head of Department or office; (2) cashiers of
collectors; (3) cashiers of postmasters; (4) superintendents of
money-order divisions in post-offices; (5) the direct custodians of
money for whose fidelity another officer is under official bond, but
these exceptions shall not extend to any official below the grade of
assistant cashier or teller; (6) persons employed exclusively in the
secret service of the Government, or as translators or interpreters or
stenographers; (7) persons whose employment is exclusively professional;
(8) chief clerks, deputy collectors, and superintendents or chiefs of
divisions or bureaus. But no person so excepted shall be either
transferred, appointed, or promoted, unless to some excepted place,
without an examination under the Commission. Promotions may be made
without examinations in offices where examinations for promotion are not
now held until rules on the subject shall be promulgated.

Approved, November 7, 1883.

CHESTER A. ARTHUR.

THIRD ANNUAL MESSAGE.

WASHINGTON, _December 4, 1883_.

_To the Congress of the United States:_

At the threshold of your deliberations I congratulate you upon the
favorable aspect of the domestic and foreign affairs of this Government.

Our relations with other countries continue to be upon a friendly
footing. With the Argentine Republic, Austria, Belgium, Brazil, Denmark,
Hayti, Italy, Santo Domingo, and Sweden and Norway no incident has
occurred which calls for special comment. The recent opening of new
lines of telegraphic communication with Central America and Brazil
permitted the interchange of messages of friendship with the Governments
of those countries.

During the year there have been perfected and proclaimed consular and
commercial treaties with Servia and a consular treaty with Roumania,
thus extending our intercourse with the Danubian countries, while our
Eastern relations have been put upon a wider basis by treaties with
Korea and Madagascar. The new boundary-survey treaty with Mexico, a
trade-marks convention and a supplementary treaty of extradition with
Spain, and conventions extending the duration of the Franco-American
Claims Commission have also been proclaimed.

Notice of the termination of the fisheries articles of the treaty of
Washington was duly given to the British Government, and the reciprocal
privileges and exemptions of the treaty will accordingly cease on July
1, 1885. The fisheries industries, pursued by a num