Expanding Possibilities 393
put the overall capital of the Canton junk trade at between 14,000,000
and 18,800,000 dollars.^165
With their income depleted, the merchants felt the pinch of having to
meet the government demand for public contributions and other forms
of exaction. The richer echelons among the merchants withdrew their
investments and kept their capital or property hidden from public view.
Trade had also been hard hit by the prevalent attacks by pirates on the
coast. After the destruction of the water force during the Opium War, the
government was left without adequate means for the suppression of the
marauders.^166
The general deterioration in the junk trade was not conβined to
Canton. In Amoy, the battle to persist in the junk trade also lingered on.
In fact, there had been signs of problems brewing since around the turn
of the nineteenth century. As recorded in the 1832 edition of the Amoy
Gazetteer, the junk trade of this port city had suffered from a decline
in proβits, if not in the amount of business. Having been the foremost
shipping center for both the coastal and overseas junk trades in the
eighteenth century, its loss of the leading position in native shipping is
often seen as the epitome of overall decline in the Chinese junk trade.
A multitude of problems confronted Amoy. First and foremost, it
was facing stiff competition from growing numbers of merchant junks
that were transgressing the designated spheres of trade. Under the
guise of being engaged in the coastal trade, the latter transported their
cargoes to Canton so as to enjoy the much lower levies, but actually
sneaked out from there to the Nanyang. Their tactics dealt the Ocean
Firms in Amoy a heavy blow and led to the closing down of their
businesses in the early nineteenth century. The consequence was a void
in the management of ocean junks. In 1821, the authorities found it
necessary to appoint Merchant Firms to take over the responsibility of
the defunct Ocean Firms.
Several new developments occurred concurrently after that. Firstly,
the merchant junks were at last ofβicially allowed to engage in the
Nanyang trade. Therefore, the demise of the ocean junks did not denote
the end of the Nanyang-bound voyages. Secondly, ocean junks from other
provinces conducted direct trade with the Nanyang and bypassed the
designated port of Amoy, but the decreasing number of ocean junks being
βitted out from Amoy was probably the result of their loss of the edge in
competitiveness to the merchant junks. Thirdly, the trading junks avoided
the port of Amoy and set sail for overseas trade from the less-supervised
- FO 228/136, no. 151, John Bowring to the Earl of Malmesbury, 11b.
- Harry Parkes in ibid., Encl. 10, p. 60.