APRIL 3.] THE NEW ZEALAND GAZETTE. 1139

deliveries, if daily, are to be suspended for the day. Chief Post-masters will exercise their discretion as to the despatch of mails to sub-offices on holidays.

495. All seaborne mails must be made up in canvas bags. On no account may paper wrappers be used.

496. Bags of mail-matter for the Clearing-room, G.P.O., must not exceed 80 lb. in weight.

DESPATCH OF FOREIGN MAILS.

497. Correspondence posted in the Dominion and addressed to the United Kingdom will be forwarded by the routes selected from time to time. It is to be understood that the name “Australia” in official instructions includes Tasmania, except on occasions when directions may be given to exclude Tasmania. “Australian States” includes Tasmania.

498. Chief Postmasters are required to notify one another by telegraph, as necessary, of the closing of mails for places beyond the Dominion. Such notices are not, as a rule, to be issued more than ten days before the closing of the mails to which they refer. The addresses are to be filled in by Chief Postmasters. The code signals to be used are given in Rule T. 2.

499. The Australian and Foreign Mail List is printed for the information of officers, and must be corrected from time to time in accordance with official announcements. Unless specially authorized by the Inspector of Post-offices, no mails may be made up for foreign offices except those specified in the list, and the instructions there given are to be read as part of these rules and regulations.

500. The numbering of letter-bills replaces, under Postal Union rules, the system of acknowledgments. Officers of despatch must carefully number in an annual series the letter-bills for each of the offices of destination. When there is no correspondence on hand for despatch at the usual time, a mail consisting of a blank letter-bill should be forwarded to every place beyond the Dominion for which mails are usually made up, with the exception of Australia. Supplementary mails will receive the next consecutive number to that of the main mail. In the case of mails for the United Kingdom, the letter-bills for each of the offices and by each route must form a separate series. Thus “London via Italy” will form one series; “London via Plymouth,” by direct steamers, another, &c.

501. All the different items in the letter-bill must be carefully completed, and on no account is the indication of the route and the name of the steamer by which the mail is forwarded to be omitted. The number of separate packets or bags comprising the mail is indicated on letter-bill P.O. 13, in the right-hand top corner. In mails for London the number of post-cards need not be specially indicated in the letter-bills. If parcel-mails are despatched by the same vessel as letter-mails, the number of receptacles should also be advised on the letter-bill, the entries to be made thus: “10 bags, 4 P.P.” Empty bags should be advised under “Official Registrations” in registered lists thus: “Fifty empty bags (in eight sacks).”

502. The presence in the mail of a packet of registered letters is to be indicated by the impression of the “R.” stamp, or by the special entry “Registered packet” at the head of the letter-bill. The number of registered articles inscribed on the lists, the number of lists, and the number of packets or bags containing those articles, must be entered on the letter-bill.

503. Verification note (V.N.) forms, P.O. 16, must be registered when they refer to the non-receipt of a mail or registered