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Coasting or Foreign Service. — Beport of Regulations Committee. Meeting held 7th March, 1893. Present: Captain Fullerton (in the chair), Captain Currie, Captain Gartside, Mr. McParlane. To the Marine Board of Victoria. Youn committee desires to report that it has taken into consideration the question remitted thereto by the Board on the 28th October, 1892, having reference to the want of uniformity existing between the Colonies of New South Wales and Victoria in the matter of the definition of "coasting service " in connection with the qualifications of engineers applying for certificates of competency. After due inquiry your committee finds that in all the Australian Colonies excepting Queensland service extending beyond the coasts of such colonies is accepted as foreign service, and it is therefore recommended — 1. That the regulations bearing upon the examination of masters, mates, and engineers be amended so as to provide that service performed in ships plying beyond the limits of the colony be regarded as foreign-going service for the purposes of such regulations. 2. That copies of replies received from the other colonies be forwarded to the Queensland Marine Board, with an intimation of the action proposed to be taken by this Board, with a view to uniformity of procedure in dealing with candidates. E. Fullbeton, Chairman of Committee. Melbourne, 10th March, 1893. J. G. McKib, Secretary.

g IM] Marine Board Office, Brisbane, 24th March, 1893. I have the honour, by direction, to acknowledge the receipt of yours of the 11th instant, enclosing particulars of replies from other Boards re interpretation of the term " coasting service " in its relation to " foreign service," and also your Board's decision in connection therewith. In reply, I am directed to state that for the present this Board will continue to work under the regulation hitherto existing, and will, in the meantime, refer to the Board of Trade for their opinion. I have, &c, The Secretary, Marine Board, Melbourne. S. A. Pethebbidge, Secretary.

No. 17. (New Zealand, No. 26.) My Lobd, — Downing Street, 19th June, 1893. My predecessor caused to be forwarded to the Board of Trade a copy of the Earl of Onslow's Despatch No. 50, of the 14th July, 1891, respecting the conveyance of poisons in vessels from Great Britain to the colonies, and I have the honour to transmit to your Lordship, for communication to your Government, copies of a notice which has been received from that department, issued in January, 1892, drawing attention to section 17 of " The Sale of Poisons and Pharmacy Act, 1868." I have, &c, EIPON. Governor the Eight Hon. the Earl of Glasgow, G.C.M.G., &c.

' A.-l, 1892. No. 10.

Enclosure. Notice to Shipownees, Shipmastees, and Others. —Maeking and Packing op Poisons. The attention of the Board of Trade has been called to a case in which serious danger to human life was caused by the shipment, for transmission abroad, of a package of arsenic, without any label to show the poisonous character of its contents. This package was subsequently broken, and the contents became mixed with a quantity of articles used for human food, also forming part of the vessel's cargo. The Board desire to call the special attention of shipowners, shipmasters, and all others concerned in the shipment of poisons to the provisions of section 17 of " The Sale of Poisons and Pharmacy Act, 1868," which requires that every package containing any of the following poisons:— Arsenic and its preparations, prussic acid, cyanides of potassium and all metallic cyanides, strychnine and all poisonous vegetable alkaloids and their salts, aconite and its preparations, emetic tartar, corrosive sublimate, cantharides, savin and its oil, ergot of rye and its preparations, oxalic acid, chloroform, belladonna and its preparations, essential oil of almonds unless deprived of its prussic acid, opium and all preparations of opium or of poppies—when sold for export, is to bear the name of the article and the word " poison," and any person infringing the provisions of the Act in this respect is subject to a penalty of £5 for each offence. The Board further desire to call attention to the great importance of taking the utmost precautions in the package and stowing of poisons of all kinds on board ship, so as to reduce to the minimum the risk of breakage, leakage, or contamination in any way of the adjoining cargo. This notice should be freely circulated among the shippers and exporters of poisons. GeOKGE J. SWANSTON, Board of Trade, January, 1892. Assistant Secretary, Marine Department.