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68 ECONOMIC INQUIRIES AND STUDIES
more than that of the United Kingdom, as their busi-
ness is so very much a business of transit only. In any
case these are points obviously requiring consideration,
when ,the imports and exports of different countries arc
compared or contrasted. They ought not to be put
together at all in any discussion till they are reduced
to common denominators.
Another point I would urge is the importance of the
question of size and general similarity in conditions in
comparing the volume of the foreign trade of any two
countries. If the United Kingdom were to be split up,
and Ireland, say, were to have separate customs, the
foreign trade of Great Britain would be enhanced by
the addition to the account of the imports from Ireland
on one side, and the exports to it on the other, which
would then become foreign trade, deducting, however,
the present imports into Ireland from foreign countries,
and the exports from it to foreign countries which are
now included in the foreign trade of the whole United
Kingdom. If Holland, again, were to be united with
Germany, and Belgium with France, it is doubtful
whether the foreign trade of both Germany and France
would be increased very much, and might not even be
diminished, so much of the foreign trade of Germany
and France being now with Holland and Belgium;
while the aggregate foreign trade of the world would
be diminished by the elimination of the two countries
named as separate countries, and they would no longer
appear as having the largest amount of imports and ex-
ports per head. In the_same way the formation of the
Australasian countries into a federation with a single
Customs frontier would greatly diminish the volume of
imports and exports as now stated. According to Table
B appended, the imports of the Australasian colonies
added together, for the year 1889, amounted to about
£69,043,000, and the exports to £62,7°6,000; but ifwe
separate what each colony imports from and exports
to the rest of the world, excluding what it imports
from and exports to its neighbours, the total would be