number made and sold, and no estimate is possible of their cost. The use of crackers is universal in China, and has been as far back as history records. It is most probable that in the beginning they were used to frighten away evil spirits. Now they are most frequently an expression of good feeling or of ceremonious compliment. They are used at weddings, births, and funerals; at festivals; religious, civil, and military ceremonies; at New Year; to salute persons about to make a journey; and, in fact, on all occasions out of the ordinary routine.

In making crackers, only the cheapest kind of straw paper which can be produced in the immediate locality where the crackers are made is used for the body of the cracker. A little finer paper is

used for the wrapper. A piece of straw paper 9 by 30 inches will make twenty-one crackers 11⁄2 inches long and one-fourth of an inch in diameter.

The powder is also of the cheapest grade, and is made in the locality where used. It costs 150 to 175 cash per catty, or 6 to 7 cents gold per pound.

For the fuse, a paper (called "leather" in Shanghai) is used, which is imported from Japan and is made from the inner lining of the bamboo. In other places a fine rice paper is used, generally stiffened slightly with buckwheat-flour paste, which, the Chinese. say, adds to its inflammability. A strip of this paper one-third of an inch wide by 14 inches (a Chinese foot) long is laid on a table, and a very little powder put down the middle of it with a hollow bamboo stick. A quick twist of the paper makes the fuse ready for use.

It is not easy to persuade the Chinese to exhibit their modes of manufacture to a foreigner; but Mr. Williams, vice-consul at Shanghai, thus describes the work as he has seen it.

The straw paper is first rolled by hand around an iron rod, which varies in size according to the size of cracker to be made. To complete the rolling, a rude machine is used. This consists of two uprights supporting an axis, from which is suspended by two arms a heavy piece of wood, slightly convex on the lower side. There is just room between this swinging block and the top of the table to place the cracker. As each layer of paper is put on by hand, the cracker is placed on the table and the suspended weight is drawn over the roll, thus tightening it until no more can be passed under the weight. For the smallest "whip" crackers, the workman uses for compression, instead of this machine, a heavy piece of wood, fitted with a handle like that of a carpenter's plane. In filling crackers, two hundred to three hundred are tied together tightly in a bunch. Red clay is spread over the end of the bunch and forced into the end of each cracker with a punch. While the clay is being tamped in, a little water is sprayed on it, which makes it pack closer. The powder is poured in at the other end of the cracker. With the aid of an awl the edge of the paper is turned in at the upper end of the cracker, and the fuse is inserted through this.

The long ends of the fuses are braided together in such a way that the crackers lie in two parallel rows. The braid is doubled on itself, and a large quick-firing fuse inserted, and the whole is bound with a fine thread. The bundle is wrapped in paper and in this

shape sent to the seacoast.

A variety of cracker I do not remember to have seen in the United States, but which is popular here, is the "twice sounding." It has two chambers separated by a -plug of clay, through which runs a connecting fuse. There is also a fuse extending from the powder in the lower chamber through the side of the cracker. When the cracker is to be fired it is set on end, and fire set to the fuse. The powder exploding in the chamber throws the cracker high in the air, where the second charge is exploded by fire from the fuse extending through the plug between the two chambers. In the manufacture of these, the clay is first tamped in with a punch to form the separating plug. The lower chamber is then loaded with powder and closed by turning over the paper at the end. The upper chamber is loaded and closed with clay. A hole is punched in the side of the lower chamber with an awl, and the fuse inserted through this opening.

At Canton the ordinary-size cracker (11⁄2 inches long by one-fourth of an inch in diameter) costs 1 tael (62 cents) for 10,000 for export. At Hankow the best quality of this size costs 1 tael for 5,000; while of the second quality 20,000 can be bought for 1 tael. At Chungking 15,000 of the ordinary crackers can be bought for 1 tael. At Shanghai tael will purchase 5,000 of the ordinary size, while the largest sell for $5 per thousand. These prices are probably only a shade above the actual cost of manufacture. The small manufacturers sell to Chinese compradores, who buy as agents of foreign firms and ship the crackers in bundles to the seacoast, where they are packed in boxes which cost about 4 taels ($2.50) per hundred, and hold 250,000 firecrackers.

Aside from the fact that all the material used is native and produced where the crackers are manufactured, and that transportation does not enter into the cost, the wonderful cheapness of manufacture is accounted for by the kind of labor used and the wages paid. The items of cost of plant and interest on it are eliminated by the fact that the crackers are made in the homes of the workmen, and in the shops where they are sold. The hours of labor are from 6 a. m. to II p. m., and there are seven working days in each week. Fourfifths of the crackers consumed in China are made by the families of those who sell them; these people, of course, receiving no wages. Of the paid work, a very large proportion is done by women and children who are paid by the piece. It is estimated that 30 women

and 10 men can make 100,000 crackers per day; for which work the women will receive 5 cents each and the men about 7 cents each. An apprentice is bound for four years, and during that time receives only his board. At the end of that period he will receive, if he is a fairly good workman, 150 cash per day, or 7 cents in United States money. An expert at the trade receives 200 cash per day, or 10 cents gold.

Workmen at this trade receive about the average rate of wages paid here for common labor. The trade is considered unhealthy and dangerous, and therefore not desirable.

JOHN GOODNOW,

SHANGHAI, December 31, 1897.

Consul-General.

COTTON GOODS IN BRITISH INDIA.*

During the year 1896-97 there were imported into British India. 1,222,920,000 yards of gray unbleached goods; 414,154,000 yards of white bleached; and 339,916,000 yards of colored, printed and dyed. The detailed imports under these three different heads were as follows:

Gray.-Jaconets, 96, 189,000 yards; mulls, 20, 211,000 yards; prints, 959,000 yards; shirtings, 581,226,000 yards; madapollams, 31,337,000 yards; T cloth and domestics, 13,058,000 yards; jeans, sheetings, and drills, 22,594,000 yards; chadars, dhutis, saris, and scarves, 455,220,000 yards.

White.-Jaconets, 33,057,000 yards; nainsooks, 119,890,000 yards; mulls, 84,980,000 yards; shirtings, 69,751,000 yards; long cloths, 2,278,000 yards; cambrics, twills, muslins, and lawns, 12,044,000 yards; chadars, dhutis, saris, and scarves, 53, 172,000 yards.

Colored.-Jaconets, 5, 187,000 yards; mulls, 4,872,000 yards; prints and chintzes, 129,702,000 yards; shirtings, 45,060,000 yards; drills, 5,259,000 yards; cambrics, twills, and muslin, 74,757,000 yards; chadars, dhutis, saris, and scarves, 29,459,000 yards.

It appears that goods made of medium counts, say from 30s to 40s, constituted last year about 97 per cent of the whole imports of gray goods, thus: Shirtings, chadars, dhutis, saris, and scarves, 84.7 per cent; jaconets, mulls, and madapollams, 12.1 per cent.

The proportion of piece goods received from the United Kingdom was: Gray piece goods, 99.5 per cent; white, 99.1 per cent; and colored, 97.9 per cent. The trifling quantity not received from that country was mainly from the Continent and the United States.

* This report is in answer to inquiries by the director of the Philadelphia Museums, to whom ADVANCE SHEETS have been sent.

Besides the three great classes of piece goods-gray, white, and colored-referred to above, the other kinds of cotton manufactures imported are chiefly handkerchiefs and shawls in the piece, lace and patent net, hosiery and sewing thread.

Calcutta is the great distributing point for Bengal, which imports. more than all other provinces together, including Burma.

It is impossible to give the manufacturers' prices and the retail prices, there being so many different qualities of the same class of goods.

The transportation charges can be ascertained from Messrs. Bucknall Bros., New York agents of the line of steamships that has recently been established between New York and Calcutta, with monthly sailings, touching at Bombay. This line will save transshipment of goods from the United States, and should greatly reduce the cost of transportation, besides facilitating trade by saving time. The duty on all cotton goods is 31⁄2 per cent ad valorem. Cotton goods are imported in bales and cases. Gray goods generally are packed in bales; bleached goods and fancy styles in cases.

The following are the principal importers of cotton goods in Calcutta: Ralli Bros., Graham & Co.; Gladstone, Wyllie & Co.; George Henderson & Co., Andrew Yule & Co., Duncan Bros. & Co., Ernsthausen, Limited; Jules Karpeles & Co.; E. D. Sassoon & Co.; Hoare, Miller & Co.; Finlay, Muir & Co.; and Ewing & Co.

I trust that the attention of our cotton manufacturers may be attracted to India as a market for their goods.

When it is considered that there are nearly 250,000,000 people in this country, whose principal clothing is cotton, the possibilities for extension of trade are obvious. American goods have a good reputation here, being made from a superior quality of cotton, and with competent active agents in the field to ascertain just the styles of goods required, I have no doubt that our manufacturers would successfully compete with those of the United Kingdom, who now practically control the market.

CALCUTTA, March 30, 1898.

R. F. PATTERSON,

Consul-General.

AMERICAN PETROLEUM IN JAVA.

I inclose translation of an article in a Batavian paper, from which it will be seen that the Standard Oil Company, in its efforts to extend its business, has concluded to enter the oil-producing field in this part of the world. Its latest and most important step to that end was to arrange for the control of the Moeara Enim Company, a company recently incorporated here for working certain petroleum.

concessions in Sumatra, as described in the inclosed article. Το consummate the deal, however, it was necessary to obtain permission from the Minister of Colonies, who evaded giving an official refusal, but recommended the Moeara Enim Company privately to withdraw the project. This was done, and so the deal is off.

This result was universally expected here, and there was general rejoicing. It was freely admitted that the absorption of the Moeara Enim Company by the Standard Oil Company would be beneficial to the oil interest of the colony, in that cost of production, facilities of transportation, etc., would be combined and cheapened in the long run; but the people are very conservative.

BATAVIA, March 18, 1898.

SIDNEY B. EVERETT,

Consul.

[From the Bataviaasche Nieuwsblad of March 14, 1898.]

MOEARA ENIM PETROLEUM COMPANY.

The mail brought us the proposal made by the board or directors of the said company to the stockholders to sell their concession to the Standard Oil Company, a question which has been much discussed of late. The proposition, however, through the intervention of the Minister of Colonies, has since been withdrawn. It reads as follows:

"As is well known, the Moeara Enim Petroleum Company, whose subscribed capital amounts to 4,000,000 florins ($1,608,000), has in cash only 3,000,000 florins ($1,206,000) to work the extensive concessions in its possession situated in the Palembang district. The directors find that this capital may be deemed sufficient only for the purposes of getting the oil out of their ground and of erecting a large refinery on the embankment of the Moesi River, but that considerably more capital is required for a rapid and firm development of the whole enterprise, necessitating the purchase of ships for transporting the oil and the establishment of tank stations, with their appurtenances, in various ports of the East.

"Under these circumstances, and considering the strong competition now prevailing in the oil market (which, during the next few years, will become still keener), the directors think it advisable to avail themselves of the chance offered to cooperate with a larger and more profitable concern, namely, with the Standard Oil Company, of New York.

"Such would be arranged by floating a new Dutch company, to be established at Amsterdam with a nominal capital of 30,000,000 florins ($12,060,000), divided into shares of 100,000 florins ($40,200), of which capital 10,000,000 florins ($4,020,000) would be paid up at once. In the last-mentioned amount the Moeara Enim Company would own 4,000,000 florins ($1,608,000) worth, representing the value of its concessions and franchises in Palembang, to be turned over to the new concern, and that of any further acquisitions or possessions there, as well as the balance of its available capital.

"The Standard Oil Company, on the other hand, would pay in 6,000,000 florins ($2,412,000) cash.

"In case an increase of capital is needed, the Standard Oil Company would have to place a further sum of 2,000,000 florins ($804,000) at the disposal of the new company. If still more is needed, such surplus is to be supplied by the Moeara