TREASURY DEPARTMENT, June 28, 1898. SIR: I am in receipt of your letter of the 17th instant, further in the matter of invoicing cotton net embroideries consigned to you for sale by your principals, Messrs. Alder & Rappolt, of St. Gall, Switzerland, this subject having been somewhat covered by your former letter of the 4th and Department's reply thereto of the 8th instant.

You state that Messrs. Alder & Rappolt have ready for shipment to the United States certain staple cotton embroideries, manufactured in accordance with instructions sent them by you; that the goods are destined for your stock, to be held and disposed of from time to time at such prices as you can obtain, and that you, therefore, desire further information as to how said goods should be invoiced, as you have reason to believe that your invoices made out on the basis of the prevailing stitch rates, with an addition of 5 per cent and 8 per cent for expenses and profit, will be criticised by the appraising officers, notwithstanding similar goods so invoiced by other firms are passed as correct at the custom house.

As was stated in Department's letter of the 8th instant, the local appraiser and the General Appraisers at New York have exclusive jurisdiction in matters relating to the appraisement and reappraisement of imported merchandise. This Department can not, therefore, undertake to pass upon the correctness of your invoices. If your statement that goods identical in quality and manufacture to those imported by you can be freely bought in the St. Gall market at prevailing stitch rates, with an addition of 5 per cent and 8 per cent for expenses and profits, should prove correct, I feel justified in saying that the local appraiser would have no difficulty in ascertaining the market value thereof, as defined by section 10 of the act of June 10, 1890. It is only in cases where the local appraiser is unable to ascertain the foreign market value of merchandise, as defined in sections 10 and 19 of the act of June 10, 1890, that resort to section 11 of the same act, as amended by section 32 of the act of July 24, 1897, and to sections 16 and 17 of the act of June 10, 1890, becomes necessary.

In regard to your inquiry whether invoices covering goods sold for delivery at a price stipulated in United States currency should be made out in such currency, I have to inform you that section 2 of the act of June 10, 1890, provides that invoices of imported merchandise shall be made out in the currency of the place from whence importations shall be made, or, if purchased, in the currency actually paid therefor. As the goods referred to by you as having been sold to domestic shippers at the price agreed upon in United States currency are purchased goods within the meaning of said section 2, and have been sold at a price in United States currency, the Department holds that such invoices should be made out in the currency paid—that is, in United States currency. Respectfully, yours,

W. B. HOWELL, (758 i.)

Assistant Secretary. Mr. H. S. BEER, New York, N. Y.

(19588.)

Stamps on custom-house entries under the act of June 13, 1898.

[Circular No. 123.]

TREASURY DEPARTMENT,
OFFICE OF THE SECRETARY,

Washington, D. C., June 30, 1898. To officers of the customs and others concerned:

Under the decision of the Commissioner of Internal Revenue, the following-named customs entries and bonds will require internal revenue stamps, as indicated in section 25 of the war-revenue law of June 13, 1898 :

Entry. Bond. 1. Import entry for consumption......

25 cents to $1.00 2. Warehouse entry...

25 cents to 1.00 $0.50 3. Warehouse withdrawal for consumption 4. Warehouse withdrawal for export.....

.50

.50 5. Withdrawal for transportation and export.......

.50 6. Withdrawal for transportation to a warehouse in another district.. .50

.50 7. Rewarehouse entry...

.50

.50 8. Rewarehouse withdrawal for consumption.. 9. Rewarehouse withdrawal for exportation ..

.50

.50 10. Rewarehouse withdrawal for transportation and exportation .50

.50 11. Rewarehouse withdrawal for transportation and warehousing in another district.........

.50 12. Warehouse and immediate transportation..

25 cents to 1.00 .50 13. Rewarehouse and consumption on arrival..

.50 14. Warehouse and immediate export by sea.

None.

.50 15. Immediate Canada in transit....

None.

.50 16. Immediate transportation without appraisement (I. T. ............... None. None. 17. Withdrawal for export from Class 6, warehouse .....

.50 18. Withdrawal for transfer to manufacturing warehouse, Class 6...... 50

.50

.50

.50

.50

19. Import entry under special bond for repairs, exhibition, etc.,

25 cents to 1.00 .50 20. Entry for export of goods covered by the preceding import entry.. .50 .50 21. All bonds with sureties taken by the collector in the transaction of customs busi

ness, 50 cents for each bond. 22. Certificates required to be issued by collectors for the cancellation of bonds or the

adjustment of customs accounts in the different districts of the Customs Service

are exempt from internal revenue stamps. Entries covering goods in transit through the United States to Canada or Mexico, entries for immediate transportation to interior ports under the acts of June 10, 1880, and February 23, 1887, entries for benefit of drawback, and entries for immediate exportation by sea, will not require internal revenue stamps.

All required stamps must be affixed to entries and duly canceled before they are deposited in the custom house, and must be so marked by the proper customs officers as to make their future use impracticable.

L. J. Gage, Secretary.

(19589.)

Spaces on steel vessels.
Spaces on steel vessels to be made by cutting in the metal.

TREASURY DEPARTMENT,

BUREAU OF NAVIGATION,

Washington, D. C., June 30, 1898. SIR: Referring to your letter dated the 24th instant, relative to the marking of spaces on steel vessels under the act of March 2, 1895, this office has to state that the spaces should be marked by cutting in the metal.

Respectfully, yours, E. T. CHAMBERLAIN, Commissioner. COLLECTOR OF CUSTOMS, Bath, Me.

(19590.)

Stamping contents of packages. Stamping of outside cases in lieu of separate packets, boxes, bottles, etc., not a com

pliance with act of June 13, 1898—Stamps may be affixed before shipment of articles from abroad.

TREASURY DEPARTMENT, June 30, 1898. GENTLEMEN: The Department duly received your letter of the 20th instant, transmitted through the Hon. H. C. Lodge, in which, referring to the proviso to section 24 of the act of June 13, 1898, entitled “An Act to provide ways and means to meet war expenditures, and for other purposes," you state that a construction requiring the importer to open each package for the purpose of affixing the necessary revenue stamps would result in the reduction of the value of the goods, and, in many cases, render them unsalable, and suggest that the amount of stamp taxes accruing on imported goods be added to and collected with the customs duties, the stamps to be affixed to the outside case or at the time of sale.

The section in question provides as follows:

SEC. 24. That the stamp taxes prescribed in this Act on the articles provided for in Schedule B shall attach to all such articles and things sold or removed for sale on and after the said first day of July, eighteen hundred and ninety-eight. Every person, except as otherwise provided in this Act, who offers or exposes for sale any article or thing provided for in said Schedule B, whether the article so offered or exposed is of foreign manufacture and imported or of domestic manufacture, shall be deemed the manufacturer thereof, and shall be subject to all the taxes, liabilities, and penalties imposed by law for the sale of articles without the use of the proper stamp denoting the tax paid thereon; and all such articles of foreign manufacture shall, in addition to the import duty imposed on the same, be subject to the stamp tax prescribed in this Act: Provided further, That internal revenue stamps required by existing law on imported merchandise shall be affixed thereto and canceled at the expense of the owner or importer before the withdrawal of such merchandise for consumption, and the Secretary of the Treasury is authorized to make such rules and regulations as may be necessary for the affixing and canceling of such stamps, not inconsistent herewith.

In reply, I have to inform you that the stamp taxes imposed by said act are internal revenue taxes collectible independently of customs duties ; that the stamping of the outside case or cover in lieu of the separate packets, boxes, bottles, etc., would not be in compliance with the law ; that the proviso to said section is inapplicable to any of the articles upon which stamp taxes are imposed by said act, and that stamps are not required to be affixed to such imported goods until the articles are offered or exposed for sale, when the person who so offers or exposes them becomes amenable as manufacturer, under section 24, to the provisions of section 20 for selling, or removing for consumption or sale, any of the articles mentioned in Schedule B, without affixing thereto the proper stamp or label. No objection would be made if the stamp should be affixed to the articles before shipment from abroad. Respectfully, yours,

W. B. HOWELL, (935 i.)

Assistant Secretary. Messrs. S. S. PIERCE COMPANY, Boston, Mass.

(19591.)

Values of foreign coins.
[Circular No. 124.]
TREASURY DEPARTMENT,

BUREAU OF THE MINT,

Washington, D. C., July 1, 1898. SIR: In pursuance of the provisions of section 25 of the act of August 28, 1894, I present in the following table an estimate of the values of the standard coins of the nations of the world :