Sargeaunt to Elliot (Assistant Under-Secretary)

Referring to your letter of the 20th instant, I
transmit to you for the information of Mr Secretary Cardwell,
the enclosed copy of a correspondence which has passed between
Messrs Brown, Lenox & Co (Admiralty Contractors for Chain
Cables & Anchors) and myself, from which it appears that the
cost of supplying the Government of British Columbia with the
Buoys, Sinkers and Chains enumerated in Mr Seymour's
despatch No 34 of 7th September last, is estimated
to amount to £1557.5.0 exclusive of freight.

As this amount is greatly in excess of the estimate of
the Harbour Master at New Westminster, and as that Officer
in his letter of the 6th September states that "the buoys
actually required are nine in number" it appears to me that
in place of sending the thirty Buoys asked for that half
that number would be sufficient for the purposes mentioned,
and to furnish the necessary relay.

At any rate a dozen or fifteen buoys, with a corresponding
number of cables and sinkers, might be sent out in the first
instance should Mr Cardwell approve of the adoption of such a course.