Page 183 - Merchants and Mandarins China Trade Era

169.

his house at Canton. Such a move made him (and other resi­

dents who followed his lead) more independent and efficient

in the tea and silk markets. By having specie on hand at all

times instead of waiting for vessels that might or might not

have dollars on board, he could move into the Canton market

at any point to purchase exports of the quality and at the

price he desired. (At this point the Hong merchants still

demanded and received immediate payment in specie.)

Beginning around 1830, bills of exchange gradually

replaced specie as the medium of purchase at Canton. By then

the volume of foreign trade in China had increased beyond the
available supply of specie or Spanish dollars. Merchants still

had to keep a stockpile of dollars in their vaults to back up

the bills drawn on their houses, but the use of bills greatly

facilitated commercial transactions. The diminishing need for

Spanish dollars did not seem to have the same impact on Arneri-
30
1
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can ven t ures to Sout h A merica. By the 1830 s American mer-
chants had re-established the trade to West Coast ports in

30
cheong, in "Trade and Finance in China," argues the
importance of American importation of Spanish dollars from South
America. Arnericarn used dollars to buy tea·s and silks from the
Chinese, who in turn used them to buy opium from the private
British traders. Cheong argues that by 1826 South American
revolutions forced this American trade to decline. A look at
Consulu.r Returns on Alnc1:-ican shippinc:,r u.l the port of Vc1lpuraiso,
a major West Coast port, does not bear this out. American
vessels from the United States increased in number after 1826
and those from Canton remained static. Consular Despatches:
Valparaiso, "Consular Returns on American Vessels arriving
at & departing from the Port of Valparaiso, Chile." Michael
Greenberg, in British Trade and the Opening of China, 1800-42
(Cambridge, 1951), p. 162, claims Americans stopped importing
dollars in 1826-27 due to the economic debacle that occurred
that season in the American China trade.