400 



ICELAND. 



net by his party secured. On March 21st 

 the reconstruction of the new cabinet was 

 completed. Stephan von Bitto, the President 

 of the Lower House of the Hungarian Diet, 

 and formerly, under Lonyay, Minister of Jus- 

 tice, was appointed prime-minister, Ghyczy 

 Minister of finance, and Bartal Minister of 

 Commerce. The other members had belonged 

 to the Szlavy cabinet. The actual leader of 

 the new cabinet, Ghyczy, announced on March 

 27th that he should aim at an improvement 

 of the financial condition by means of a re- 

 duction of the expenditures, that he firmly 

 adhered to the present union with Austria, and. 

 that he was in favor of adjourning other re- 

 forms until the restoration of the financial 

 equilibrium. In place of Bitt6, Bel a Perczel 

 was elected President of the Lower House. On 

 March 28th the Diet adjourned to April 15th. 



The annual meeting of the joint delegations 

 of the Austrian and Hungarian Parliaments, 

 which this year was held in Pesth, was opened 

 on April 20th, and closed on May 22d. Dr. 

 Rechbauer was elected president of the cis- 

 Leithan and Gorove of the trans-Leithan sec- 

 tion. The proceedings were on the whole 

 harmonious, and a full understanding about 

 the common budget was reached. The prime- 

 minister, Count Andrassy, thanked the delega- 

 tions in the name of the Emperor, and Presi- 

 dent Rechbauer in response expressed a wish 

 that the time might soon come when it would 

 be safe to diminish the large armies. 



The Diet, after reassembling on April 15th, 

 devoted its time chiefly to the discussion of 

 financial questions, a new electoral law, and a 

 bill concerning the regulation of civil mar- 

 riage. With regard to the latter, the prime- 

 minister, on June 23d, asked the Lower House 

 to postpone the discussion of the report of 

 the committee until the fall session, as the 

 Government intended to bring in a new bill. 

 The request of the prime-minister was com- 

 plied with by a vote of 158 against 108. In 

 the discussion of the new electoral law so 

 little progress was made that the Diet could 

 not only not be closed on June 25th, as was 

 originally intended, but when it was pro- 

 rogued, on August 15th, an agreement be- 

 tween the two Houses had not been reached. 



Among the most brilliant speeches of the ses- 

 sion was one made in July by Tisza against 

 Polit, the leader of the Servian national party, 

 who had proposed the transformation of the 

 Hungarian state into a confederation of the 

 several nationalities, after the model of Switz- 

 erland. The Left fully agreed with the Deak 

 party, that the unity of the Hungarian state 

 and the ascendency of the Magyar nationality 

 must be fully maintained. 



At the beginning of September, a letter 

 from Kossuth to Tisza was published, in which 

 the latter was highly praised for his firmness 

 of character, and called upon to place himself 

 at the head of the party of independence, 

 which aims at the severance of all the admin- 

 istrative ties which bind Hungary to Austria. 

 Kossuth urged Tisza to abandon the idea of a 

 coalition with the Deak party. 



On October 19th the Banns of Croatia 

 opened in the name of the Emperor the new 

 Croatian University at Agram, and installed 

 the rector. A large number of foreign uni- 

 versities were represented by delegates, who in 

 their several languages welcomed the new 

 addition to the literary institutions of Europe. 

 The University of Agram is the third of the 

 lands of the Hungarian crown, the two others 

 being those of Pesth and Klausenburg, the 

 latter of which was opened in 1872. The 

 opening solemnities were a great Slavic demon- 

 stration against the Magyars. The Hungarian 

 flag was entirely ignored. At the banquet not 

 one toast was given out in honor of Hungary, 

 while, on the other hand, all the toasts in 

 honor of the Slavic nationality, and even a 

 violent speech from the Slovack agitator Sas- 

 sirek, met with enthusiastic applause. 



The Hungarian Diet reassembled in October 

 for its last session. The Minister of Finances, 

 Ghyczy, found it necessary to propose a num- 

 ber of new taxes in order to provide for the 

 large deficit which the budget for 1875 again 

 presented. Although his financial schemes 

 met with the full approval of the Emperor, 

 they produced great excitement in the country, 

 and the protests against them were so numer- 

 ous and energetic, that at the close of the 

 year another ministerial crisis appeared to be 

 inevitable. 



ICELAND, a large island in the North At- 

 lantic Ocean, subject to the Danish crown, 

 attracted, in 1874, unusual attention, by the 

 solemn celebration of the millennial anniver- 

 sary of the first settlement. The area, includ- 

 ing adjacent islands, .is estimated at 39,758 

 square miles, of which 16,243 are inhabitable. 

 The population of Iceland, in its most flourish- 

 ing period, exceeded 100,000 ; recent censuses 

 give it as follows: 1864,68,084; 1869,69,508; 

 1870, 69,763 ; 1874, 70,900. 



The long conflict between the people of Ice- 

 land and the Government of Denmark concern- 

 ing the constitutional rights of the former were 

 brought to a close on January 5, 1874, when 

 the King of Denmark sanctioned a new consti- 

 tution, which had been submitted to him by 

 the Althing, or Legislative Assembly, of Ice- 

 land. The new constitution, which went into 

 operation on August 1, 1874, is divided into 

 seven parts, or chapters. The first of these, 

 which contains thirteen paragraphs, deals with 



