protests or declarations which captains, masters, crews, passengers, or merchants, who are citizens of the United States, may respectively choose to make there; and also such as any foreigner may choose to make before them relative to the personal interest of any citizen of the United States. Copies of such acts duly authenticated by consuls or vice-consuls, under the seal of their consulates, respectively, shall be received in evidence equally with their originals in all courts in the United States. [See § 896.]

803. SEC. 1708. Every consular officer shall keep a detailed list of all seamen and mariners shipped and discharged by him, specifying their names and the names of the vessels on which they are shipped and from which they are discharged, and the payments, if any, made on account of each so discharged; also of the number of the vessels arrived and departed, the amounts of their registered tonnage, and the number of their seamen and mariners, and of those who are protected, and whether citizens of the United States or not, and as nearly as possible the nature and value of their cargoes, and where produced, and shall make returns of the same, with their accounts and other returns, to the Secretary of the Treasury. [See §§ 4561, 4580.]

804. SEC. 1709. It shall be the duty of consuls and vice-consuls, where the laws of the country permit:

First. To take possession of the personal estate left by any citizen of the United States, other than seamen belonging to any vessel, who shall die within their consulate, leaving there no legal representative, partner in trade, or trustee by him appointed to take care of his effects.

Second. To inventory the same with the assistance of two merchants of the United States, or, for want of them, of any others at their choice. Third. To collect the debts due the deceased in the country where he died, and pay the debts due from his estate which he shall have there contracted.

Fourth. To sell at auction, after reasonable public notice, such part of the estate as shall be of a perishable nature, and such further part, if any, as shall be necessary for the payment of his debts, and, at the expiration of one year from his decease, the residue.

Fifth. To transmit the balance of the estate to the Treasury of the United States, to be holden in trust for the legal claimant; except that if at any time before such transmission the legal representative of the deceased shall appear and demand his effects in their hands they shall deliver them up, being paid their fees, and shall cease their proceedings. 805. SEC. 1710. For the information of the representative of the

deceased, the consul or vice-consul, in the settlement of his estate, shall immediately notify his death in one of the gazettes published in the consulate, and also to the Secretary of State, that the same may be notified in the State to which the deceased belonged; and he shall, as soon as may be, transmit to the Secretary of State an inventory of the effects of the deceased, taken as before directed.

806. SEC. 1711. When any citizen of the United States, dying abroad, leaves, by any lawful testamentary disposition, special directions for the custody and management, by the consular officer of the port or place where he dies, of the personal property of which he dies possessed in such country, such officer shall, so far as the laws of the country permit, strictly observe such directions. When any such citizen so dying, appoints, by any lawful testamentary disposition, any other person than such officer to take charge of and manage such property, it shall be the duty of the officer, whenever required by the person so appointed, to give his official aid in whatever way may be necessary to facilitate the proceedings of such person in the lawful execution of his trust, and, so far as the laws of the country permit, to protect the property of the deceased from any interference of the local authorities of the country where such citizen dies; and to this end it shall be the duty of such consular officer to place his official seal upon all of the personal property or effects of the deceased, and to break and remove such seal as may be required by such person, and not otherwise.

807. SEC. 1712. Consuls and commercial agents of the United States in foreign countries shall procure and transmit to the Department of State authentic commercial information respecting such countries, of such character and in such manner and form and at such times as the Department may from time to time prescribe.

And they shall also procure and transmit to the Department of State, for the use of the Agricultural Department, monthly reports relative to the character, condition, and prospective yields of the agricultural and horticultural industries and other fruiteries of the country in which they are respectively stationed;

And the Commissioner of Agriculture is hereby required and directed to embody the information thus obtained, or so much thereof as he may deem material and important, in his monthly bulletin of crop reports. [As amended by act June 18, 1888, 25 Stat., 186.]

808. SEC. 1713. Every consular officer shall furnish to the Secretary of the Treasury, as often as shall be required, the prices current of all articles of merchandise usually exported to the United States from the port or place in which he is situated;

And he shall also furnish to the Secretary of the Treasury, at least once in twelve months, the prices current of all articles of merchandise, including those of the farm, the garden, and the orchard, that are imported through the port or place in which he is stationed.

And he shall also report as to the character of agricultural implements in use, and whether they are imported to or manufactured in that country; as to the character and extent of agricultural and horticultural pursuits there.

That part of the information thus obtained which pertains to agriculture shall be transmitted by the Secretary of the Treasury, as soon as the same shall have been received by him, to the Commissioner [now Secretary] of Agriculture, who shall include the same, or so much thereof as he may deem material and important, in his annual reports, stating the said prices in dollars and cents, and rendering tables of foreign weights and measures into their American equivalents.-[As amended by Act June 18, 1888, 25 Stat., 186.]

809. SEC. 1714. The specification in this Title of certain powers to be exercised and duties to be performed by consuls and vice-consuls, shali not be construed as implying the exclusion of others resulting from the nature of their appointments, or prescribed by any treaty or convention under which they may act.

810. SEC. 1715. No consular officer shall certify any invoice unless he is satisfied that the person making oath thereto is the person he represents himself to be, that he is a credible person, and that the statements made under such oath are true; and he shall, thereupon, by his certificate, state that he was so satisfied. [See § 2862 R. S.]

811. SEC. 1716. The fee provided by law for the verification of invoices by consular officers shall, when paid, be held to a full payment for furnishing blank forms of declaration to be signed by the shipper, and for making, signing, and sealing the certificate of the consular officer thereto; and any consular officer who, under pretense of charging for blank forms, advice, or clerical services in the preparation of such declaration or certificate, charges or receives any fee greater in amount than that provided by law for the verification of invoices, or who demands or receives for any official services, or who allows any clerk or subordinate to receive for any such service any fee or reward other than the fee provided by law for such service, shall be punishable by imprisonment for not more than one year, or by a fine of not more than two thousand dollars; and shall be removed from his office.

812. SEC. 1717. That no consular officer of the United States shall hereafter grant a certificate for goods, wares, or merchandise shipped from

countries adjacent to the United States, which have passed a consulate after purchase for shipment. [See § 2861 R. S.]

813. SEC. 1718. Whenever any master or commander of a vessel of the United States has occasion for any consular or other official service, which any consular officer of the United States is authorized by law or usage officially to perform, and for which any fees are allowed by the rates or tariffs of fees, he shall apply to the consular officer at the consulate or commercial agency where such service is required to perform such service, and shall pay to such officer the fees allowed for such service by the rates or tariffs of fees. And every such master or commander who omits so to do shall be liable to the United States for the amount of the fees lawfully chargeable for such services when actually performed. All consular officers are authorized and required to retain in their possession all the papers of such vessels, which shall be deposited with them as directed by law, till payment shall be made of all demands and wages on account of such vessels. [See §§ 4207, 4309.]

814. SEC. 1719. No consular officer, nor any person under any consular officer shall make any charge or receive, directly or indirectly, any compensation, by way of commission or otherwise, for receiving or disbursing the wages or extra wages to which any seaman or mariner is entitled who is discharged in any foreign country, or for any money advanced to any such seaman or mariner who seeks relief from any consulate or commercial agency; nor shall any consular officer, or any person under any consular officer, be interested, directly or indirectly, in any profit derived from clothing, boarding, or otherwise supplying or sending home any such seaman or mariner. Such prohibition as to profit, however, shall not be construed to relieve or prevent any such officer who is the owner of or otherwise interested in any vessel of the United States, from transporting in such vessel any such seaman or mariner, or from receiving or being interested in such reasonable allowance as may be made for such transportation by law. [See $$ 4561, 4577, 4578, 4580, 4581, 4584.]

815. SEC. 1720. American vessels running regularly by weekly or monthly trips, or otherwise, to or between foreign ports, shall not be required to pay fees to consuls for more than four trips in a year.

816. SEC. 1721. The fee for certifying invoices to be charged by the consul-general for the British North American Provinces, and his subordinate consular officers and agents, for goods not exceeding one hundred dollars in value, shall be one dollar.

817. SEC. 1722. No consul, vice-consul, or consular agent in the Dominion of Canada, shall be allowed tonnage fees for any services, actual or

constructive, rendered any vessel owned and registered in the United States that may touch at a Canadian port; and in the collection of official fees they shall receive foreign moneys at the rate given in the Treasury schedule of the value of foreign coins.

818. SEC. 1723. Whenever any consular officer collects, or knowingly allows to be collected for any service, any other or greater fees than are allowed by law for such service, he shall, besides his liability to refund the same, be liable to pay to the person by whom or in whose behalf the same are paid, treble the amount of the unlawful charge so collected, as a penalty, to be recovered with costs, in any proper form of action, by such person for his own use. And in any such case the Secretary of the Treasury may retain out of the compensation of such officer, the amount of such overcharge, and of such penalty, and charge the same to such officer in account, and may thereupon refund such unlawful charge, and pay such penalty to the person entitled to the same if he shall think proper so to do.

819. SEC. 1724. Every consul-general, consul, or commercial agent, mentioned in Schedules B and C, or vice-consul, or vice-commercial agent, appointed to perform the duty of any such officer mentioned in Schedules B and C, who omits to collect any fees which he is entitled to charge for any official service, shall be liable to the United States therefor, as if he had collected the same; unless, upon good cause shown therefor, the Secretary of the Treasury shall think proper to remit the

same.

820. SEC. 1725. All such consuls-general, consuls, commercial agents, and consular agents, as are allowed for their compensation the whole or any part of the fees which they may collect, and all such vice-consuls and vice-commercial agents appointed to perform the duties of such consuls-general, consuls, and commercial agents as are allowed for their compensation the whole or any part of such fees, shall make returns in such manner as the Comptroller of the Treasury shall prescribe, of all such fees as they or any person in their behalf so collect. [As amended by section 5, Act June 31, 1894, 28 Stat., 162.]

821. SEC. 1726. Every consular officer shall give receipts for all fees collected for his official services, expressing the particular services for which the same were collected. [See § 4213.]

822. SEC. 1727. Every consular officer shall number all receipts given by him for fees received for official services, in the order of their dates, beginning with number one at the commencement of the period of his service, and on the first day of January in every year thereafter. He