§ MR. R. N. FOWLERasked the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, Whether his attention has been called to a Bill, now before the Congress of the United States, repealing the duties on tea and coffee products of the possessions of the Netherlands; and, whether Her Majesty's Government will urge on the Government of the United States to amend the Bill, so as to place tea imported into America from this Country in the same position as that imported from the possessions of the Netherlands?
§ SIR CHARLES W. DILKESir, the effect of the Bill would appear to be to abolish, in the case of tea and coffee, the produce of the Possessions of the Netherlands, the differential duty levied on those articles when produced in countries East of the Cape of Good Hope, and imported into the United States from places West of the Cape. We are awaiting a Report from Her Majesty's Minister at Washington as to its bearing on tea and coffee produced in British Possessions.