In reply to your letter of this day's date requesting that the Royal Mail Steamer
which is appointed to leave Southampton with the West India Mails on the 2
nd Proximo may be detained until the arrival of a queens messenger from Osborne who
will be the bearer of despatches for the Governor of
British Columbia, I am commanded by my Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty to request you will state
to Secretary
Sir E Bulwer Lytton that their Lordships have no power to delay the Packets of the West Indian Royal
Mail Company.