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(Secret and Confidential.)

Sir,

32

No. 70.

Colonial Office to Admiralty.

Downing Street, May 4, 1878.

I AM directed by the Secretary of State for the Colonies to transmit to you, to be laid before the Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty, a copy of a letter from the Treasury, ** relative to the proposed expenditure in respect of works, armaments, and gun-boats, recommended by the Colonial Defence Committee for certain Colonies, together with a copy of the reply of this Department.†

I am to request that you will move their Lordships to furnish the information desired by the Lords Commissioners of the Treasury respecting the gun-boats recommended by the Colonial Defence Committee, to which their Lordships' attention has already been drawn in the letter from this Department of the 20th ultimo.

I am, &c.

(Signed)

R. H. MEADE.

No. 71.

(Secret and Confidential.)

Sir,

Colonial Office to Treasury.

Downing Street, May 4, 1878. I AM directed by the Secretary of State for the Colonies to acknowledge the receipt of

your letter of the 2nd instant,* relative to the proposed expenditure in respect of works, armament, &c., recommended by the Colonial Defence Committee for certain Colonies.

2. In reply I am to request that you will state to the Lords Commissioners of the Treasury that a copy of your letter has been communicated to the War Office and Admiralty, and that ample time will be given for considering the apportionment of cost, respecting which their Lordships will of course be consulted before a decision is taken, as no guns beyond the thirty to forty 64-ton guns at present available can be ready for delivery until the expiration of three months from the date of order, and then only at the rate of two a-week.

3. With regard to the last paragraph of your letter, I am to observe that there are other points besides the two mentioned by the Lords Commissioners, at which Imperial interests are concerned, as, for instance, Singapore, which is of great value as a coaling station, and that in defending the various ports, both Colonial and Imperial interests will be provided for by the same works, without which the guns would be useless, and that as the War Office will be responsible for the manufacture of the guns, and for the works to hold them, it would seem better that whatever disbursements are made should be undertaken also by that Department in the first instance, whether on account of works or armaments, the Colonies being called upon to reimburse whatever may eventually be considered their fair proportion. But on this point the Secretary of State for War may perhaps desire to give an opinion, and a copy of this letter has been communicated to the War Office with that object. On receiving a reply from that Depart- ment, a further letter will be addressed to you on the subject.

I am, &c. (Signed)

R. H. MEADE.

No. 72.

Governor-General the Earl of Dufferin to the Right Honourable Sir M. E. Hicks

(Telegraphic.)

Beach, Bart.-(Received May 6, 1878.)

May 4, 1878.

MY Government are anxious, in view of the present relations between Great Britain and Russia, about the defenceless condition of the Atlantic seaboard of the Dominion, and the danger to the shipping interest of the Empire, and submit that a fleet of fast cruizers would be necessary for protection if war should be declared.

• No. 67.

+ No. 71.

No. 47.

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