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37

No. 86.

Admiralty to Colonial Office.

(Confidential.) Šir,

Admiralty, May 10, 1878, WITH reference to your letter of the 26th ultimo,* marked Secret and Confidential, containing the Second Report of the Colonial Defence Committee on the defences of the Australian Colonies, Tasmania, and New Zealand, and requesting more particularly to be informed whether my Lords desire that a coal depôt should be maintained at King George's Sound for the use of Her Majesty's ships of war, I am commanded by my Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty to acquaint you, for the information of the Secretary of State for the Colonies, that my Lords neither have, nor propose to have, any coal depôt in King George's Sound, and they are prepared to recommend its being abandoned for the present as a coaling station.

&c.

I am,

(Signed)

No. 87.

ROBERT HALL.

Colonial Office to Admiral Sir A. Milne, Bart., G.C.B.

(Secret and Confidential.) Sir,

Downing Street, May 11, 1878. IN your letter of the 17th ultimot you stated that the Colonial Defence Committee had forwarded Reports on all the Colonial ports which, in the absence of further instruc- tions from the Secretary of State, they had thought it necessary to consider. You added that they had abstained from making any suggestions as regards certain Canadian ports on the ground that the provision for their defence appeared to devolve on the Dominion Government. In the letter from this Office of the 8th instant‡ a copy was transmitted to you of a telegram from the Governor-General, urging the provision of a fleet of fast armed cruizers for the protection of the Atlantic seaboard; and, under all the circumstances, Sir Michael Hicks Beach thinks it important that the Committee should take into their consideration the question of the defence of the principal Canadian Atlantic ports and favour him with any suggestions which, it their opinion, may be calculated to meet the case of this undefended seaboard in the event of its being suddenly subjected to the risks of war.

I am to inclose the paraphrase of a telegram which Sir M. Hicks Beach has addressed to the Governor-General in reply to his telegram of the 4th instant. §

I am, &c.

(Signed)

R. H. MÉADE.

No. 88.

The Right Honourable Sir M. E. Hicks Beach, Bart., to Governor-General the Earl of

(Telegraphic. Paraphrase.)

Dufferin.

Downing Street, May 11, 1878. ESQUIMALT defences. Despatch respecting goes to you to-day through Consul- General, New York. Arrange with him for its being safely transmitted to you.

No. $9.

The Right Honourable Sir M. E. Hicks Beach, Bart., to Governor-General the Earl of

(Telegraphic.)

Dufferin.

Downing Street, May 11, 1878. INFORMATION desired for Colonial Defence Committee. Description and number of local forces at St. John, Sydney, Pictou, and Charlottetown, and whether there are any guns at those places in serviceable condition, their number and calibre.

* No. 54.

+ No. 47. 35 C

‡ No. 74.

§ Nos. 72 and 77.

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