POLLAK-VIRAG RAPID TELEGRAPH IN GERMANY. A new invention relating to rapid telegraphy is undergoing a practical test, the results of which should receive due consideration in the United States. The system is known as the Pollak-Virag rapid telegraph, and after a careful examination at the Polytechnic Institute at Charlottenburg it was shown to the Emperor and Empress of Germany about the middle of last February. It was decided at this visit by the chief of the German postal system and other influential persons that the new system would be given a practical test on the line between Berlin and Königsberg, which is some 710 kilometers (4471⁄2 miles) long. The results obtained with the new system are considered most satisfactory, as it has been demonstrated that 40,000 words per hour can be transmitted under the most varying conditions. The imperial telegraph service has decided to introduce the system on the busy line between Berlin and Frankfort. A special writing machine, worked in the usual way, perforates a strip of paper which is drawn over a roller under metallic brushes with great rapidity. The interruptions of the current move the membranes of two telephones at the receiving station, which write the messages by means of a small mirror. In scientific circles the new system has created a great deal of interest, and some of the technical journals in Germany have given descriptions of it. Of these, one of the best appeared in the Zeitung des Vereins Deutscher Eisenbahn-Verwaltungen, of November 19 and 26, 1902. BERLIN, May 25, 1903. DEAN B. MASON, Vice and Deputy Consul-General. PROGRESS IN GERMAN CABLE LAYING. A new era in German cable construction began with the laying of a cable to Vigo, Spain, a distance of about 1,300 miles. During the last seven years, Germany has laid 7,375 miles of cable, at a cost of over $7,000,000. In 1898 a cable, 73 miles in length, was laid between Sassnitz and Trelleborg, and in 1899 German Southwest Africa was connected with the international telegraph system by a cable 154 miles long. In 1900 the first German-American cable between Emden and New York, via the Azores-a distance of 4,813 miles-was laid. At about the same time Germany put down the first German cables along the Chinese coast, the cable Tsintau-Chefoo being 285 miles and that connecting Tsintau and Shanghai 438 miles long. The year 1901 witnessed the laying of the fifth cable between Germany and England, connecting Borkum and Baktou, a distance of 280 miles. The telephone cable between Fehmarn and Laaland was laid in 1902. The construction of a second trans-Atlantic cable between Emden and New York, via the Azores, has been commenced and will, it is expected, be ready for service before the expiration of the next year. Germany is also contemplating an increase of her cable net in eastern Asia and the South Sea by constructing cables between Alenado and Guam and the Palau Islands and Shanghai. It is said that the growth of German interests, both military and commercial, will in the future require the building of more cables by Germany, independent of foreign nations. Germany now has cable works and two cable steamers. FRANKFORT, May 14, 1903. RICHARD GUENTHER, Consul-General. AMERICAN DRIED FRUITS IN GERMANY. While in the United States last year, I visited a number of the larger prune and apricot orchards in the vicinity of San José, Cal., and since my return to this country have given the importation of evaporated American fruits considerable study. For this part of Germany-namely, Baden and Alsace-Lorraine-I find the outlook for increased sales most encouraging. From the leading importer in the western part of Germany I learn that California prunes and apricots are rapidly supplanting the products of France and Italy. The California fruit is cheaper and its flesh brighter and more solid. Speaking of the packing and drying of prunes and apricots, my informant tells me he has no fault to find, except with the manner in which the boxes are put together. He says there would be less breakage if they were dovetailed instead of being simply nailed. Regarding the time in transit, he says that he has experienced considerable annoyance and some loss of trade in consequence of shipments being delayed en route from California. One shipment was over ten weeks on the way; the buyers think the goods were held in New York several weeks. California fruits are generally paid for in advance, which fact makes delays in shipments especially annoying. The Elsässische Conserven-Fabrik und Import Gesellschaft, of Strassburg, last season sold 8 carloads of apricots, 10 carloads of prunes, and 25 carloads of evaporated apples. Prunes and apples retail here at from 122 to 15 cents per pound and apricots at 20 cents. The evaporated apples come from the vicinity of Rochester, N. Y., and find a ready sale. Considerable fault, however, was found with the shipments of last season. The apples were not all sufficiently dried before packing, which caused them to mould in the boxes. The metric system should be used in foreign shipments. KEHL, May 29, 1903. JOSEPH I. BRITTAIN, Consul OPENING FOR DRIED FRUITS IN FRANCE. Several commission merchants at Nantes have requested me to secure for them the agency of responsible fruit-exporting houses in the United States. There is a growing market in all western and northwestern France for American dried fruits (the prunes of southern California being most in request) and the demand is unusually active this year because of the almost complete failure of the French fruit crop. Any of our fruit exporters who wish to be represented at Nantes need only communicate with this consulate. The merchants here are interested in California prunes, dried apricots, and dried apples; they wish particularly to hear from California firms that will export these products direct to Nantes, as they do not care to do business through middlemen at Antwerp, Hamburg, and Liverpool. The season is advancing, and if this excellent market interests any of our exporters who are not already represented in this territory, they should communicate at once. NANTES, May 22, 1903. BENJ. H. RIDGELY, Consul. SURTAX ON GOODS INDIRECTLY IMPORTED INTO FRANCE. Vexatious correspondence and loss of money have recently resulted in a number of cases because of unfamiliarity, on the part of United States shippers to France, with the French regulations respecting merchandise transshipped in some European port before. arriving in the port of destination. In some instances, merchandise has been forwarded under what the consignors deemed to be a through bill of lading, the possession of which they vainly presumed would protect them against the imposition of the French surtax which is applicable in the case of importations from a European country of products of extra-European origin. The exemptions from this surtax are: Quinine bark; Australian, South African, and Indian wool; Indian cotton; jute, cacao fiber, and vegetable fiber generally, with the exception of cotton; tobacco; and Ceylon plumbago. It will be observed that none of these exemptions cover mer. chandise of American origin. The surtax ranges from 1.80 francs (34 cents) to 60 francs ($11.58) per 100 kilograms (220 pounds) in about forty specified cases, and is 3.60 francs (69 cents) per 220 pounds in all nonspecified cases. In order that there may be no misunderstanding about the matter, I have procured from the collector of customs at this port an official letter, in which he says: Replying to your inquiry of the 6th instant, I have to say that, except in cases of superior force or acts of God, which do not constitute an interruption to direct transportation, merchandise transshipped in the course of its journey by sea is regarded as having arrived from the place where such transshipment has occurred. It results from this that the surtax is applicable to products of extra-European origin brought into France by a ship which has received them in a European port, whatever may have been the commercial reasons and particulars respecting the transshipment. This surtax is applicable to nearly all classes of merchandise, and the exceptions to the rule are very rare indeed. These exceptions in general arise from geograph. ical or economic considerations, and it suffices to cite a few examples to design their character. Thus, for example, it is possible to import by way of Denmark the products of Iceland and the Faroe Islands; from European Russia, the products of Asiatic Russia; from Constantinople and the European ports of Turkey upon the Black Sea, the products of the Asiatic possessions of the Ottoman Empire; from Spain, the products of the Canary Islands and of the Spanish possessions of the Morocco coast; etc. As American shippers are obliged to pay the maximum tariff of France, except in a limited number of cases covered by the commercial convention with the United States signed on May 30, 1898,* the imposition of a surtax makes the transaction of business prac tically impossible, and shippers should guard against the possibility of the application of this surtax by forwarding their goods on board steamers sailing directly from American to French ports. MARSEILLES, Mcy 18, 1903. ROBERT P. SKINNER, * See Special Consular Reports, Tariffs of Foreign Countries, Part I, p. 222. COAL IMPORTATIONS AT MARSEILLES. The total imports of coal at Marseilles during the year 1902 were 965,542 tons, showing a decrease of 86,964 tons from the quantity imported for the previous year, when the importations were 1,052,526 Included in the above return of British coal, there are about 15,000 tons of patent fuel (briquettes) and 61,000 tons of gas coal from the Sunderland and Tyne districts. Of the American shipments, about half the quantity was gas coal, while the German was composed of coal, patent fuel, and coke from the Westphalian districts, and was delivered to the Paris, Lyons, and Mediterranean Railway Company, the Messageries Maritimes Company, Transports Maritimes Company, and the Marseilles. Compagnie du Gaz et Hauts Fourneaux. The prices obtained were low, and the importations have been made by the companies here with a view to ascertaining the results to be expected from this coal, as compared with British coal. The 7,200 tons from Belgium were patent fuel. The Russian coal was only a small sample and, I understand, did not give good results. The f. o. b. price for contracts can be averaged at 22s. 6d. ($5.46) per ton, the average current price being about 1s. (24 cents) per ton higher. Extreme competition for 1903 has resulted in large contracts being taken at figures which can not be remunerative, and, although the volume of trade this year may not materially differ from that of 1902, the losses at Marseilles will be considerable, unless the prices which have ruled in South Wales for the first five months are considerably reduced. I still deem it unfortunate that American exporters failed to follow up their energetic and successful efforts of previous years to get |