Charge of commissions. Expenses in detail. Transportation, frontier duties, &c. Other details deemed useful. 3d. The customary charge of commissions for purchasing and shipping goods of different descriptions. The usual brokerage on the purchase or sale of merchandise; whether it is paid by the buyer or seller, or by both. 4th. The usual and customary expenses in detail attending the purchase and shipment of merchandise, including commissions, brokerage, export duty, dock, trade, or city dues, lighterage, porterage, labor, cost of packages, covering, or embaling, cooperage, gauging, weighing, wharfage, and local imposts or taxes of any kind; which of the foregoing, or other items, are usually included in the price of the article, or become a separate charge to be paid by the shipper or purchaser. 5th. In the case of merchandise purchased at interior places, or in other countries having no shipping ports of their own for shipment to foreign countries, through the ports of the consulate, the customary expenses attending the transportation from such interior places or countries to the port of shipment, including all transit, export, or import frontier duty, and every other charge up to the arrival at such port, and the ordinary expenses attending the shipment thereof. 6th. Consular officers will include in their reports, in detail, information on any other points which they may think proper, in order to an ascertainment of the value of Print'd documents. merchandise forwarded to the United States, and the assessment of the legal duties, forwarding any printed or other documents which they may think desirable that the Department should possess. Course and progress of trade. Frauds, &c. Prices of staple productions, &c. 1856. 719. Consular officers will keep the Department regularly and fully advised of the course and progress of trade from the several ports of their consulates to the United States; of all actual or attempted frauds on the revenue of the United States which may come to their knowledge, and the mode in which such frauds are or can be carried into effect; exercising a due watchfulness on all shipments destined for the United States. 720. Consular officers will regularly, and as frequently Sec. 27 Act Aug. 18, as practicable, advise the Department of the prices, from time to time, of the staple articles of foreign production exported from the country of their residence to the United States, and, where practicable, the prices of merchandise generally so exported; and particularly, the prices current of all articles of merchandise usually exported to the United States from the ports or places where they are located will be transmitted by each steamer, when there is a regular communication by steam vessels from the ports of their residence; otherwise, monthly. the Department of 721. Consular officers will report monthly to the Trea- Monthly reports to sury Department the rates of exchange prevailing between rates of exchange. the ports or places at which they reside, and the following places to wit: London, Paris, Amsterdam, Hamburg, New York, and other principal ports in the United States. tors of undervaluation in invoices, &c. 722. To check or prevent frauds on the revenue of the Reports to collecUnited States, consuls will report to collectors of customs, at ports to which the merchandise is destined, all invoices. in which the merchandise is, in their opinion, undervalued, communicating at the same time prices current, or other evidences of market value, in proof of the fact. voices, and advise fects, omissions, &c. 723. Consular officers before whom the oath to an in- To examine invoice is either taken or verified should examine the details collectors of deof such invoice, and a reasonable time for that purpose cannot be justly denied to them. They should point out its defects, if any, to the exporter; and they will promptly advise this Department and the collector at the port to which the goods are destined, of every instance of refusal on the part of the exporter to remedy such defects, so that the same may be subject to the proper revision at the custom-house. detect abuses, 724. It is the duty of consuls to use all proper efforts Duty of consuls to to detect any abuses that may be committed, or unfair where practicable. practices that may exist, not only as to the declaration of cost or value in invoices, but as to all charges, discounts, bounties, or other matters incident to the business of preparing merchandise for the markets of the United States. mation regularly appraisers. 725. Consular officers will forward regularly, as often To furnish inforas practicable, to the general appraisers residing at New to certain general York and San Francisco, such prices current, manufacturers' statements of prices, or merchants' printed circulars of prices, and such other general information as may be useful to appraisers in the discharge of their duties. partment of the Reports to the De- 726. Consular officers are also requested to transmit, at rates of depreci- least once a month, if opportunity offers, to this Depart ated currencies. Fees. Consuls to amine dise in cases. ex merchan ment, a statement of the rates at which any depreciated currency of the country they reside in is computed in United States or Spanish silver dollars, or in silver or gold coins. of other countries; observing, in all cases of an estimate of the currency in such foreign coins, that their weight and standard should be made known to the Department. 727. Consular officers are referred to article 125 of these regulations for the tariff of fees prescribed by the President of the United States, in pursuance of law, as compensation for the services they are to perform under the regulations of this section, as well as other consular duties. 728. United States consuls residing at the termini of certain the routes over the isthmus of Panama, Tehuantepec, or San Juan de Nicaragua, are required, in certain cases, to examine merchandise passing in transit over those routes from one port of the United States to another, as follows: On arrival at the isthmus, the copy of the entry will be exhibited to the United States revenue agent, if there be one residing there; if none, then to the United States consul residing at the port, who will examine the packages, and compare the same with the description in the copy of the entry, and will certify the result of his examination on the copy, and deliver it to the owner or his agent. On arrival at the port on the isthmus from which the goods are to be shipped to the United States, the same examination and comparison shall be made by the United States revenue agent, if there be one residing there; if none, then by the United States consul, and the result certified by him on the copy of the entry, and the same delivered to the owner or his agent in charge of the goods. 729. In cases of transportation of the products of American fisheries in the Pacific to the United States, by way Produce of Ameri- of the isthmus of Panama, in order to entitle them to be can fisheries in the Pacific, via Pa nama, to the Uni- transported across said isthmus, shipped to a port of the ted States. United States, and to be treated, on arrival, as if imported direct from the whaling or fishing ground in the original vessel, a manifest must be made out, in the usual form, specifying the marks, numbers, description of packages, and contents, port of destination, and to whom consigned; which manifest must be verified by the oath of the master or commander before the United States consul at Panama. On the arrival of the oil, or other product of the fishery, (as the case may be,) at the Atlantic terminus of the route, the manifest aforesaid must be presented to the United States consul at Aspinwall, who will certify thereon to the due shipment of the merchandise under his inspection on board the vessel (naming the vessel and her master) for its destination in the United States. The foregoing regulations will apply also to whale oil and other products of American fishery transported by the route of San Juan de Nicaragua. 730. In view of the fluctuations in the value of the Piastre of Turkey Spanish dollar in the ports of Turkey, the consuls of the United States are instructed that, in estimating the value of Turkish currency in said ports, reference is in no case to be had of the Spanish dollar, but that in all cases the value of the Turkish currency is to be given as compared with the United States silver dollar, according to the form subjoined: FORM NO. 225. Consular certificate of the value of Turkish currency. CONSULATE OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. I, the undersigned, consul of the United States of America, do hereby certify that the true value of the Turkish piastre (in Turkish gold pounds of piastres 100. given in payment of merchandise at the rate of piastres 108. each, or in silver "medjidie" of piastres 20. given at the rate of piastres 21. each,) in which currency the annexed invoice of merchandise is made out, is three cents 19055 timated in United States silver dollars, or twenty-five 60% of said piastres to a United States silver dollar. es 100 day of In witness whereof, I have hereunto set my hand and affixed the seal of my office at, this one thousand eight hundred and fifty [L. S.] United States Consul. CHAPTER V. BOUNTIES TO VESSELS ENGAGED IN THE COD FISHERY AND SECTION I. FISHING BOUNTIES. Conditions of allowance, terms of codfishery, &c. When the vessel is of 20 tons bur between master and fishermen. ART. 731. To entitle fishing vessels to the allowance of employment in bounty, the laws require that they shall have been excluAct July, 29, 1818. sively employed in the codfishery at sea a specified period between the last day of February and the last day of November, under certain restrictions and conditions. No allowance can be made unless the proofs herein pointed out are duly made in good faith, and presented to the collector at the custom-house where the codfishing license was issued for his decision. These indispensable proofs are set forth with the necessary explanations, as follows: 732. In the case of a vessel of twenty tons burden or den, agreement upwards, the original agreement made previous to the Act June 19, 1818. fishing voyage or voyages of the vessel between the master, or skipper thereof, and every fisherman employed therein, not being an apprentice or servant of the master, skipper, Endorsed or wit- Or Owner, which original agreement must be endorsed or countersigned by the owner of the vessel or his agent, and must express whether the same is to continue for one voyage or for the season; and also stipulate that the fish, or the proceeds of such fishing voyage or voyages, which may appertain to the fishermen, shall be divided among them in proportion to the quantities or number of said fish which each fisherman shall have respectively caught, together with an affidavit or affirmation of the owner, his agent or legal representative, showing expressly that such agreement or agreements contain the true and actual contracts nessed by owner. |