SERVIA. 



739 



After voting the new loan, which was raised 

 in Vienna at 6 per cent., tlie Skupshtina, on 

 January 3, adjourned till the end of the month. 

 The chiefs of the Radical party, whose demand 

 for a general amnesty to political offenders was 

 granted, sent an address expressing fidelity to 

 the King. In a circular note to the powers 

 the Minister of Foreign Affairs unfolded the 

 scheme of political reforms. Personal and 

 civil liberties should be extended, though not 

 at the expense of order, by enlarging the self- 

 government of the communes, restricting offi- 

 cial interference in elections, liberalizing the 

 laws governing the press, associations, and 

 public meetings, and modifying the criminal 

 code and laws relating to security of person 

 and property, and the civil service. 



The Radical Cabinet, existing only by the 

 King's sufferance, endeavored to carry out 

 their pact, and to prove the capability of their 

 party to conduct the Government. But in the 

 new Chamber elected in February and con- 

 vened on March 31, in which the Radicals se- 

 cured 129 seats out of 142, the Prime Minister 

 was unable to control the majority, which was 

 composed largely of men educated in France, 

 holding Republican and Socialistic opinions. 

 King Milan, in an angry message to the Cham- 

 ber, warned the ministers that they could not 

 continue in office if they allowed the Radical 

 Club to control their decisions, and if they 

 could not forward legislative business within 

 acceptable lines. Resolutions of revolutionary 

 tendency were voted, such as one in favor of 

 taxing luxuries, another to make 3.000 dinars 

 the uniform salary of officials of all grades, a 

 third abolishing bishoprics, and others reduc- 

 ing the pay of military officers, making officers 

 of the militia elective, and introducing new 

 direct and indirect taxes, some of which were 

 contrary to existing treaties. One deputy pro- 

 posed to dismiss all foreigners employed in the 

 railroad service, and another demanded to know 

 if there was a secret treaty with Austria. The 

 bill on the government of communes took 

 away from the central authorities the right to 

 interfere with the ordinances or the acts of the 

 local authorities within their province, and the 

 powers to remove mayors and to dissolve com- 

 munal councils. The only other act that was 

 passed, a bill on the reorganization of the army, 

 contained provisions for abolishing about half 

 of the standing army, and replacing it with a 

 militia. Both these bills the King refused to 

 sanction. At a conference with the ministers 

 on April 26, he persisted in his refusal to sign 

 the bill on communal representation, and s.iid 

 that he considered the agreement which he had 

 made with the Radical majority in the winter 

 no longer binding for either party, whereupon 

 the ministry resigned in obedience to the de- 

 mand of the Radical Club. The King deter- 

 mined to call to his aid the moderate men of 

 the Conservative party, and therefore invited 

 Nikola Christich, who had thrice performed a 

 similar task, to select a neutral ministry. 



The Christich Ministry. The new Council of 



Ministers, constituted on April 27, was made 

 up as tollows : Premier and Minister of the In- 

 terior, Christich ; Minister of Foreign Affairs, 

 Mnatovirh ; Minister of Public Instruction and 

 Ecclesiastical Affairs, Vladan Djorjevich ; Min- 

 ister of Justice, Georg Pantelich ; Minister of 

 Agriculture and Commerce ad interim, Vladan 

 Djorjevich ; Minister of Finance, Dimitrije 

 Rakich ; Minister of Public Works, Michael 

 Bogitchevich ; Minister of War, Costa Protich. 

 The new Minister of Foreign Affairs held the 

 same portfolio in the Pirotshanatz Cabinet, 

 which first entered into the Austrian alliance, 

 and has since been several times Minister of 

 Finance. The present Minister of Finance is a 

 young man prominent in the councils of the 

 Progressist party, who has been chief of sec- 

 tions in the department over which he was 

 called to preside and in the Ministry of Foreign 

 Affairs. The Minister of Justice, an eminent 

 jurist who was a member of the Christich 

 Cabinet in 1883 is free from party ties, as are 

 also Dr. Djorjevich, an author and scientist 

 who has done much for sanitary reform, and 

 Gen. Pr<tich, a distinguished military adminis- 

 trator. The Minister of Public Works held the 

 same office in Garashauin's last Cabinet, and 

 in 1883 under Christich. 



The Skupshtina was dissolved on April 29 

 without having voted the budget. The leaders 

 of the Radicals published assurances that they 

 would countenance no revolutionary disturb- 

 ances, and would act within constitutional 

 limits. Gen. Gruich, on account of a state- 

 ment made to a foreign newspaper correspond- 

 ent, in which he ascribed the dismissal of the 

 Radical Cabinet to Austrian pressure, was 

 placed on the retired list of the army. The 

 arrears of taxes were collected more strictly 

 than under Ristich and Gruich, who spared 

 their party followers. The Government at- 

 tempted again to break the spirit of Radical- 

 ism by tyrannical repression. Many politicians 

 were arrested and thrown into jail. The finan- 

 cial situation was difficult, but, by means of 

 the new loan, the Government in June re- 

 deemed the tobacco regie, which had been sold 

 to a foreign corporation. Besides suppressing 

 insurrectionary movements in Servia, especially 

 in the Saitchar department, the authorities, 

 after a frontier raid of political brigands into 

 Bulgaria had taken place in the Trn district, 

 dismissed the prefects of Pirot and Nish, and 

 took measures to prevent the recurrence of 

 such disturbances. 



The Royal Diyorfe. King Milan married Na- 

 talie, Princess Sturdza. born May 14, 1859, 

 daughter of a Russian nobleman, Col. de 

 Keshko de Pulcherie, on Oct. 17. 1875. Their 

 only child, the Crown - Prince, was born in 

 1876. Domestic differences arose between 

 them; the opponents of the King all sympa- 

 thized with Queen Natalie, and even those 

 who plotted to overthrow Milan desired to 

 preserve the throne for her son, except some 



