13

H.—7

No. 17. The Agent-Geneeal to the Hon. the Commissionee of Teade and Customs. (Telegram.) London, 28th January, 1886. Ovee two hundred thousand salmon ova, " lonic."

No. 18. The Agent-Geneeal to the Hon. the Commissionee of Teade and Customs. (Telegram.) London, 15th January, 1886. Consideeable shipment salmon ova to Auckland by " lonic," fortnight.

No. 19. The Hon. the Commissionee of Teade and Customs to the Agent-Geneeal. Sie, — Government Buildings, Wellington, 12th March, 1886. I have the honour to acknowledge the receipt of your Memorandum No. 113, of the 28th January last, in which you transmit copy of correspondence setting forth the conditions under which you engaged Mr. F. W. Paxton to proceed in the " lonic " in charge of the shipment of salmon ova by that steamer. That arrangement seems to me to be an excellent one. I have, &c., The Agent-General, 7, Westminster Chambers, London, S.W. Julius Vogel.

No. 20. The Agent-Geneeal to the Hon. the Colonial Teeasueee. Sie, — 7, Westminster Chambers, London, S.W., 9th February, 1886. I have to acknowledge the receipt of your letter of the 31st December last, No. 439, relating to the shipment of fish ova. I beg permission to express my acknowledgments for your explanation, and to assure you that nothing was further from my intention than to make any personal complaint in my letter last October of the course the Government had taken in the matter. But, having been long impressed with the enormous importance to New Zealand of acclimatizing the salmon, I had given some study to the subject; and I could not see with pleasure so great an expense being incurred in sending Home Mr. Farr, when it was in reality quite unnecessary to send a special agent at all. As it is, I can only be very glad now that I have been able, with the invaluable assistance of Sir James Maitland, to send you so large a shipment this season at so small an expense. I regret to be obliged to confirm what I lately said to you—that, notwithstanding repeated promises, I see no chance now of getting any Ehine ova this year. I am now in constant communication with Professor Cossar Ewart about the herring experiment ; and we have designed the plan of the icehouse he will want. On this subject I shall be addressing you again shortly. I beg that you will be pleased to accept my excuses for having addressed my letters respecting ova to the Colonial Secretary instead of yourself. If you will turn to your letter of the 15th August, 1885, you will see that it was only dated " Wellington," and, as I did not know the subject had been transferred to the Customs Department, I merely supposed that you had signed the letter for the Hon. the Colonial Secretary. In future, all letters relating to it shall be properly addressed to yourself. I have, &c, The Hon. the Colonial Treasurer, Wellington. F. D. Bell.

No. 21. The Agent-Geneeal to the Hon. the Commissionee of Teade and Customs. (Telegram.) London, 18th March. Heeeing ova : Between two and three millions, " Euapehu." Please prepare.

No. 22. The Honoeaey Secketaky, Wellington and Wairarapa Accclimatization Society, to the Hon. the Colonial Teeasubee. Sir,— Wellington, 25th March, 1886. On the arrival of the " lonic " the Marine Department handed me one case of salmon ova (No. 86) and one case of frozen trout ova (No. 36), which I took to the Masterton hatching establishment by the afternoon train on Monday, the 23rd instant, together with about 2cwt. of ice. On opening the case of salmon ova, I found a large part of them looking bright and healthy; so*, after lowering the temperature of the water with ice, placed the ova in the hatching-boxes, picking. out 3,150 dead ones. I was informed that there were about twenty thousand ova in the case ; but,, judging from appearance in the boxes, Ido not think that there were so many. Assuming, however, that there were, this would leave about 16 per cent, of dead ones in the case. 3—H. 7.