INTERCOLONIAL COMMERCE. 325 as the Chinese. Thirty-three tahils, or L. 1 1 the catti of 1 lb. were paid for it in Ksempfer's time, which is much above the price paid at present for the best sort in China. * The tea of Japan is inferior to that of China, yet the Dutch at one time exported it in consi- derable quantity. They appear to have paid a high price for it, and it is probable that, considering the sterility of the soil of Japan, compared to that of China, this production cannot be reared there so cheap or so good as in the latter country. This appears plain enough from the circumstance of tea being an article of importation from China, and from the acknowledgment of the Dutch, that the tea of Japan is neither so good, nor will keep so well as that of China. The use of tea is as general in Japan as in China ; the people of the latter drink only black tea, those of the former only green. The rice of Japan is of the very finest quality, and small quantities are exported as objects of curiosity, but in a country with an inferior soil, a crowded population, and no unoccupied land, it must be high priced, and can never be largely ex- ported. It is much more probable, that in a free trade, it would become a great article of importa- tion from the Archipelago and Siam.
- The passion for the edible swallows' nests does not, it i^
remarkable, extend to the Japanese.
