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(ulcatta Government Gazette, I discovered the error under which I was laboring. I therefore had letter No 168 and the Memorandum accompanying it (forming Inclosures Nr 1 and 2 of this Despatch) sent to M. Scales who at once saw the propriety of the previous Regulations, adverted to in them, and which he accordingly has since done.
Your Lordship will readily understand how necessary it is to keep open those Channels of Communication (the Ports of Calcutta and Madras) when I mention that at least one half of the enormous correspondence of the foreign Community of China goes by those routes; and although, it may be added, some Mercantile Firms and some few Individuals have Agents or Friends in India to whom they might enclose their letters to be forwarded to England, and elsewhere, yet that resource is neither open to nine tenths of the Officers of Her Majesty's Service now stationed in vast number in China, nor to a great other persons who would therefore be absolutely cut off in this distant Region, from any means of communication with their families and friends during a considerable period of each year; as few Vessels seldom (or hardly ever) clear out for Bombay direct.
With regard to letter No 174 - forming Inclosure N°3 to this Despatch - I have to state, that it