APPENDIX.

The Usefulness of Shipping. In commerce a ship serves two purposes: First, that of transportation for the merchant; second, that of earning and saving for its nation a competence of wealth and power. The merchant's use of shipping is highly beneficial, but the national service is invaluable: First, in balancing foreign trade; and, second, in providing means for maritime defense.

A shipless nation is generally in foreign debt. Its exports and imports may balance, while its commerce, as a whole, is shortcoming, the balance to be paid in coin. The explanation is this: Commerce consists of transportation as well as trade. The charge for freight follows the cargo; it is a virtual export, or import, as the case may be. By our own ship abroad, it increases our credit there. By our own vessel home, it saves debt here. Thus, transportation must needs be balanced as well as trade, either by trade itself, by transportation, by exports or imports of precious metals, stocks, bonds, or investments - perhaps bankrupt paper. Where alien merchants, underwriters, and bankers, as well as foreign vessels, are employed in a nation's commerce, as now in ours, only a very large excess of exports over imports can or will prevent an adverse balance of COMMERCE. (See pages 18, 19, and 20.)