porcelain or china ware, and many other beautiful and useful things, became more easy to be procured in this country. ”

“ Indeed, all the evidences available will clearly show that for full thirty centuries India stood out as the very heart of the commercial world, cultivating trade relations successively with the Phoenicians, Jews, Assyrians, Greeks, Egyptians, and Romans in ancient times, and Turks, Venetians, Portuguese, Dutch, and English in modern times. A genial climate and a fertile soil, coupled with the industry and frugality of the Indian people, rendered them virtually independent of foreign nations in respect of the necessaries of life, while their secondary wants were few. ”

“ Moreover, the European trader, no matter in however small a way, will not hawk his goods about. Perhaps the strongest proof of the trading capabilities of the Indian and, generally speaking, of his integrity, is to be found in the fact that the great houses will give him credit, and, in fact, many of them do the bulk of their trade through his agency. It is no secret that the opposition to the Indian in Natal is but partial, and by no means represents the real feelings of a good portion of the European community. ”

“ This agent, who has passed many years among the Indians, speaks with great feeling of the sad prospect staring them in the face. He says: “But one course remains which promises any permanent relief to them, or any lasting benefit to the country in which they dwell; that is, simply to make such modifications in the ‘intercourse’ laws as will invite the residence of traders among them, and open the whole Indian Territory for settlement. Trade is the only civilizer of the Indian. ”

“ The very Europeans who are now wholesale dealers would be retail dealers but for the presence of the Indian storekeepers, except in isolated instances. The Indian storekeepers have, therefore, raised the Europeans a stage higher. It has, further, been said that, in time to come, Indians may usurp the wholesale trade also from the Europeans. ”

“ If wealth was accumulated, it is not intended to infer that the pressing wants of the Indians were not relieved—that the trade was not a very acceptable and important one to them, and that great peril and expense were not encountered, and a high degree of enterprise displayed in its prosecution. ”

“ First instructions for trade with the native Indians reveal an immediate concern for the establishment of good relations with them and for laying in a good stock of Indian corn as a food reserve, but they show too a concern for the policies that would shape the development of a wider trade. ”

“ Should the merchandise be placed too high to be easily purchased by them they would and can dispense with nearly all the articles of trade. On the contrary should the price be too low the business could not be continued; the prospects of gain not being equivalent to the risk of the adventure or capital employed it would be abandoned. Consequently a medium is and must be established whereby are secured the advantage and comfort of the Indian and a tolerably fair prospect of gain for the trader. ”

“ No important business was ever intrusted to an inexperienced person, a policy which almost certainly prevented any serious errors. A regular tariff was established on the Company's goods, comprising all the articles used in their trade with the Indians; nor was the quality of their goods ever allowed to deteriorate. A price was also fixed upon furs according to their market value, and an Indian knowing this, knew exactly what he could purchase. ”

“ Through ages India thus occupied a unique position in the commercial world as the main supplier of the world's luxuries. As a consequence she throughout had the balance of trade clearly in her favour, a balance which could only be settled by the export of treasure from European and other countries that were commercially indebted to her. For India desired nothing which foreigners could give her but the precious metals. ”

“ No trade, of consequence, can ever be effected with Indians, unless the pipe be first smoked, and the matter calmly and seriously deliberated upon. An Indian chief would think his dignity seriously compromised if he were expected to do any thing in a hurry, much less so serious a matter as a salmon or beaver trade ”

“ It is a peculiarity of the Indian that he will sell nothing at wholesale, nor will he trade anywhere but in the marketplace, on the spot where he and his forefathers have sold garden-truck for three centuries. ”

“ Of this number is that great, respectable, affluent, and, as we have fatally experienced; most powerful body, the West Indian Merchants. I cannot deny that many, perhaps almost all of this class, may have a direct interest in the extension of West Indian cultivation. Though planting speculations may not answer to the immediate undertakers, they may answer to the merchant in this country; and he might gain by the cultivation being pushed to an extent which would utterly ruin the planters. ”

“ The Indian traders act as middlemen. They begin where the Europeans leave. It is not to be denied that they can live cheaper than Europeans; but that is a benefit to the Colony. They buy wholesale from European stores, and can sell with a trifling addition to the wholesale prices, and are thus a benefit to the poor Europeans. It might be said in answer to this that the work now done by the Indian storekeepers could be done by Europeans. ”

“ As to the competition between the Indian and European traders, it has been well said, in some of the extracts quoted above, that, if there is any competition, it is rendered possible by the large support given by the European merchants. But the very fact that the European merchants are willing, nay anxious, to support Indian traders, shows that they do not compete with them to any appreciable extent. ”

“ We know that the West-Indians are always indebted to our merchants, and that the value of every shilling of West India produce is English property. So that our import from them, and not our export, ought always to be considered as their true value; and this corrective ought to be applied to all general balances of our trade, which are formed on the ordinary principles. ”

“ Of far greater importance was Asiatic India, which, unlike America or even Africa, offered a field favorable for commerce rather than for conquest or for colonization. For it happened that the fertility and extent of India—its area was half as large as that of Europe—were taxed to their uttermost to support a population of probably two hundred millions; and all, therefore, which Europeans desired was an opportunity to buy Indian products, such as cotton, indigo, Spices, dyes, drugs, silk, precious stones, and peculiar manufactures. ”