122 



CHILI. 



the reason that, prior to the war, on Sept. 12, 

 1878, the force of the army did not exceed 

 3,122 men, that during the war the army of 

 occupation alone counted 25,000, and that dur- 

 ing the summer of 1883 the Chilian army still 

 numbered 17,408 men, while the number of 

 generals was the same as in 1878 and in 1854, 

 when the army counted only 3,000 men. The 

 regular army comprised, in 1882, 9 generals, 

 19 colonels, 77 lieutenant-colonels, 114 majors, 

 198 captains, and 562 lieutenants, together 979 

 officers ; ten battalions (9,040 men), three regi- 

 ments (1,500 men) horse, and two regiments 

 (2,214 men) artillery ; total strength of army, 

 12,921. The National Guard counts 31,113 

 men enlisted, 17,912 of whom perform service. 



Navy. The navy, in 1883, embraced two 

 iron-clad frigates, one monitor, two corvettes, 

 two gunboats, and two cruisers, carrying, to- 

 gether, 53 guns, having a joint tonnage of 

 10,611, and 3,260 horse-power the whole 

 equipped by 1,728 sailors. 



The navy furthermore comprises two steam- 

 ers, one transport, five pontoons, five small 

 steamers, and eleven torpedo-boats. 



Navy officers : One vice-admiral, four coun- 

 ter-admirals, eleven captains of ships-of-the- 

 line, fourteen captains of frigates, twenty-two 

 of corvettes, forty lieutenants, and forty -two 

 enrolled cadets. 



Finances. The President, in his annual mes- 

 sage, remarked with reference to the deprecia- 

 tion of the paper money in circulation in Chili, 

 and the low ruling of it as compared with the 

 exchange on Europe, that this unfavorable 

 feature must be due in part to the general 

 trade relations between Chili and foreign coun- 

 tries, the outstanding amount of paper money 

 being comparatively small. 



The latest report of the Minister of Finance 

 renders an account of the actual workings of 

 the Treasury in 1882. According to this docu- 

 ment, the ordinary revenue reached the aggre- 

 gate of $40,107,209, being an increase of $3,- 

 672,488 over that of 1881. The extraordinary 

 revenue amounted to $1,849,825, thus increas- 

 ing the income of the nation in 1882 to $41,- 

 957,035. As, at the same time, the ordinary 

 and extraordinary expenditure did not exceed 

 $41,620,137, there was an excess of receipts of 

 $306,897. The budget for 1884 estimates the 

 income at $44,365,000, and the outlay at $46,- 

 536,550. - 



Foreign Debt On Dec. 31, 1882, the foreign 

 debt of Chili amounted to $34,878,000. The 

 amount set aside toward the sinking fund for 

 1884 is $1,567,000. These sinking-fund opera- 

 tions have at no time, according to what the min- 

 ister states, been less than 2 per cent, in a year, 

 but in some years they reached 14 per cent. 



CHILIAN FOREIGN INDEBTEDNESS. 



1870 $27,843.000 



1871 27,079,500 



1872 2fi,2S2,000 _. 



1878 86,818,500 1880. 



1874. . . > 25.689,000 1 1881 



1875 80,168,000,1882. 



1876 88,809,000 1 1888. 



1877 $87,400,500 



1878 85,908.000 



1879 84,870,000 



84,870,000 



84,870,000 



84,870,000 



84,870,000 



As nearly all the foreign loans have been 

 contracted for railroad purposes, the minister 

 appends to his report a statement of the actual 

 value of the Government railroads on Dec. 31, 

 1882: 



Line from Valparaiso to Santiago $17,878,290 



" Santiago to Curico 9,298.924 



" " t urico to Angol 8,198,818 



" " Chilian to Taicahuano 4,795,904 



Total $40,171,846 



The Minister of Finance has appointed a 

 committee of investigation to report on exist- 

 ing mining laws, and a revision of the same. 

 The committee is to give its opinion on the 

 ensuing queries: Whether it is advisable to 

 create a national mining bureau ; if so, the 

 committee is to suggest what sphere of action 

 should be assigned to it, and where it should 

 have its seat ; whether the export duty on 

 mineral products should be modified, and to 

 what extent the import duty on mining mate- 

 rial and sheet-iron, examining at the same time 

 to what extent the public revenue would be 

 affected by such changes ; what new privileges 

 may be safely extended to mining industry so 

 as to foster its development; to what extent 

 transportation should be increased and per- 

 fected between the mines and the coast. Fi- 

 nally, the committee is ordered to procure com- 

 plete statistics bearing on every branch of min- 

 ing industry in all its details. The minister 

 feels confident that great results will be reached 

 if this important branch of the public wealth 

 receives the attention it deserves at the hands 

 of the Government and people of Chili, and 

 for this purpose the bureau is proposed to be 

 created. 



Another committee has been appointed to 

 lay down the basis for a revision of the tariff, 

 the members of the committee being mer- 

 chants of leading nationalities. . 



National Legislation. A bill was passed to secu- 

 larize the cemeteries, which caused a great deal 

 of commotion among orthodox Catholics, espe- 

 cially the female portion thereof, and at Santi- 

 ago the ladies personally petitioned the Presi- 

 dent en mAsse to intercede in behalf of threat- 

 ened faith while the bill was under debate. 

 Other bills elicited almost as much interest 

 among the public at large, among them one 

 reforming public instruction, another legaliz- 

 ing civil marriage, one granting certain privi- 

 leges to parties building a dry-dock at Valpa- 

 raiso, one creating the new province of O'Hig- 

 gins in the department of Rancagua, one or- 

 dering a special medal to be struck to reward 

 the soldiers participating in the crowning vic- 

 tory of the war, the battle of Huamacucho, of 

 July 10, 1883 ; finally, a pension bill in favor 

 of all soldiers who fought on the Chilian side 

 in the late war. 



On the other hand, the Senate rejected the 

 bill limiting the coastwise trade to the Chilian 

 flag. 



Railroads. Tn 1882 the total length of gov- 

 ernment lines was 949 kilometres (equal to 598 



