Salt trade

“ The end of Furnival need not occupy us; he came into the salt trade in 1822 with a sufficiency of financial backing, an unusual stock of confidence and energy, and a patent which “created a sensation through the whole salt trade”; we take our leave of him eleven years later in a debtors’ gaol—a victim to the methods which the Cheshire salt proprietors invariably adopted in ridding themselves of an obtrusive competitor. ”

“ In 1890, an official of the Salt Union reflected with grim complaisance that, although no trade had had more patents applied to it than the salt trade, no trade could show so large a percentage of failures in the matter of reformed methods, and since all the companies that had brought forward new plants and processes in competition with the Salt Union had come short of success, he piously concluded that the system which had survived the trial of generations must be the fittest. ”

“ Individuals in every generation recognized that the methods of mediaevalism cried aloud for revision, but the salt trade resolutely and consistently set their faces, and their hands, against every suggested innovation. The salt-men were the avowed enemies of Thomas Lowndes, they drove Chrysel back to Saxony, they loaded Furnival with misfortune and landed him in gaol. ”

“ But, although the salt industry is one of the oldest in the country, it has received scant treatment at the hands of authors, and this is accounted for by the factiv that the trade has been conducted by a comparatively small group of men who have resisted all attempts of outsiders to participate in either their secrets or their profits. The desire for information has been consistently rebuked, and practical details relating to borings, working expenses, levels of brine, and quantities raised have been jealously concealed. ”

“ I think it cannot be doubted that the salt trade, in common with all staple British manufactures, is entitled to the protection of government; and the British manufacturers of salt consider that, in common with other manufacturers of this country, they are entitled to such protection, in particular from a competition at home with foreign manufacturers ”

“ Capital is showing itself, almost everywhere, a remorseless Juggernaut, crushing thousands of victims beneath its ponderous wheels.” In that year a proposal to form the trade into one huge company was frustrated by the bitterness of internal jealousies. Further attempts to bring all the salt proprietors into a combination for mutual protection and profit were made and abandoned from the same cause. ”

“ This salt is superior to any other found in the Southwest and commanded such a price that Cushing found it often adulterated with other varieties. He goes on to say that the influence of such a salt supply upon the movements of large tribes is not confined to those of America, for “all the great historic trade-routes across Asia were first established along salt trails.”—Thirteenth Annual Report, Bureau of Ethnology and Anthropology, pp. ”

“ THE PRODUCTIVE CALIFORNIA SALT BEDS
The United States produces one-fourth of the entire output of the world. Salt was one of the first two great articles of international commerce in the history of the world trade.
AN UNDERGROUND PASSAGE WAY THROUGH SOLID SALT
The most wonderful salt mines in the world are those of Galicia, in Austria. In this region there is a mass of salt estimated to measure 500 miles in length, 20 miles in breadth, and 1,200 feet in thickness. ”

“ For a century afterward, so completely was this trade monopolized by the Portuguese and Dutch Governments, that it constantly commanded even a higher price. Except salt, perhaps no other condiment is so universally used; and yet the natives, who cultivate it for the rest of the world, never use it themselves, just as we have already seen is the case with those Malays who raise cloves and nutmeg and mace. ”

“ In most European countries a tax is laid on salt; and the coarser as well as the finer crystals are therefore often dried so as not to pay duty on more water than can be helped.
The brine used in the salt manufacture in England is very nearly saturated, containing 25 or 26% of sodium chloride, the utmost water can take up being 27%; and it ranges from 38 to 42 oz. of salt per gallon. In some other countries the brine has to be concentrated before use.
Saltmaking is by no means an unhealthy trade, some slight soreness of the eyes being the only affection sometimes complained of ”

“ In May, a correspondent of the same journal deplored the material damage the trade was145 suffering through the perversity and selfishness of the salt proprietors, and he came to the conclusion that their object was “not really to do business but to kill one another out.” “Is there more morality,” he asked, “in the man of means starving out the man without means by selling, below cost of make, than there would be in stopping him on the highway and picking his pocket?... ”

“ Even in this country, when the old open-pan system of evaporating salt from brine produced only two tons of salt for the consumption of a ton of fuel, rock-salt could be raised, purified, and marketed in competition with white salt, but the modern boiling processes have effected such substantial improvements and consequent economical advantages, that the rock-salt industry appears to be doomed to decay. ”

“ The primitive methods that characterized the brine industry have been adhered to with equal tenacity in the winning of rock-salt. It is extraordinary that, in the manufacture and in the mining of salt, each successive generation of salt-men, in inheriting their methods from their forefathers, or adapting them from the miners of another country, have always preserved the intense conservatism that appears to be inseparable from the industry, and have resisted all innovations that have promised to simplify or expedite their labours. ”

“ About a fifth of all the salt consumed in the world annually is produced in the United States, and other large producers are Great Britain, Germany, Russia, China, India, and France.
The United States produces almost its entire consumption of salt, which is increasing at a very rapid rate. Salt is produced in fourteen states, but over 85 per cent of the total output comes from Michigan, New York, Ohio, and Kansas. Reserves are practically inexhaustible. ”

“ The freest importation of salt provisions, in the same manner, could have as little effect upon the interest of the graziers of Great Britain as that of live cattle. Salt provisions are not only a very bulky commodity, but when compared with fresh meat they are a commodity both of worse quality, and as they cost more labor and expense, of higher price. They could never, therefore, come into competition with the fresh meat, though they might with the salt provisions of the country. ”

“ The West is the last section to be viewed, and it will be found to be the true seat of the most oppressive operations of the salt tax. The domestic supply is high in price, deficient in quantity, and altogether unfit for one of the greatest purposes for which salt is there wanted—curing provisions for exportation. A foreign supply is indispensable, and alum salt is the kind used. The import price of this kind, from the West Indies, is nine cents a bushel; from Portugal, eight cents a bushel. At these prices, the West could be supplied with this salt at New Orleans, if the duty was abolished ”

“ The reason I have heard why stock require salt in this country, is, that being at so great a distance from the ocean, there is no salt in the air, as in countries nearer the sea. I {180} believe they give their beasts salt on the shores of the Atlantic; and as it is there said to be serviceable to them, perhaps salt is beneficial to cattle in all situations, at least in hot climates. Beasts are much lighter here than in England, as their flesh is not so firm as in a colder country ”

“ The value of these articles was two millions and a quarter of dollars. To this amount must be added the supply for the army and navy, and all that was sent to the South for home consumption, every pound of which had to be cured in this kind of salt, for common salt will not cure it. The Western country is the great producer of provisions; and there is scarcely a farmer in the whole extent of that vast region whose interest does not require a prompt repeal of the duty on this description of salt. ”

“ Since then, for Bengal Proper, the supply of the condiment has been obtained chiefly by importation, but in part by private manufacture under a System of excise.' (Balfour, Cyclopaedia, 3rd ed., s.v. Salt.) At present the Salt Department is controlled by a single Commissioner with the Government of India, The fee payable for a licence to manufacture salt is fifty rupees. It is inaccurate to describe the limitation imposed on the manufacture of salt as a monopoly. Any one can sell salt, but it can be made only under licence. ”

“ It has always been obvious to every intelligent investigator outside the little circle of salt proprietors, that the open-pan process was a survival of the dark ages, but the principle governing the precipitation of salt from brine is so simple that the equal difficulty presented itself to the practical salt-men, of either effecting further simplification or of securing further economies by the elaboration of the process. ”

“ Salt is, I may remark, a Government monopoly in Japan. No one except the Government, or some person licensed by the Government, is allowed to import salt from abroad, while no one can manufacture salt without Government permission. Salt made by salt manufacturers is purchased by the Government, which sells it at a fixed price. This particular monopoly has only recently been established, and the reason put forward for it is a desire to improve and develop the salt industry and at the same time to add to the national revenue. ”

“ Smurthwaite, in partnership with Richard J. Taylor (son of a former President of the Church, John Taylor) engaged in the manufacture of salt, with the financial backing of a leading Church banker. Along the shores of Salt Lake, salt is obtained, by evaporation, at the cost of about sixty cents a ton; its selling price, at the neighboring smelting centers, ranges from three dollars to fourteen dollars a ton; and the industry has always been one of the most profitable in the community. ”

“ LATEST METHODS OF SALT-MAKING In tracing the development of the salt-making industry in this country, it will be observed that, until the last quarter of a century, the old open-pan system defied improvement, and the salt-makers from generation to generation successfully resisted the endeavours of all who suggested innovations or hinted that better methods could be introduced in the manufacture. ”

“ The salt industry is now said to have reached a very stable basis and the demand for salt in the United States is practically all supplied by American manufacturers. Salt can be put to a great many uses in addition to the usual requirements for table and cooking. ”

“ At this same hearing, a representative of the road salt industry complained that mid-Atlantic states were importing road salt from Chile and Mexico rather than buying from mines in Ohio and Louisiana. Importing salt was cheaper than buying domestically due to the difference in transport costs. ”

“ In an ordinary household every possible influence, social and domestic, is brought to bear on the heretic who abstains from flesh foods. Anxious relatives and indignant friends adjure him to remember the duty he owes to himself and to his family, and urge him for the sake of those dear to him, if not for his own, to return to that great sacramental bond of union between man and man—the eating of our non-human fellow-beings. Is he smitten by one of the numberless ailments that are the stock-in-trade of the physician, and of which flesh-eaters are daily the victims in every part of the world? ”

“ At Goderich on Lake Huron, in 1866, in boring for oil, a deposit of rock salt was struck at a depth of about 960 ft., and the brine was remarkably strong and of great purity. The manufacture of salt was commenced immediately, and developed rapidly, until now the production amounts to several millions of bushels annually, affording the principal source of supply for Canada, and also furnishing a large amount for export to the United States. ”

“ We are not dependent upon neutralization for the enormous quantities of salt used in the home and in commerce. It is from the active, restless seas of the present, and from [228] the dead seas of the prehistoric past that our vast stores of salt come. The waters of the Mediterranean and of our own Great Salt Lake are led into shallow basins, where, after evaporation by the heat of the sun, they leave a residue of salt. By far the largest quantity of salt, however, comes from the seas which no longer exist, but which in far remote ages dried up and left behind them their burden of salt. ”

“ In Africa are large beds of salt land, beds of rock-salt and a lake covered at times with a shining white crust of pure salt two feet thick. France, Spain, Portugal, Italy and some Mediterranean islands are the chief producers of sea-salt. In China there are salt wells of great depth and number.
In Spain, France and other countries salt is a government monopoly, and no one else can sell it. ”

“ The worst is that salted meat has lost those saline constituents that are not readily supplied except in fresh fruits and vegetables, precisely those foods that are rarest wherever salt meat is most likely to be used, in large towns, cold countries, during the winter season, or at sea. Sailors at sea get rations of lime-juice when their supply of vegetables brought from shore comes to an end, not to counteract the effects of the salt, as some suppose, but to furnish in another form what the brine has taken away. In Norway, salt food and scurvy are alike common. ”