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rate which will be levied in New Zealand, on
behalf of this office, upon those letters posted
in the Colony and forwarded to the United
Kingdom via Marseilles.

The arrangement which I am to propose
for adoption is that, your office shall enter on
the Letter Bill accompanying each Mail from
New Zealand viâ Marseilles, the weight, in
bulk, of the letters so forwarded, and afterwards
account to this Department for the French
transit postage at the rate per ounce stipulated
to be paid by this Country to France. That
rate is at present 1s. 8d. per ounce, to cover
which one fourth of that sum, viz. 5d. is now
collected on each quarter ounce letter, in ad-
dition to the ordinary Packet postage. But,
on the 1st January next, this rate of payment
to France will be reduced to 10d. an ounce,
the exact fourth of which is of course 2d.; but
it is presumed that the rate actually collected
on both sides will be 3d. the quarter ounce.

The same system of prepayment and division
of the postage will also obtain in the case of
letters conveyed by the new line of Packets
between Australia and India and other British
Colonies short of the United Kingdom, the
Australian Colonies retaining the postage on
those letters despatched, and this office receiv-
ing the postage on letters transmitted in the
opposite direction, and neither office making
any charge on delivery.

The British Packet rate of postage on these
letters has been reduced, since the 1st January
that, to four pence the half-ounce, and it is
presumed that this reduced rate, which will be
charged by the Agents of this Office on letters
sent to New Zealand from India, Hong Kong,
Ceylon, Malta &c., will be equally applied to
letters sent from New Zealand to those places.

Some special provision is necessary in respect
to letters passing through the United Kingdom
between New Zealand and other Colonies and
Continental or other Foreign Countries; and I
am to request that the following arrangements,
which have received the approval of the
Treasury, may be adopted:—

1st. That in the case of letters posted in
New Zealand, addressed either to other
Colonies or to Foreign Countries, and in-
tended to pass through the United King-
dom, the total postage, both British and
Foreign, shall invariably be collected in
advance, for which purpose a list of the
rates of postage will be furnished to your
Office by the next mail. The Colony to
retain, as its share of such postage, the
entire rate of sixpence the half ounce,
chargeable for conveyance between New
Zealand and the United Kingdom, and to
account to this Office for the postage
chargeable for the transmission of the let-
ters from this country to their destination.

2nd. That on letters in the reverse direction,
the total postage, British and Foreign,
shall, in like manner, be collected in ad-
vance, in all practicable cases. Such
letters will be delivered up to the New
Zealand Office as paid to destination, and
will be entitled to delivery in the Colony
without further charge.

There are a few Foreign Countries, for in-
stance Spain, Portugal, and Brazil, with the
Post Offices of which this Department has no
arrangements for the collection of postage on its
behalf, and in these exceptional cases, in order
to avoid the detention for postage of any letters
which may reach England from those coun-
tries addressed to New Zealand, it will
be necessary to forward the letters to New
Zealand as unpaid, and for this Office to claim
from the Colony the postage due to the Mother
Country, including both the British and
Forein rates.

3rd. That on letters forwarded from New
Zealand, via Trieste, to the Northern
Countries of Europe, the British Packet
Postage, the at rate of one shilling the
half-ounce letter, shall be collected and
retained by the Colony; and that, in the
opposite direction, (this Department
having no means of collecting the post-
age,) the British rate shall also be col-
lected by the Colony on the delivery of
the letters, but accounted for to this
Office.

4th. There is another class of letters for
which it is essential to make special ar-
rangements, viz. those which are trans-
mitted in the Mails sent directly to and
from France without passing through the
United Kingdom.

As regards these letters, I am to propose that
the Australian Colonies shall collect and retain
the British postage (6d. the half ounce) on those
despatched in the Mails to France, and deliver
free of charge those received in the Mails
from France, leaving this Office to obtain for
the latter, payment from France, under the
terms of the Postal Convention between that
Country and the United Kingdom.

As regards Newspapers the present arrange-
ments will not be disturbed.

It only remains to settle the adjustment of
postage on Books.

You are aware that one of the conditions
laid down on the establishment of the Colonial
Book Post was, that no Book should be sent
by any route which would entail an additional
expense of transit postage on the Department.
As, however, the Mails are about to be con-
veyed via Suez, it is necessary to modify this
regulation, and in consequence of the difficulty
and expense attending the conveyance of Books
across the Isthmus of Suez, it is proposed to
raise the charge from sixpence to eightpence
the single rate, increasing at the rate of 1s. 4d.
per pound, instead of 1s. per pound as at