ent may be reached.

Notwithstanding that Great Britain originated the proposal to enforce
international rules for the prevention of collisions at sea, based on
the recommendations of the Maritime Conference of Washington, and
concurred in, suggesting March 11, 1895, as the date to be set by
proclamation for carrying these rules into general effect, Her Majesty's
Government, having encountered opposition on the part of British
shipping interests, announced its inability to accept that date, which
was consequently canceled. The entire matter is still in abeyance,
without prospect of a better condition in the near future.

The commissioners appointed to mark the international boundary in
Passamaquoddy Bay according to the description of the treaty of Ghent
have not yet fully agreed.

The completion of the preliminary survey of that Alaskan boundary which
follows the contour of the coast from the southernmost point of Prince
of Wales Island until it strikes the one hundred and forty-first
meridian at or near the summit of Mount St. Elias awaits further
necessary appropriation, which is urgently recommended. This survey was
undertaken under the provisions of the convention entered into by this
country and Great Britain July 22, 1892, and the supplementary
convention of February 3, 1894.

As to the remaining section of the Alaskan boundary, which follows the
one hundred and forty-first meridian northwardly from Mount St. Elias
to the Frozen Ocean, the settlement of which involves the physical
location of the meridian mentioned, no conventional agreement has yet
been made. The ascertainment of a given meridian at a particular point
is a work requiring much time and careful observations and surveys.
Such observations and surveys were undertaken by the United States Coast
and Geodetic Survey in 1890 and 1891, while similar work in the same
quarters, under British auspices, is believed to give nearly coincident
results; but these surveys have been independently conducted, and no
international agreement to mark those or any other parts of the one
hundred and forty-first meridian by permanent monuments has yet been
made. In the meantime the valley of the Yukon is becoming a highway
through the hitherto unexplored wilds of Alaska, and abundant mineral
wealth has been discovered in that region, especially at or near the
junction of the boundary meridian with the Yukon and its tributaries. In
these circumstances it is expedient,