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OCEAN MAIL SERVICE.

State loans money on favorable terms to Swedish navigation companies.
 The fund in 1908 was 5,000,000 crowns (crown—26.8 cents)
($1,340,000), increased in 1905 to 10,000,000 crowns, and in 1907
increased to 15,000,000 crowns ($4,020,000). The amount so loaned
in 1909 has not been ascertained. In 1906 Sweden entered into a fiveyear
 contract with the Swedish Nordstjernan Company, guaranteeing
a total subsidy of 510,000 crowns, increased in 1908 to 655,000 crowns,
for a steamship line to Buenos Aires, the subsidy for 1909 being
150,000 crowns ($40,020). In 1907 a five-year contract was made
with the Swedish East Asiatic Steamship Company for a total subsidy
 of 1,850,000 crowns for regular service to the Orient, the annual
payment being about $100,000. This subsidy is calculated to pay all
the Suez Canal tolls of the ships. These subsidies, of course, are
trade and navigation subsidies, for there are much quicker ways of
sending Swedish mails to Asia and South America. For its mails
to the United States only $3,752 are paid to Swedish ships, included
with $137,752 paid in 1909 for the ocean-mail service to neighboring
European countries.

PORTUGAL.

Portugal has no laws for general construction or navigation bounties
 or admiralty subventions and makes no appropriation for naval
reserves. The Empresa Nacional de Navegacao received for its mail
service during the year 1907-8 a sum equivalent to $53,000, and the
appropriation asked for during 1908-9 was equivalent to about
$50,000. Its contract with the Government, made in 1905, binds the
company in return to carry free mails and official correspondence
and parcels post up to the weight of 1,000 kilograms per trip. Beyond
 this weight the payment to any port is 2 cents per kilogram,
and the post-office agent is transported and maintained without charge
to the Government.

BELGIUM.

Belgium grants no subsidies and is so far dependent on foreign
shipping in certain directions that it offers a bonus to German steamships
 to call at Antwerp. Since 1889 it has paid to the German Australian
 Steamship Company 1,500 francs a voyage to have its
monthly steamers for Australia call at Antwerp, where at least 1,500
tons of outward freight are guaranteed. Under a somewhat similar
arrangement the North German Lloyd Company is paid 60,000
francs a year, in return for which its steamers under contract with
the German Government for voyages to Asia and Australia agree to
stop at Antwerp for cargo. The Government also repays to the
company all its Belgian and Dutch pilotage taxes. The steamers of
the German Kosmos Line for Chile and Peru stopping at Antwerp
are also exempted from pilotage charges. During 1908 the refund of
pilotage charges amounted to 170,000 francs, and other payments, as
above, to 120,000 francs; in all, 290,000 francs, or $58,000.

SOUTH AMERICA.

The countries of South America are not shipbuilding countries,
and so far as they have merchant steam fleets they are composed
mainly of vessels built in England. The shipping under the flags of