The divergence which has so long existed between Anglo-American and Continental views upon contraband was very noticeable at the commencement of the war of 1898, which gave occasion to the letter which immediately follows. While the Spanish Decree of April 23 set out only one list of contraband goods, the United States Instructions of June 20 recognised two lists--viz. of "absolute" and of "conditional" contraband, including under the latter head "coal when destined for a naval station, a port of call, or a ship or ships of the enemy; materials for the construction of railways or telegraphs, and money, when such materials or money are destined for an enemy's forces, provisions, when destined for an enemy's ship or ships, for a place besieged." An answer was thus supplied to the question suggested in this letter, as to articles _ancipitis usus_. CONTRABAND OF WAR Sir,--I fear that the mercantile community will hardly profit so much as the managers of the Atlas Steamship Company seem to expect by the information contained in their letter which you print this morning. It was, indeed, unlikely that the courteous reply of the Assistant Secretary of State at Washington to the enquiry addressed to him by the New York agents of the company would contain a declaration of the policy of the United States with reference to contraband of war. The threefold classification of "merchandise" (not of "contraband") quoted in the reply occurs, in the judgment of the Supreme Court in the well-known case of the _Peterhoff_ (5 Wallace, 58), but it is substantially that of Grotius, and has long been accepted in this country and in the United States, while the Continent is, generally speaking, inclined to deny the existence of "contraband by accident," and to recognise only such a restricted list of contraband as was contained in the Spanish decree of April 24 last. The questions upon which shippers are really desirous of information (which they are, however, perhaps not likely to obtain, otherwise than from decisions of prize Courts) are of a less elementary character. They would like to know what articles _ancipitis usus_ ("used for purposes of war or peace according to circumstances") will be treated by the United States as contraband, and with what penalty the carriage of such articles will be visited--_i.e._ whether by confiscation or merely by pre-emption. I am, Sir, your obedient servant, T. E. HOLLAND. Oxford, May 9 (1898). The four letters which next follow also relate to the two classes of contraband goods, with especial reference to the character attributed to foodstuffs, coal and cotton.