Chargé Rives to the Secretary of State.

No. 314.]

Sir: Referring to my dispatch No. 311 of February 28, 1906, reporting that negotiations of the Austro-Hungarian Government with Switzerland and Servia for the conclusion of commercial treaties were in progress, I now have the honor to report that the commercial treaty with Switzerland has been concluded and signed on the 9th of March, 1906.

This treaty came in force on the 12th of March in the form of a provisional agreement (provisorium), which will last until the ratifications [Page 48] have been exchanged, but not longer than the 30th of June, 1906.

I beg to inclose a clipping from the semiofficial “Fremden Blatt,” which shows the principal tariff rates of this agreement. (Not printed.)

The negotiations with Servia have finally ended in the conclusion of a provisional commercial agreement on the basis of the “most-favored-nation clause,” which will take effect on March 19, and continue until the definite conclusion of the commercial treaty between the two countries.

I have, etc.,

George Barclay Rives.