If the master against whom such summons is issued neglects to appear, or, appearing, does not show that the wages are paid or otherwise satisfied or forfeited, and if the matter in dispute is not forthwith settled, the judge or justice or commissioner shall certify to the clerk of the district court that there is sufficient cause of complaint whereon to found admiralty process; and thereupon the clerk of such court shall issue process against the vessel. In all cases where the matter in demand does not exceed one hundred dollars the return day of the monition or citation shall be the first day of a stated or special session of court next succeeding the third day after the service of the monition or citation, and on the return of process in open court, duly served, either party may proceed therein to proofs and hearing without other notice, and final judgment shall be given according to the usual course of admiralty courts in such cases. In such suits all the seamen having cause of complaint of the like kind against the same vessel may be joined as complainants, and it shall be incumbent on the master to produce the contract and log book, if required to ascertain any matter in dispute; otherwise the complainants shall be permitted to state the contents thereof, and the burden of proof of the contrary shall be on the master. But nothing herein contained shall prevent any seaman from maintaining any action at common law for the recovery of his wages, or having immediate process out of any court having admiralty jurisdiction wherever any vessel may be found, in case she shall have left the port of delivery where her voyage ended before payment of the wages, or in case she shall be about to proceed to sea before the end of the ten days next after the day when such wages are due, in accordance with section forty-five hundred and twenty-nine of the Revised Statutes. [This section shall not apply to fishing or whaling vessels or yachts—Dec. 21, 1898, sec. 26—but this section shall apply to all vessels engaged in the taking of oysters—June 28, 1906, sec. 4.] (R. S., 4547; Dec. 21, 1898; sec. 6; June 28, 1906; sec. 4.) Moneys paid under the laws of the United States, by direction of consular officers or agents, at any foreign port or place, as wages, extra or otherwise, due American seamen, shall be paid in gold or its equivalent, without any deduction whatever any contract to the contrary notwithstanding. (R. S., 4548.) Any question concerning the forfeiture of, or deductions from, the wages of any seaman or apprentice, may be determined in any proceeding lawfully instituted with respect to such wages, notwithstanding the offense in respect of which such question arises, though hereby made punishable by imprisonment as well as forfeiture, has not been made the subject of any criminal proceeding. (R. S., 4603.)