434 



JEWS. 



JOHNSON, KEVERDY. 



It might, perhaps, appear that a question such as 

 that was foreign to the general questions of the con- 

 ference, inasmuch as Koumania was not necessarily 

 included in its deliberations. The council, however, 

 deemed they had a right to ask for it to be included, 

 from the fact that Eoumania acquired her indepen- 

 dence in 185(5, at the termination of the Crimean War ; 

 but in the Treaty of Paris, in clause 23, which gave 

 the constitution to Eoumania, there was no special 

 mention of the Jews. In tlie convention of 1858 

 there was a clause (46) which said that all Christians 

 should enjoy absolute liberty of conscience, civil and 

 religious and political liberty, in Koumania; but the 

 Jews were not mentioned by name. It was assumed, 

 unfortunately in error, that Koumania would not 

 make any exception against the Jews, but would 

 extend that liberty to the Jews as well as the Chris- 

 tians ; but this had not been the case, as had been 

 seen by the persecutions which had taken place 

 during a long series of years, and to which his lord- 

 ship alluded so eloquently in the House of Commons 

 in 1868. 



Equally harsh had been the treatment of the 

 Jews in Servia, which province came more di- 

 rectly under the consideration of the confer- 

 ence at Constantinople. Lord Derby assured 

 the deputation that 



The policy of England in the future, as in the 

 past, would be one favorable to the removal of all 

 distinctions between the holders of different reli- 

 gious faiths, and that the influence of that country 

 would be exerted to prevent the recurrence of the 

 persecution to which Jews had been exposed in 

 Servia and in Koumania. He would not offer any 

 opinion upon the memorial in detail, but he should 

 be happy to forward it to the embassy at Constanti- 

 nople for such action as might seem possible upon 

 it, and as it would be thought fit there to take. The 

 question of Roumaiiia ana Servia on the one hand, 

 and the question of the Turkish provinces on the 

 other, stood upon different foundations. With re- 

 gard to anything that might be done for the internal 

 administration of Turkey, he should certainly not 

 be prepared to concur in any measures of adminis- 

 trative reform which were not intended to apply 

 equally to all non -Mussulman subjects. With regard 

 to Servia and Roumania, the position of semi-inde- 

 pendence which they had acquired made direct ac- 

 tion upon them a matter of greater difficulty. The 

 Government, however, would see what was to be 

 done in that respect, and he would advise the depu- 

 tation to appeal constantly and on all fitting occasions 

 to the general public opinion of the world. 



An effort has been made to estimate the act- 

 ual number of Israelites in the world, and the 

 relative numbers of them in different countries; 

 but such an estimate can give only an imperfect 

 approximation to the real number, for the rea- 

 son that in many countries even of Europe no 

 religious census is taken, and, further, that it 

 must in any case leave entirely out of account 

 the number of those who may have descended 

 from the lost tribes. Computations made from 

 the most recent documents, dating from 1870 

 to 1875, indicate the total number of Jews, 

 known to be such, on the earth, to be not less 

 than 7,868,447, or, in round numbers, 8,000,000. 

 Of these, about 5,500,000 are in Europe, of 

 whom three-fifths are in the empires of Rus- 

 sia, Austro-Hungary, and Germany (in Russia, 

 including Poland, 2,760,000; in Austria and 

 Hungary, 1,376,000; in Germany, 612,000). 



Three hundred and fifty thousand are assignee! 

 to Turkey in Europe, 250,000 to Roumiinia, 

 and in other countries of Europe the number 

 ranges from 68,000 in the Netherlands to 25 

 in Norway. It is calculated that Asia con- 

 tains about 800,000 Jews, of whom 500,000 are 

 in Yemen and other parts of Arabia; Africa a 

 little more than 1,000,000, of whom 340,000 

 are in Morocco, 80,000 in Algeria, 160,000 in 

 Tripoli, 150,000 in Tunis, and perhaps 250,000 

 in Abyssinia; America 514,000, of whom 500,- 

 000 live in the United States; and Oceanica 

 about 7,000. The highest proportion of Jew- 

 ish to the whole population is reached in War- 

 saw and the neighboring provinces, where the 

 ratio is 170 Jews to 1,000 inhabitants. 



JOHN, FRATSTZ, Freiherr VON, an Austrian 

 general, born November 20, 1815 ; died May 

 25, 1876. He was educated at the military 

 academy in Wiener-Neustadt, from which he 

 graduated in 1835. He distinguished himself 

 at the revolution in Milan, in 1848, and at the 

 battles of Custozza, Volta, Gravellone, and 

 Novara, and also took part in the expedition 

 against Tuscany and the Romagna. He was 

 appointed chief of the general staff of the 

 Second Army in Verona in 1859, major-gen- 

 eral in 1861, and upon the outbreak of the 

 Italian War, in 1866, was placed at the head of 

 the general staff of the Army of the South. 

 This office he filled with great ability, con- 

 tributing materially to the victory at Custozza, 

 for which he was created lieutenant-field-mar- 

 shal on June 25, 1866, and on July 10th was 

 appointed chief of the general staff of all the 

 Austrian forces operating in Italy. On Sep- 

 tember 6, 1866, he was intrusted with the ad- 

 ministration of the ministry of war, and at the 

 same time was appointed chief of the quarter- 

 master-general's staff for the -whole Austrian 

 army, and was shortly afterward definitely ap- 

 pointed Minister of War, which position he re- 

 tained until 1868. He was then appointed 

 commanding general in Gratz, where he re- 

 mained until 1874, when he again entered the 

 ministry of war as chief of the general staff. 

 He was created Freiherr (baron) in 1857, and a 

 life-member of the Herrenhaus in 1867. 



JOHNSON, REVEHDY, an American states- 

 man, died at Annapolis, Md., February 10, 

 1876. He had been the guest of Governor 

 Carroll at the Executive mansion, and was 

 dining with a number of friends. Soon after 

 dinner he was found dead in the yard by a 

 servant. Mr. Johnson was born in Annapolis, 

 May 21, 1796. He was educated at St. John's 

 College in that city, and at the age of seventeen 

 began to study law in Prince George's County 

 in the office of his father, who was chief- justice 

 of the judicial district of which that county 

 was a part. In 1815 he was admitted to the 

 bar, and in 1817 removed to Baltimore. He had 

 devoted much of his time to the arguing of cases 

 before the United States Supreme Court. In con- 

 junction with Mr. Thomas Harris he reported 

 the decisions of the Maryland Court of Appeals 



