89. Officer.-All processes not served by the consul personally must be executed by an officer of the consulate, who shall sign his return, specifying the time and mode of service, and annexing an account of his fees. 90. Copies on appeal.—On appeal, copies of all the papers must be paid for in advance by the appellant, except in criminal cases where respondent is unable to pay. 91. Copies. Any person interested is entitled to a copy of any paper on file, on prepayment of the fee. 92. Reasonable clearness, precision, and certainty should be required in the papers, and substantial justice and all practicable despatch is expected in the decisions. 93. Definition of consul.-The word "consul" is intended to include the consul general, and any vice-consul or deputy consul actually exercising the consular power at any consulate, unless the sense requires a more limited construction. 94. Associates. Each associate in a consular trial shall, before entering on his duties, be sworn by the consul. Before taking the oath he may be challenged by either party, and for sufficient cause excused and another drawn. 95. Contempt.-Consuls will always preserve order in court, punishing summarily any contempt committed in their presence, or any refusal to obey their lawful summons or order, by imprisonment not exceeding twenty-four hours, or by fine not exceeding fifty dollars and costs. 96. Attorney.-Every party to a civil or criminal proceeding may be heard in person, or by attorney of his choice, or by both; but the presence of counsel shall be under the exclusive control and discretion of the consul. 97. Accounts. The accounts of the consular courts shall be kept in United States currency; and every order of deposit, decree of costs, taxation of fees, and, generally, every paper issuing originally from the court, shall be expressed in dollars and cents, and satisfied in United States metallic currency, or its equivalent. XVII.-FEES. 98. In consular court In all cases where the amount in question is not more than $500....... In all cases where it is over $500... In all cases where no specific damages are sought, the fee shall be $5 for minor, and $15 for greater cases. $5.00 15.00 99. Clerk's fees For docketing every suit commenced.... For executions. For issuing all writs, warrants, attachments, or other compulsory process. 1850 1.00 1.00 For summonses and subpoenas.. 50 For all records at the rate of, for each hundred words.... 20 For every seal to process issued.... For drawing every notice, paper, order, or process, not otherwise provided for. 2.00 1.00 1.00 For filing each paper upon the return of the marshal, and all other papers filed in court. 100. Marshal's fees 10 For each bail-bond..... For returning all writs, attachments, warrants, and summons, each.. For serving any writ, warrant, attachment, or other compulsory process, each person. For searching for the same, and if not found, to be certified by the consul, and on his order to be paid by said ship. For apprehending a deserter and delivering him on board the vessel deserted from, to be paid by the vessel before leaving port.. 5.00 2.00 200 1.00 50 1.00 For every commitment or discharge of prisoner 2.00 On subpoenas for each witness summoned.. 50 For releasing property under execution, by order of plaintiff.. For selling property under execution when the amount collected does not exceed $1,000.. If over $1,000, and not exceeding $5,000.... If over $5,000.... For making collections under $200, in cases where no adjudication has taken place 5 For travelling fees in serving all processes, each mile. For serving every notice not hereinafter provided for, in addition to the usual traveling fees... 3.00 102. Witnesses' fees For every day's attendance at court... For each mile travelled in going to and returning from court... 3.00 2.00 1 00 1 50 0 15 1 00 3 00 XVIII.-PROVISO. 106. All decrees heretofore issued by authority of the commissioners and ministers of the United States to China, which are inconsistent in whole or in part with the provisions of this decree, are hereby annulled, and those portions are henceforth void and of no effect; and the promulgation of these rules abrogates no authority hitherto lawfully exercised by consuls in China not inconsistent herewith. SIR: I have the honor to transmit to you herewith a certified copy of each of the decrees of April last, which have already received your approval. They will be made public at this port on the day named in the notification, and it is expected that they will reach you in time for circulation on the same date. In reply to inquiries which have been made, I have to state that no new forms of processes have as yet been prescribed. The experience of the various consular officers will readily effect the changes which may become necessary under the new regulations. The fee headed "in consular court" is, together with all fines imposed, to be brought to the credit of the United States in the account required by section 17th of the act of Congress. The clerks' and marshals' fees may, as heretofore, be passed to those officers. The judicial report, form 132, should be regularly transmitted, as required in section 312, Consul's Manual. In the absence of a marshal it may be prepared by the clerk of the court, or by the consul himself. I should recommend that the "court account" should also be transmitted quarterly. It is expected that the decree of registry will be very useful in preventing to an extent the abuse of the national name, which has been so common in China. The various officers will, I think, find it of much advantage to insist strenuously upon the registry of all persons under their jurisdiction. In cases when an offender, who is not registered, and who has no satisfactory proof in support of his claim to citizenship, is arrested and handed to you for punishment, you will perhaps find it desirable to deliver him to the Chinese authorities. In such case the condition inay be made, that the native officer shall sit at the trial with two consular officers as assessors, who shall have power to veto his decision. If, however, you should prefer to proceed yourself with the trial, it has been held at Peking that the offender, having submitted himself to the jurisdiction of the court, must abide by its decision. Your obedient servant, SIR: I have the honor to send herewith a letter addressed to me by Thomas Walsh, esq., one of our leading and most intelligent merchants in the east. The letter is in response to one from me requesting accurate statistics in relation to our trade with California. I made it a point with him to secure statements rather under than overdrawn, so that no misleading facts should go from me to my countrymen. You will be pleased to find how carefully he has met my request, and will prize his letter accordingly. I have the honor to be, sir, your obedient servant, Hon. WILLIAM H. SEWARD, Secretary of Stale. ANSON BURLINGAME. [Enclosure.] Mr. Walsh to Mr. Burlingame. NAGASAKI, September 13, 1864. MY DEAR MR. BURLINGAME: Your very friendly letter of 1st June, in reply to my note of May 21, was only a fortnight in coming to me. I have delayed thanking you for it in order to collect, if I could, some of the statistics you ask for as to trade between China and California. At length I have gathered some figures. They are a little old, being those of the exports of 1861 and 1862, one year, but I cannot procure any others at present, and they must answer. As the trade has latterly been pretty steady, I think they may safely be taken as the average figures of what the trade is at present, and would be for a few years longer. No doubt steam communication would develop new business and increase the old, as it always does; and the experience of steamers on the Chinese coasts and rivers shows that the Chinese are quite like other people in this respect. The figures are as follows: Exports from China, Japan, and Manila to San Francisco, November 4, 1861, to November From Japan: 4, 1862. Teas, about 500,000 pounds, 900 tons measurement, at $10... This was divided among forty-six vessels of 39,500 register tons, or, say, 50,000 tons measurement capacity, giving an average freight of, per ton, $6 70. A line of four steamers ought to be able to keep up monthly departures from Hong Kong, touching at Kanagawa going over and at Sandwich islands coming back. Each steamer would thus make three voyages per annum, each voyage occupying four months; of this time two months (if the steamers were good and fast) would be spent at sea and two months in the different ports. The expenses of a steamer which would carry 1,000 tons of cargo and go eight knots in ordinary weather would be, at least, as follows: Coal for sixty days, 1,200 tons, at average cost of $12.. Wages, &c., for four months, at $3,000 per month.. Wear and tear, one per cent. per month on value of $175,000.. Total expenses for four months.... $14,400 12,000 7,000 $7,000 3,500 43,900 It is evident, therefore, that each steamer would have to make out of freight and passengers about $44,000 per voyage to escape loss. As there are at present but few passengers and but little freight from California to China, at least $30,000 of this ought to be made on the voyage from China to California. I do not see how this can be done under existing circumstances. The bulk of the merchandise shipped to California cannot bear high freights. It would, therefore, be imprudent to reckon on over $15 per ton for the steamer's capacity at any time-say a steamer of 1,000 tons capacity carries 800 tons, At $15, would be.. And 250 Chinese passengers, at $40.. Passage money of ten cabin passengers, at $300. Less one-third for cabin stores, servants, &c.... Total earnings..... $12,000 Leaving a deficit on each voyage of, say, $6,000. A moderate subvention from government would cover this; but it must be noted that I have reckoned the coal at a low rate, and allowed full rates for goods and passengers. I do not believe that silk or passengers would go from China to Europe by way of California at present, even if there were good steamers across the Pacific, for it will be impossible for any steamer lines touching at California to land silk in Europe as quickly as the steamers to Suez do it. For some years, therefore, the Pacific steamers would have to depend almost wholly on Pacific trade, and this trade does not develop very rapidly. But when the Pacific railroad shall have been finished, the whole subject will acquire a new character. Then, if we have such laws as will encourage the trade, not only silks and passengers, but teas even, could advantageously be sent, especially from Shanghai and Japan, via America, and have no doubt this will be done to an extent sufficient to employ a line of semi-monthly or even of weekly steamers from Hong Kong, via Shanghai and Kanagawa, to San Francisco. Meanwhile, if our government could spare three or four hundred thousand dollars a year to set the steamers on foot, the money would be well spent, for it would probably result in the establishment of a current of trade across the Pacific which, by the time the railroad was ready, might be strong enough to flow without such aid, leaving government free to devote its whole concern to the railroad itself, which will doubtless at first require a good deal of assistance. As a patriot and a tax-payer, and entirely disregarding any interest I might retain in the east, I would applaud any reasonable expenditure of public money in the effort thus to make our country the intermediary between the far east and Europe. For, sooner or later, such an expenditure would yield a ten-fold harvest. Ten-fold? Yes, ten thousand times ten-fold. For we are not Egyptians who will be content to carry such a commerce through our ports and across our territory and draw from it merely carrier's wages; but we would manage it so that the whole world would soon become tributary to us for doing it, and we would do it so that they would be glad to be thus tributary. As to the kind of steamers for the Pacific route, I should say, after some experience and considerable reflection on the matter, that they ought to be wooden vessels with iron frames, propelled by screws; in size, about 1,500 tons, which would leave about 1,000 tons for cargo; to steam eight knots in average weather; with a hurricane or upper deck, so that the passengers shall be chiefly on the main deck, and the best vessels of this sort which can be built. It ought not to be attempted to make quasi men-of-war of them. That sort of steamers have failed as often as they have been tried. Above all, the company which receives a subsidy from the government should be so organized that there will be no danger of their dropping the experiment before it has been fairly tried. I have delivered your message to Pumpelly, who is living with us, and he thanks you for it. If circumstances allow it, we (he and I) propose to obey your "command" so far as to call at Pekin next month on our way to Europe via Liberia. We are not yet quite sure of being able to go, but we have made all ready and are very desirous to go that way. One of the chief pleasures I reckon on en route is to see you again. I have much to tell you about Japan, which I cannot put in this already too long letter, and also much to discuss with you about our own dear country. I want to see you soon at home again, and engaged, as I know you would be, in overthrowing the wrong and sustaining the right. We are fast approaching the crisis of our republic's career, and if all good men do not rally together against corruption, personal ambition, and ignorance, our nation will be lost. Hoping soon to see you, I remain, my dear sir, yours truly, THOS. WALSH. No. 99.] Mr. Seward to Mr. Burlingame. DEPARTMENT OF STATE, Washington, December 13, 1864. SIR I enclose a pamphlet containing a copy of the correspondence which has taken place between this department and the honorable Z. Chandler, the chairman of the Committee on Commerce in the Senate of the United States, in relation to proposed overland telegraph between Europe and America, by the way of Behring straits, projected by Perry McD. Collins, esquire. I enclose also a copy of an instruction addressed to Cassius M. Clay, esquire, our minister at St. Petersburg, on the 24th of September last, No. 85, and of his reply of the 14th ultimo, No. 62. I refer you to the act of Congress of the 1st of July last, entitled "An act to encourage and facilitate telegraphic communication between the eastern and western continents," and to the President's last annual message. As it is considered desirable and important that a branch of the great line of telegraphic communication referred to in these papers should penetrate into the populous and wealthy empire to which you are accredited, you are expected to |