F.—-Ba.

[Extracts from Parliamentary Paper F.-8 of 1899.]

No. 34. The Hon. Audley Coote, Sydney, to the Hon. the Postmaster-General, Wellington. Sir, — Waverley Park, Sydney, 11th January, 1899. Seferring to my previous communication dated 19th May last [No. 1, F.-Ba, 1898], I have now the honour to bring under your notice some other articles which appeared in the Electrical Beview of the 23rd and 30th September and 14th October last year, under the title " Side-lights on Cable Eoutes." I enclose herewith reprints of the articles in question. I have, &c, The Hon. the Postmaster-General, Wellington. Audley Coote.

Enclosure 1 in No. 34. [Reprinted from the Electrical Review of the 23rd and 30th September, 1898.] Side-lights on Cable Eoutes. As a study of what we may fairly enough call an unsuccessful intrigue, we commend to the attention of our readers a report printed in June last by order of the Speaker of the Cape of Good Hope Parliament, headed " Copies of communications that have passed between the Government of Cape Colony, the Imperial Government, and the Eastern Telegraph Company, on the subject of a deep-sea cable vid the Cape, with extension to Australia." The frank audacity of some of the proposals advanced by the Eastern Telegraph Company and its backers would come as an amusing relief in the perusal of these letters were it only new, but for those who have any knowledge of the methods by which in the East and in Australasia these companies have gradually acquired their present monopoly, the freshness of the style has altogether disappeared. To lay the matter clearly before those who may not care to wade through these letters, we may state shortly that they refer to certain proposals made by the Eastern, Eastern Extension, and Eastern and South African Telegraph Companies, to the Imperial Government, and to the Governments of Cape Colony and of the Australian Colonies. Of these cable companies, the Eastern and the Eastern and South African are practically one in all but name, and are both under the able management of Mr. J. Denison Pender, who is also a director of the Eastern Extension Telegraph Company, the interests of which are most closely allied with those of the other two companies, the Marquis of Tweeddale being chairman of this as well as of the Eastern Company. The community of interests above indicated obviously calls for joint action in cases of need. Now, for some years past (since about the time of the Transvaal difficulty), the telegraph-lines to the Cape and South Africa generally have given much trouble and caused much dissatisfaction, owing to the frequent breakages ; these lines run along both the east and west coasts of Africa, the Eastern and South African owning all those on the east and a portion of those on the west coast. This company, therefore, suffers both in purse and credit, owing to the frequent interruptions, which, besides, might possibly make the laying of an opposition cable necessary, thus entailing serious competition, reduced rates, and consequent loss. Such a position clearly requires remedy. The allied Eastern Extension Company also is not free from the serious danger of competition, should a cable over which they have no control be laid between Australia and Canada. This also requires attention. The papers now published by the Cape of Good Hope Parliament expose the manner in which the combined companies hope to find relief from the troubles above indicated, but not at their own expense. About the beginning of this year frequent reference was made in the Press, many paragraphs appeared concerning an " all-British " cable to Australia, vid the Cape, and touching at Various places en route, which, in return for " certain privileges," would be laid by the companies above mentioned. The nature of these privileges is given in a letter dated the 22nd March, 1897, addressed by Mr. J. Denison Pender to the Chancellor of the Exchequer. In this letter, after referring to the demand for "additional telegraphic communication between Great Britain and the Australasian Colonies, quite independent of the Mediterranean route," Mr. Pender proposes that the combined companies should provide " cables between England, the Cape, and Australia, touching only at Gibraltar, Sierra Leone, Ascension, St. Helena, Durban, Mauritius, Eodriquez, and Cocos." In consideration of the above, the "privileges" asked for are the following: £25,000 annually for twenty years from the Imperial Government; an extension by the Australasian Governments, for at least ten years, of the annual £32,400, which they have been paying to the Eastern Extension Company for the last nineteen years ; also a present of a double-wire land-line (about one thousand miles long) between Cape Town and Durban from the Governments of Cape Colony and Natal, a land-line which, as the Postmaster-General of Cape Colony points out, is equal to aperpetual subsidy of £12,000 per annum. An underground land-line service from London to Cornwall is also to be provided : this will cost the Imperial Government at least £50,000. In addition to the above, it is stipulated that an annual subsidy of £32,000 for twenty years shall be paid if a branch cable be laid from the Seychelles to Ceylon, touching at Diego Garcia on the way.* The financial side of the proposal having been set forth, Mr. Pender asks for an " undertaking by the

* We hear that the cable between Mauritius and the Seychelles Islands, for the laying of which the Eastern and South African Telegraph Company is receiving a large annual subsidy from the Imperial and Indian Governments, is at present totally interrupted.

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