Upon examining this statement with attention, it will be seen, 1. That the quantity of wheat exported from the United States is diminished, and that the increase in the exportation of flour, proceeding from the great number of mills that have been fucceffively erected, and in that of fea-biscuit, does not by a great deal compenfate the decrease in the exportation of wheat. This decrease, for which I have met with no one who could give me a reafon completely fatisfactory, is owing, int part, to the ravages committed in several states by the Heffian fly, which has made it neceffary to abandon the cultivation of wheat, and in part to the great quantity of land laid down in pasture. But I must again repeat, that the difference in the exportation of wheat is too great to be explained in this manner, efpecially as in many new settlements, corn is cultivated at leaft during the first years; and as in many parts of Virginia, Carolina, and Maryland, the cultivation of wheat has very generally fuperfeded that of tobacco and indigo. The confumption may be increased in the great towns by the increase of their population; and also in some of the back fettlements, where, owing to a want of corn-mills, the ufe of wheatflour was formerly almoft unknown. But this VOL. IV. G g increase increase of confumption cannot be very great; for in almost every part of the United States where wheat is cultivated, the inhabitants live upon rye-bread, and still more commonly upon maize or Indian-corn. 2. That the exportation of other corn, that is to fay, rye, barley, &c. is alfo diminished. This is owing to the increased consumption of the diftilleries, which, though checked of late by the high price of grain, has nevertheless been very confiderable during the laft fix years. 3. It will be feen that the exportation of leaf tobacco is very much diminished, and that this diminution is not compenfated by the great increase of manufactured tobacco; because it is true, as I have obferved in my account of the fouthern states, that the cultivation of tobacco is exceedingly decreased. 4. That the increase of culture has been directed to that of vegetables, onions, and potatoes, and that it is confiderable; and that it has taken a ftill greater turn towards artificial meadows, or what are called grazing farms. The cnormous difference between the progreffive exports from 1791 to 1796, of cheese, butter, tallow, candles, and manufactured fhoes, is a proof of it; although it is true that the tanneries of the United States import a great quantity of raw hides from that part of St. Domingo which formerly belonged to the Spaniards. 5. It will also be remarked, that the produce of the fisheries is much increased in the last fix years; but the greater part of this produce, fo confiderably augmented in quantity, is in itself of little value, excepting the whale fishery; and although the amount of its whole value exceeds that of the value of produce diminished in quantity, the increase is hardly of any account in the immenfe progreffion of the general value of the exports, which was estimated at nineteen millions twelve thousand and forty dollars in 1791, and at fixty-feven millions fixty-four thousand and ninety-feven dollars in 1796. The following account of the exportation of foreign produce will prove how much of the increase in the exports of the United States is owing to that branch of commerce. I fhall add to this an amount of the drawback upon the re-exportation of foreign produce imported into the United States in the courfe of the years 1793, 1794, 1795; I was not able to procure one of the two preceding years, nor of the year 1796. I do not pretend to give, by this statement, a precife idea of the confumption of foreign produce in the United States; becaufe goods being intitled to the right of a drawback for a whole year after they have been entered in the customhoufe books, it fometimes happens that articles which have paid the duties in one year, and which are included in the receipts of that year, are not re-exported till the year after. The following account, however, will afford an idea generally true, of the consumption of that produce; and it will fhew, that the consumption of colonial commodities is little augmented in the United States, while that of ar ticles manufactured in England is confiderably increased. |