Section 0

An Act to amend Act XLVI of 1860 (to authorize and regulate the Emigration of Native Laborers to the French Colonies). WHEREAS since the passing of Act XLVI of 1860 (to authorize and regulate the Emigration of Native Laborers to the French Colonies) the Convention therein recited between Her Majesty the Queen of Great Britain and Ireland and His Majesty the Emperor of the French has been varied in the following particulars: that is to say, by substituting for Article XXVI in the said Convention as so recited in the said Act, the following Article: "ARTICLE XXVI. The present Convention shall begin to take effect on the 1st of July 1862; its duration is fixed at three years and a half. It shall remain in full force if notice for its termination be not given in the course of the month of July of the third year, and then notice can be given only in the course of the month of July of each succeeding year. In case of such notice being given it shall cease eighteen months afterwards. In case, however, the power thus reserved to the Governor General of British India should at any time be exercised, the French Government shall have the right immediately to terminate the whole Convention if they should think proper to do so. But in the event of the determination of the present Convention, from whatever cause, the stipulations relative to Indian subjects of Her Britannic Majesty introduced into the French Colonies shall be maintained in force in favor of the said Indian subjects until they shall either have been sent back to their own country, or have renounced their right to a return passage to India." And also by the addition of the two following Articles which were not comprised in the Convention or recited in the said Act, that is to say— "ARTICLE XXVII. The present Convention shall be ratified, and the ratifications shall be exchanged at Paris in four weeks, or sooner if possible. ADDITIONAL ARTICLE. His Majesty the Emperor of the French having stated that, in consequence of the order which he gave long ago that no more African Emigrants should be introduced into the Island of Re-union, that Colony has, since last year, had to obtain laborers from India and China; and Her Britannic Majesty having, by Convention signed on the 25th of July 1860, between Her Majesty and His Majesty the Emperor of the French, authorized the Colony of Re-union to recruit six thousand laborers in Her Indian possessions, it is agreed that the Convention of this date shall take effect forthwith with regard to the said Colony of Re-union. And It is declared and enacted as follows:—