517
Maintenance of Gardens and Grounds.-The increase in this item is made up as follows:
Transferred from gardening operations in Cemetery,$ 800 Increase considered necessary for Cemetery,
200
Transferred from Maintenance of Government Office Grounds, 100 Maintenance of Peak Garden (C.O.D. 141 of 1904),........... Maintenance of Taipingshan Garden (C.O.D. 231 of 1903),...
100
500
$1,700
LAND REGISTRY OFFICE.
PERSONAL EMOLUMENTS.
Clerk and Translator.-The salary of the holder of the office is at present $720, but he is expected to pass in 1905 as 2nd Class Translator when he will come on the scale provided.
Temporary Clerk.-This Clerk has hitherto been paid $1 a day out of lapsing salaries, but is now shown on the Estimates. It is possible that further clerical assistance may be permanently required for New Territory work.
NEW TERRITORIES.
2 Copying Clerks.-These posts have been placed in Class VIII of the classifi- cation scheme and made permanent, but the holders come on the scale at $300, the - figure at which they were appointed.
Coolies for Land Bailiffs.—Are required to carry maps, etc., for field work.
OTHER CHARGES.
Incidental Expenses.-Previous provision insufficient to meet increased wants due to increases of staff, electric lighting formerly paid for by Supreme Court, uniforms for messengers, and new furniture required.
ATTORNEY GENERAL AND CROWN SOLICITOR.
PERSONAL EMOLUMENTS.
Crown Solicitor's Clerk.-On the resignation of this Clerk recently, the Crown Solicitor requested that the Clerk's salary might be added to the item Expenses of Crown Solicitor's staff as no special work devolved upon this Clerk all the clerical work being divided between the various clerks employed by the Crown Solicitor, and this was approved.
LAND COURT, NEW TERRITORY.
Provision was only made for six months of 1904, but it became necessary to supplement this as the work of settling claims could not be completed by the 30th of June. A revised Estimate was laid before Council involving an excess of $7,746.80 over the original estimate and a further Supplementary Vote was taken later for $4,524 for the Staff required from the 1st June to the 31st of December, 1904, in connection with the work of Land Settlement, as apart from the investigation of claims, in New Kowloon and the New Territory. A vote was also taken for half of Mr. CLEMENTI's salary for six months from July to December to admit of the officer acting in Mr. CLEMENTI's substantive post of Assistant Registrar General drawing half salary while Mr. CLEMENTI was seconded to the Land Court. Other clerical assistance may still be required for 1904.
The work of hearing and deciding claims will be completed by the end of the year, and the Land Court consequently disappears from the 1905 Estimates.