gmertca, , ?|emp, an& JUapoleon - Vote Hemp

Making and Learning the RulesMessrs. Ryberg and Company merchants there, to whom youare consigned. Balast your vessel with dispatch, and proceedto St. Petersburg, taking with you Messrs. Ryberg and Com ­pany letter of credit upon the House of Messrs. Edward JamesSmith and Company to furnish you on m y account withRussian goods. . . . 20Often Americans, come as far as the edge of the Balticseeking Russian goods, went no further. Gothenburg andCopenhagen were good markets for our sugar, coffee, rice, andtobacco. Sweden could offer hemp, sailcloth, and linens of herow n growth and manufacture as well as quantities of thesegoods imported from Russia. Mor e important, she could offerSwedish iron, which was at least equal in quality to Russia's,and reputed by many to be superior. 21 Copenhagen, one of thegreat entrepots of the world, could supply American buyerswith iron, hemp , duck, ravensduck, cordage, flems, tallow, etc.,almost as readily as could Kronstadt or Riga. Som e of the linenwas of Danish manufacture. All else was imported from Sweden,Prussia, Russia, and elsewhere in central and easternEurope. 22Those American vessels that persevered and sailed on to buyRussian goods at their source rather than haggle with Scandinavianmiddlemen were quite courteously received—and nowonder. Britain was Russia's best customer, but by the firstdecade of the nineteenth century few other nations could topthe United States' claim to be Russia's second best customer.For instance, in 1803, United States vessels took from St.Petersburg 315,452 poods of clean hemp, little enough comparedwith the 1,313,912 poods with which British vesselssailed off. However, all the purchases of clean hem p of all the53