The commercial supremacy attained by many of the large cities of
Britain is not wholly due to natural causes, or even to ordinary
causes. Much of it is due to extraordinary enterprise and forethought
on the part of their citizens. London, for example, is the centre of
the wool trade of Britain. The woollen manufacturers of Britain use
about 250,000 tons of wool annually, and three fourths of this is
imported. Other cities that lie near the seats of the great woollen
manufactures--Liverpool, for example--have tried to secure a share of
this vast importation of wool, but London, because of the special
attention it gives to this trade, manages to keep almost the whole of
the trade in its own hands. Similarly, London almost wholly
monopolises the trade of England with Arabia, India, the East Indies,
China, and Japan. It is therefore the great emporium for tea, coffee,
sugar, spices, indigo, and raw silk. It also enjoys the bulk of
Britain's trade in fruits (oranges, lemons, currants, raisins, figs,
dates, etc.) and in wines, olive oil, and madder, with the countries
that lie about the Mediterranean. By virtue partly of its situation,
but largely because of the enterprise of its merchants, it absorbs
nearly the whole of Britain's French trade, and of England's trade
with Germany, Belgium, Holland, and Denmark. This includes principally
wines (from France), and butter, eggs, and vegetables. Another great
branch of its trade is that with the ports of the Baltic, including
those of Russia, the imports comprising, besides wheat and wool,
tallow, timber, hemp, and linseed. The tobacco imported from Virginia
into England goes almost wholly to London; so does almost the whole of
the Central American and South American trade in fine woods,
dye-stuffs, drugs, sugar, hides, india-rubber, coffee, and diamonds.
Quite a large share of the trade of Britain with Canada is
concentrated in London; also, more than one half of the trade of
England with the West Indies, the imports from the latter country
comprising principally sugar, molasses, fruit, rum, coffee, cocoa,
fine woods, and ginger.