couraging. None
but wooden sugar-cane mills were employed at that time, but since
then many small steam-power factories have been erected (_vide_
Sugar). The produce shipped in Yloilo [125] was principally carried
to the United States in American sailing-ships.

For figures relating to Chief Exports from the various ports, _vide_
Chap. xxxi., "Trade Statistics."

Most of the carrying Import trade was in the hands of subsidized
Spanish steamer-owners, whilst the larger portion of the Exports was
conveyed in foreign vessels, which arrived in ballast from Eastern
ports where they had left cargoes.

Smuggling was carried on to a considerable extent for years, and in
1891 a fresh stimulus was given to contraband by the introduction of a
Protectionist Tariff, which came into force on April 1 of that year,
and under which Spanish goods brought in Spanish ships were allowed
to enter free of duty. [126]

In order to evade the payment of the Manila Port Works Tax (q.v.), for
which no value was given, large quantities of piece-goods for Manila
were shipped from Europe to Yloilo, passed through the Custom-house
there and re-shipped in inter-island steamers to Manila. In 1890 some
two-thirds of the Yloilo foreign imports were for re-shipment.

The circumstances which directly led to the opening of Zamboanga (in
1831) as a commercial port are interesting when it is remembered that
Mindanao Island is still quasi-independent in the interior--inhabited
by races unconquered by the Spaniards, and where agriculture by
civilized settlers is as yet nascent. It appears that the Port of Jolo
(Sulu Is.) had been, for a long time, frequented by foreign ships,
whose owners or officers (chiefly British) unscrupulously supplied the
Sulus with sundry manufactured goods, including _arms of warfare_,
much to the detriment of Spanish interests there, in exchange for
mother-of-pearl, pearls, gums, etc. The Spaniards claimed suzerain
rights over the island, but were not strong enough to establish and
protect a Custom-house, so they imposed the regulation that ships
loading in Jolo should put in at Zamboanga for clearance to foreign
ports. The foreigners who carried on this illicit traffic protested
against a sailing-ship being required to go out of her homeward
course about one hundred and twenty miles for the mere formality
of customs clearance. A British ship (and perhaps many before her)
sailed straight away from Jolo, in defiance of the Spaniar