TENDERS FOR THE PACIFIC MAIL SERVICE.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXX, Issue 4452, 26 June 1875, Page 3

TENDERS FOR THE PACIFIC MAIL SERVICE.

The Sydney Morning Herald of the 18th says : “In a telegram published in our issue yesterday, it was stated that the tender of the Pacific Mail Company was the lowest—file terms being, in round numbers, £90,000 for a service via Fiji, and £75,000 for a service via Auckland. In the correspondence recently laid before Parliament on the motion of Mr. Dibbs, we find the following letter from Messrs. Taylor and Cox, the agents in San Francisco of the company referred to. It is dated October 10, 1874, and was addressed to the Hon. Saul Samuel, C.M.6., when that gentleman was at the head of the Postal Department. Messrs. Taylor and Cox thus described the facilities they possess for carrying on the service ;—‘Learning that the contractors for the mail service from your colony to this port are unable to carry out their engagements, and judging from the very able speech of your Colonial Seoietary (Hon. Henry Parkes), made at Victoria Theatre on 18th August last, that you find the line a necessity, and desire its continuance, we write to say that if arrangements mutually satisfactory can be made, we are willing to give you a monthly line of steamers, and pledge ourselves to perform the service in a manner befitting its importance. Our facilities for doing so arc perhaps better than those of any other company. We own and have running thirty-five (35) steamships, second to none afloat in safety, comfort, speed, equipment, and cuisine, with an aggregate of 100,000 tons. The company has been in existence. nearly twenty - five (26) years, and is now carrying out successfully a ten years’ contract with the United States Government, for a bi-monthly service between this country and China and Japan. Knowing that your recent experience with American lines has been most unsatisfactory, we are the more anxious to demonstrate that this company is fully able to establish permanently just such a lino between Australia, New Zealand, and this country, as the large and increasing trade and travel demand. We may briefly state that our steamers range from 3000 to 4000 tons, and that our dock, plant, workshops, and storehouses (bonded and free), are on a scale commensurate with our business. The track of the Central Pacific railroad runs down on our wharf, so that overland freight can be transferred from steamers to cars with the least possible delay.- If the nature of the merchandise will not admit of railroad rates, we have steamers of large tonnage running every fortnight to Panama, and connecting at Colon (Aspinwall) with onr Atlantic steamers running to New York ; also with Royal Mail Steam Packet Company, and West India S.S. Company to Liverpool, Ham-burg-American Packet Company to Germany, and Compaguie Generale Trans-Atlaiitique to France. At Panama we connect with the Pacific Steam Navigation Company, running to all South American ports, and at this port with lines running as far north as Vancouvorland, and with our own branch line to all Mexican and Central American ports. By arrangement with these connecting lines we issue through bills of lading, and can contract to carry either passengers, freight, or treasure from Sydney to all ports in China, Japan, British Columbia, Oregon, Mexico, and Central and South America, as well as to all the principal European ports, without further trouble to your shippers after they receive their bills of lading. We have requested the Hon. Mr. Okney, late member for West Melbourne, Victoria, who is here on a visit and leaves by this opportunity, to call upon you. He has seen and inspected our ships and property ■here, and can post you fully regarding same. iWe shall be most happy to hear from you on this subject.’ We learn that, at a meeting of the Cabinet held yesterday, matters connected with the Pacific Mail Service were considered ; and we believe that negotiations are pending for the continuance of the temporary service until such period as a permanent contract can be made on a satisfactory basis.” In a leading article in the same issue, the Herald says;—“ According to a telegram yesterday, tenders for the Pacific service have been sent in within the limit named by the late Government. Those who have perused the voluminous correspondence placed on the table of the House, will be aware that several . of the great steamship owners ridiculed the smallness of our proposed subsidy, and talked of the necessity of raising it to £IOO,OOO or £120,000. , It is quite obvious that the lowest tenderers, had before them the information that £90,000 was the Government limit, as they have tendered just £SO below that sum. Whether they became acquainted with tins fact in consequence,of its publication here in the Parliamentary papers, or whether they had really managed to find it out before, we do not yet know, but it is clear that in tendering they knew the limit beyond which they must not pass, and they have sailed as close to the wind as possible. Exactly what the ‘ Pacific Mail and Railway combination ’ is, we are not fully informed, but there are intimations in the published correspondence that efforts had Ifebn made to secure a combination of the railway companies, over whose lines our mails and passengers travel, and the Pacific Mail Company which already predominates in the North Pacific. Whether it is this particular combination that has thus tendered, and whether, if so, they are' also in connection with any transatlantic steamboat company, and with the builders of the new vessels that_ Mr. Forbes had ordered, or with the proprietors of the vessels that have already been in the service, we do not at present perfectly know. Anyhow, if the parties arc competent, and can give satisfactory security, the . Government will be entitled to close, with the offer. It will be seen that there are alternative tenders for the services via Fiji and for one via Auckland, the latter being £15,000 the cheaper. The contractors propose to adopt the original scheme, which was known as the ‘ forked line,’ so that the vessels coming from San Francisco should go alternately to Otago and to Sydney, the colony not served by the direct lino being on each alternative occasion served by the branch line. Great objections were made to the complication of this system, and a modification was afterwards proposed which may be called the ‘ forked scheme ’ No. 2, or the alternating scheme, which was to he worked as follows : —The main steamer to leave Sydney and go always by way of Otago and the New Zealand ports, calling at Fiji to pick up a branch mail from Sydney, but coming back direct from San Francisco to Sydney, and dropping the New Zealand mails at Fiji. The effect of this scheme is that New Zealand would always have the trunk line to Sau Francisco, and New South Wales would always have the trunk line back ; so far this would be an equal division of the advantage, and it was said that the arrangement would suit the traffic, inasmuch as New Zealand would be likely to have most cargo in the shape of wool to send to San Francisco, and Sydney most cargo to receive from there. As this arrangement was one of the plans agreed upon between Mr. Russell and Mr. Samuel, and as it is easier for the contractors than the first forked service, it is jirobably the one referred to. That being so, wo have to consider whether it is worth while to pay £15,000 a year more for such a service than for one by the route in force via Auckland. As New Zealand bears half the expenditure, the extra cost of the alternating service will be to New South Wales £7500 a year. The New Zealanders would doubtless prefer it because it gives them their much desired coast service, which merely calling at Auckland does not. In judging as to wiiich of the two arrangements will be most suitable for New South Wales, wo require to know what is the speed stipulated. Hitherto, no doubt, the Pacific service has failed as an alternating rival to that via Brindisi, but it has not failed as an alternating rival to that via Southampton, and the greater portion of our mails take the cheaper route. The contract taken up by Mr. Hall lias been estimated at about £BO,OOO a year, and therefore _ the new contract is £IO,OOO a year more, that is to say, £SOOO to each colony. On whole, that is not a great increase considering the way in which the line has been disparaged in the eyes of contractors, and the way in which capitalists have been frightened by the real or pretended ruin brought upon Mr. Forbes and Mr. Debouche.”