通訊與貿易──十九世紀末臺灣和寧波郊商人的訊息傳遞

「郊」是講閩南語或類閩南語的海商所組成的商人團體，他們長期以來控制清代臺灣對外貿易，貿易圈北及日本，南至暹邏。這群商人不但透過各地代理店或是固定交易行號之間的交易，建構出臺灣與中國沿海港口城市，甚或廣及東亞的貿易網絡，也經由書信、電報往返，形成綿密的情報網，並進一步利用訊息傳遞輔助貿易，影響商品市場價格。本文即透過19 世紀末較為罕見的郊商私文書，重現其訊息傳遞的種類、模式及其變遷，亦即他們如何先專以中式帆船（junk）傳遞書信、貨單、帳簿；輪船興起之後，又如何利用輪船信局運送，之後則轉而使用電報。19 世紀末，正是這群郊商信息傳遞模式變化的過渡時期，既存有鹿港仍以中式帆船傳輸訊息，也有在條約港的郊商採取帆船、輪船及電報三者並用的現象。本文透過多種類型的一手史料，一方面釐清在條約港和非條約港的郊商通訊方式的變化過程及差異；另一方面，檢視訊息傳遞如何影響其貿易的運作。

關鍵字

郊商；帆船；輪船信局；電報；信息傳遞；鹿港；寧波

並列摘要

The jiao (brokerage cartel) was a merchant community constituted by sea merchants who spoke Fujianese dialects or other related vernaculars. For a long time, they controlled the external trade of Qing-dynasty Taiwan, including its trade networks north to Japan and south to Siam. These merchants not only built up the trade networks between Taiwan and the port cities of China and expanded across East Asia but also formed dense intelligence networks through the transmission of messages by letter and later by telegram between the agencies and their owners. They used this message transmission to manipulate trade and influence commodity prices. The present article uses the private correspondence of merchants from the end of the nineteenth century to reconstruct the types, transmission patterns, and evolution of such messages. In other words, this study illustrates how jiao merchants first sent letters, manifests and account books by junks; and how, following the rise of steamships, these merchants employed the Steam Letter Hong and ultimately telegrams for delivering their messages. The end of the nineteenth century was a transition period in the information transmission practices of jiao merchants. On the one hand, in the port of Lugang, jiao merchants only utilized junks to send messages; on the other hand, in the treaty ports jiao merchants made use of junks, steamships, and telegrams to conduct their business. In sum, this article uses primary sources to demonstrate the process of change in the modes of communication of jiao merchants and to analyze how such message transmission affected trade and markets.