assistant to the Chief of Ordnance, United States Army, shall hereafter have the rank of major. Sandy Hook proving PROVING GROUND, SANDY HOOK, NEW JERSEY: For current expenses and maintenance of the ordnance proving ground, Sandy Hook,Maintenance. New Jersey, including general repairs and alterations, and accessories incidental to testing and proving ordnance, including hire of assistants for the Ordnance Board, skilled mechanical labor, purchase of instruments and other supplies, building and repairing butts and targets, clearing and grading ranges, twenty-seven thousand dollars. For the necessary expenses of officers while temporarily employed on ordnance duties at the proving ground and absent from their proper stations, at the rate of two dollars and fifty cents per diem while so employed, and the compensation of draftsmen while employed in the Army Ordnance Bureau on ordnance construction, eight thousand dollars. Expenses of officers. For purchase of ties for repair of railroad tracks, three thousand Repairs to track. dollars. WATERTOWN ARSENAL, WATERTOWN, MASSACHUSETTS: For enlargement and improvement of gun-carriage plant, including the purchase and setting up of an additional one hundred and fifty horsepower steam engine, resetting and necessary enlargement of boilers, steamheating arrangements for new setting-up shop, foundry, and foundryextension machine shop, and necessary new machine tools and appliances, thirty-one thousand dollars. Watertown Arsenal. Wharf. For rebuilding and enlarging the arsenal wharf upon the Charles River, twelve thousand five hundred dollars. WATERVLIET ARSENAL, WEST TROY, NEW YORK: For increasing Watervliet Arsenal. the present water-service system to supply post and shops with pure drinking water, three thousand one hundred and five dollars. For filling and grading grounds, construction of necessary roads to shops, and covering the same with granite paving, three thousand five hundred dollars. BENICIA ARSENAL, BENICIA, CALIFORNIA: For construction of gun platforms, for material, grading, and laying of spur track to platform, and for firing butt, four thousand five hundred dollars. Water service. Grounds. Benicia Arsenal. Board of Ordnance and Fortification. Purchases, tests, etc. Civilian member. BOARD OF ORDNANCE AND FORTIFICATION: To enable the Board to make all needful and proper purchases, experiments, and tests to ascertain, with a view to their utilization by the Government, the most effective guns, small arms, cartridges, projectiles, fuses, explosives, torpedoes, armor plates, and other implements and engines of war, and to purchase or cause to be manufactured, under authority of the Secretary of War, such guns, carriages, armor plates, and other war material as may, in the judgment of the Board, be necessary in the proper discharge of the duty devolved upon it by the Act approved September Vol. 25, p. 489. twenty-second, eighteen hundred and eighty-eight; to pay the salary of the civilian member of the Board of Ordnance and Fortification provided by the Act of February twenty-fourth, eighteen hundred and ninety-one, and for the necessary traveling expenses of said member when traveling on duty as contemplated in said Act; for the payment Expenses. of the necessary expenses of the Board, including a per diem allowance to each officer detailed to serve thereon when employed on duty away from his permanent station, of two dollars and fifty cents a day; and for the test of experimental guns, carriages, and other devices procured in accordance with the recommendation of the Board of Ordnance and Fortification, one hundred and fifty thousand dollars: Provided, That before any money shall be expended in the construction or test of any gun, gun carriage, ammunition, or implements under the supervision of the said Board, the Board shall be satisfied, after due inquiry, that the Government of the United States has a lawful right to use the inventions involved in the construction of such gun, gun carriage, ammunition, or implements, or that the construction or test is made at the request of a person either having such lawful right or authorized to convey the same to the Government. Tests. Proviso. Right to use inven tions. Purchases to be of ture. American Exception. manufac Counterpoise car riage. Contract with J. A. Howell for tests, etc. Proviso. Nature of tests. Amonnt. Payments. Emery's elevating gun carriage. Vol. 27, p. 475. Manner of payments changed. That all material purchased under the foregoing provisions of this Act shall be of American manufacture, except in cases when, in the judgment of the Secretary of War, it is to the manifest interest of the United States to make purchases in limited quantities abroad, which material shall be admitted free of duty. To enable the Board of Ordnance and Fortification, in its discretion, to procure and test one ten-inch counterpoise carriage of the type patented by Commodore J. A. Howell, United States Navy, the Secretary of War is hereby authorized and directed to contract with the licensee of said Howell patents for said carriage, without advertising, which shall be constructed according to the plans and specifications prepared by said J. A. Howell, and said carriage shall be capable of an all-round fire, and the details of said plan may be modified, changed, and improved in the discretion of the contractors: Provided, That the ten-inch carriage herein authorized to be contracted for shall be subjected to the same tests that the Buffington-Crozier ten-inch carriage will be subjected to with respect to ease of maneuvering, rapidity of firing, of traversing, and raising to the firing position; and the sum of fifty thousand dollars, or so much thereof as may be necessary, is hereby appropriated for the purchase of said Howell ten-inch carriage, including the erection of foundations and platform, the expense incident to its mounting, and the ammunition for its test. Eighty-five per centum of the amount herein appropriated shall be paid in partial payments as the work progresses, and the remainder upon the completion and test of said carriage by the Board of Ordnance and Fortification, and the work found to be done according to contract. That in the Act making appropriations for fortifications and other works of defense, for the armament thereof, for the procurement of heavy ordnance for trial and service, and for other purposes, approved February eighteenth, eighteen hundred and ninety-three, the paragraph beginning with the words "Of the one hundred and ten thousand dollars" and providing for terms of payment for the twelve inch elevating gun carriage to be contracted for with A. H. Emery under the provisions of said Act be, and is hereby, amended to read as follows: Of the one hundred and ten thousand dollars to be paid for the carriage and its foundations, eighty-five per centum shall be paid in partial payments as the work progresses, in accordance with the proposals submitted by A. H. Emery to the Board in his letter of January twentyfirst, eighteen hundred and ninety-three. And no bond shall be required for the return of this money if the carriage is not accepted, nor shall the said Emery be required to return the money paid, and the carriage shall belong to the United States when the tests are completed. The balance of the one hundred and ten thousand dollars shall be paid as soon as said carriage shall have been completed in all respects according to contract and shall also have undergone and endured a test satisfactory to the Board of Ordnance and Fortification.. Of the twenty thousand dollars to be paid for the testing of the carriage three-eighths shall be paid the contractor when the preliminary tests are completed, and the other five-eighths shall be paid to him proportionally as the Contract for auxil fifty rounds for proof are furnished. And the Secretary of War is iary loading appara hereby authorized and directed to enter into a supplemental contract with the contractor for this carriage, for the supply by him of a loading apparatus to go with and belong to the carriage and to be furnished therewith as a part thereof; and the carriage shall be so constructed that a part of the work of recoil can be used for the horizontal traverse of the carriage and the working of the loading apparatus; and the payment for the work so furnished under this supplementary contract shall be ten thousand dollars, which sum shall be due and payable when said loading apparatus is completed in all respects according to contract, and shall also have undergone and endured said test hereinbefore mentioned, to make which payment the sum of ten thousand dollars is hereby appropriated. tus. Payments. High power gun, cast in one piece. Contract with R. J. Payments. To enable the Board of Ordnance and Fortification to procure and test one eight-inch caliber high-power gun, cast in one piece, on the plan of R. J. Gatling; and the Secretary of War is hereby authorized Gatling for tests, etc. and directed to contract with said Gatling for said gun, without advertisement, which gun shall be constructed according to the plans and specifications prepared by said Gatling, and under his supervision, and to be subjected to the same test now applied to the built-up gun of the same caliber, and the sum of forty thousand dollars is hereby appropriated to pay for said gun; of which sum eighty-five per centum shall be paid in partial payments as the work progresses, in accordance with the contract to be entered into between the Secretary of War and the said Gatling, and the remainder upon the completion and test of said gun: Provided, That before said contract is entered into, the plans and specifications for said gun shall be deposited with the Secretary of etc. War, which plans and specifications may be modified, in the discretion of said Gatling, from time to time as the work progresses: And provided further, That the said gun shall conform in general form and dimensions to modern ordnance, and shall not therefor differ materially in form and dimensions from service guns, in order that it may admit of being mounted on a service carriage and in a service emplacement or fortification. FORT MONROE, VIRGINIA: Repair and maintenance of wharf: For twenty fender piles, four hundred dollars; forty thousand feet of docking, three inches by eight feet, laid, one thousand one hundred and twenty dollars; repair freight house, painting house and roof, two hundred dollars; fifty chairs for waiting room, seventy-five dollars; fuel for heating same, forty dollars; oil and supplies for lighting same, twenty-five dollars; six cuspidors for same, six dollars; closet for same with fixtures complete, one hundred dollars; wharfinger, nine hundred dollars; laborer, policing wharf, four hundred and twenty dollars; in all, three thousand two hundred and eighty-six dollars; for one-half of said sum to be supplied by the United States, one thousand six hundred and forty-three dollars. Provisos. Requirements. Fort Monroe, Va. Repairs and maintenance of roads, pavements, streets, lights, and Repairs of roads, etc. general police: For one hundred feet of bulkhead retaining wall, to protect road bed south end of Main street from sea, one thousand dollars; two thousand two hundred and ninety-four square yards vitrified brick pavement, with gutters and drains, complete, for Main street, south end, seven thousand four hundred and fifty-five dollars and fifty cents; six thousand five hundred feet two-inch by twelve-inch by sixteen foot boards, for sidewalks, ninety-seven dollars and fifty cents; two thousand feet three-inch by four-inch by sixteen-foot scantling, for sidewalks, thirty dollars; three hundred pounds of cut nails, for sidewalks, six dollars; one laborer, driver of cart; policing streets, four hundred and eighty dollars; eight street lamps with posts complete, forty dollars; oil and supplies for street lamps, one hundred and seventyfive dollars; one laborer to care for lamps, three hundred dollars; in all, nine thousand five hundred and eighty-four dollars; for one-half of said sum to be supplied by the United States, four thousand seven hundred and ninety-two dollars. Maintenance of sewer system: For superintendent, one thousand two hundred dollars; two engineers, at nine hundred dollars each; two firemen, at six hundred dollars each; three laborers, at five hundred dollars each; coal, six hundred dollars; waste, oil, and pump repairs, two hundred and fifty dollars; sewer pipe, cement, brick, and supplies, three hundred dollars; six thousand eight hundred and fifty dollars; for one-half of said sum to be supplied by the United States, three thousand four hundred and twenty-five dollars. Approved, June 6, 1896. Sewer system. Post, p. 472. June 6, 1896. Arizona. Refunding of all outstanding obligations Vol. 26, p. 179; Vol. authorized. 28, p. 224. Confirmation of funded bonds, etc. CHAP. 339.—An Act Amending and extending the provisions of an Act of Congress entitled "An Act approving with amendments the funding Act of Arizona," approved June twenty-fifth, eighteen hundred and ninety, and the Act amendatory thereof and supplemental thereto approved August third, eighteen hundred and ninety-four. Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That the provisions of the Acts of Congress approved June twenty-fifth, eighteen hundred and ninety, and August third, eighteen hundred and ninety four, authorizing the funding of certain indebtedness of the Territory of Arizona, are hereby amended and extended so as to authorize the funding of all outstanding obligations of said Territory, and the counties, municipalities, and school districts thereof, as provided in the Act of Congress approved June twenty-fifth, eighteen hundred and ninety, until January first, eighteen hundred and ninety-seven, and all outstanding bonds, warrants, and other evidences of indebtedness of the Territory of Arizona, and the counties, municipalities, and school districts thereof, heretofore authorized by legislative enactments of said Territory bearing a higher rate of interest than is authorized by the aforesaid funding Act approved June twenty-fifth, eighteen hundred and ninety, and which said bonds, warrants, and other evidences of indebtedness have been sold or exchanged in good faith in compliance with the terms of the acts of the legislature by which they were authorized, shall be funded, with the interest thereon which has accrued and may accrue until funded into the lower interest-bearing bonds as provided by this Act. SEC. 2. That all bonds and other evidences of indebtedness heretofore funded by the loan commission of Arizona under the provisions of the Act of Congress approved June twenty-fifth, eighteen hundred and ninety, and the Act amendatory thereof and supplemental thereto approved August third, eighteen hundred and ninety-four, are hereby declared to be valid and legal for the purposes for which they were Refunding permit issued and funded; and all bonds and other evidences of indebtedness ted until Jan. 1, 1897. heretofore issued under the authority of the legislature of said Territory, as hereinbefore authorized to be funded, are hereby confirmed, approved, and validated, and may be funded as in this Act provided until January first, eighteen hundred and ninety-seven: Provided, That nothing in this Act shall be so construed as to make the Government of the United States liable or responsible for the payment of any of said bonds, warrants, or other evidences of indebtedness by this Act approved, confirmed, and made valid, and authorized to be funded. Approved, June 6, 1896. Proviso. Non liability of United States. June 8, 1896. Postal service. Fourth-class matter defined. Vol. 20, p. 360. CHAP. 370.-An Act To regulate mail matter of the fourth class. Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That mailable matter of the fourth class shall embrace all matter not embraced in the first, second, or third class which is not in its form or nature liable to destroy, deface, or otherwise damage the contents of the mail bag or harm the person of anyone engaged in the postal service, and is not above the weight provided by law, which is hereby declared to be not exceeding four pounds for each package thereof, except in case of single books weighing in excess of that amount, and except for books and documents Printed or written published or circulated by order of Congress, or printed or written Limit of weight. Congressional docu ments. official matter. Obscene, etc. R. S., sec. 3893, p. 758. Lotteries, etc. official matter emanating from any of the Departments of the Government or from the Smithsonian Institution, or which is not declared noumailable under the provisions of section thirty-eight hundred and ninety-three of the Revised Statutes as amended by the Act of July twelfth, eighteen hundred and seventy-six, or matter appertaining to lotteries, gift concerts, or fraudulent schemes or devices. Approved, June 8, 1896. CHAP. 371.-An Act To expedite the delivery of imported parcels and packages not exceeding five hundred dollars in value. June 8, 1896. Customs. value. Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That articles, not merchandise intended for sale, not exceeding five hundred dollars in value, imported imported articles not in packages not exceeding one hundred pounds in weight, in vessels of exceeding $500 in the United States, may be specially delivered to and appraised at the public stores, and the entry thereof liquidated by the collector under such regulations as the Secretary of the Treasury may prescribe, and after such appraisement and liquidation may be delivered, upon payment of the liquidated duties under the bond provided for in this Act, to express companies or other duly incorporated inland carriers bonded for the transportation of appraised or unappraised merchandise between the several ports in the United States: Provided, That not more than one such consignment to one ultimate consignee from the same consignor shall be imported in any one vessel: And provided, That the original appraisement of and liquidation of duties on such importations shall be final against the owner, importer, agent, or consignee, except in the case of manifest clerical errors, as provided for in section twentyfour of the Act of June tenth, eighteen hundred and ninety: Provided, That nothing contained in this Act shall apply to explosives, or any article the importation of which is prohibited by law. Provisos. Single consignments. Errors. Vol. 26, p. 140. Prohibited articles not affected. Responsibility of carriers. Proviso. Disposal of unclaimed Vol. 26, p. 134. SEC. 2. That such express companies or other inland carriers shall be responsible to the United States under bond for the safe delivery of such articles to the ultimate consignee: Provided, That if any package shall not be delivered to the ultimate consignee by the express company packages. or other inland carrier, and shall be returned to the collector of the port where such articles are entered under the provisions of this Act within ninety days from the date of importation intact, the collector shall take charge of such package and dispose of it as unclaimed merchandise, and the duties, including additional duties, if any, under section seven of the Act of June tenth, eighteen hundred and ninety, paid shall be refunded by the Secretary of the Treasury out of any moneys in the Treasury not otherwise appropriated; and the express company or other Liability of carriers. inland carriers shall be relieved of any liability therefor under its bond; and before any express company or other inland carrier shall be permitted to receive and transport any such articles they shall become bound to the United States in such bonds, in such form and amount, and with such conditions not inconsistent with law as the Secretary of the Treasury may require. Transportation bond. Record. SEC. 3. That articles transported under the provisions of this Act Sealing, etc. shall be corded and sealed in such manner as shall from time to time be prescribed by the Secretary of the Treasury; and the collector of the port of first arrival shall retain in his office a permanent record of such merchandise so forwarded. Consignment to car. rier. Invoices. SEC. 4. That such packages may be consigned to and entered by the agents of the express company or other inland carrier or steamship company, who shall at the time of entry state the ultimate consignee, and in all cases where a certified or other invoice is now required by law such invoice may be attached to or inclosed in the package, under such. regulations as the Secretary of the Treasury may prescribe; and the Delivery. delivery of such articles to the express company or other inland carrier shall not be delayed because of the nonarrival of the triplicate invoice, but the ultimate consignee shall be liable for any increased duty found due on reliquidation, if any, after receipt of said merchandise from the express company or other inland carrier or steamship company making entry under this Act; and the provisions of section twenty-eight hun- R. S., sec. 2857, p. 553. dred and fifty-seven, Revised Statutes, shall not apply to importations under this Act. Approved, June 8, 1896. Increased duty, etc. |