control the policy of the Government. But a Minister of Andrassy's bold genius, feeling the weight of responsibility resting upon himself, and having the power and patronage in his grasp, would not long submit to tutelage. The task that he undertook was the double one of educating a nation to representative self-government, in which the Magyars proved apt and eager pupils, and of gaining the approval of the Emperor-King, reared amid bureaucratic traditions strong enough to choke the constitutional development of his Cisleithan dominions. The ingrained believers in centralized despotism were astounded to see Franz Josef won over, by a revolutionist lately under sentence of death, to acquiesce in the removal of all restraints on agitation by granting complete freedom of the press. of assembly, and of association in Hungary; in the abolition of the civil and political disabilities of the Jews, not withstanding the protests of the Conservative Magyar aristocracy; and finally in the organization of a national Honved army. When the free Hungarian people came to be looked upon as the chief bulwark of the Hapsburg Empire, when the strength and prosperity of Hungary was considered even at the expense of the Cisleithan half of the monarchy, all the Vienna traditions were thrown out of the groove, and the era was opened when the stifled nationalities of Austria could throw off the incubus of the German bureaucrats. Andrassy raised a loan of 100,000,000 florins to build railroads and public works, began the rebuilding of BudaPesth on a magnificent scale, and instituted grand projects for the development of the material and intellectual progress of the country. Having no taste or talent for economical or financial minutia or departmental details, he not only lacked the capacity to direct and supervise the execution of his plans, but intrusted the work to men whom he selected on account of their power to grasp and advocate his large political conceptions without reference to their special knowl. edge or administrative training. After four and a half years of misapplied efforts, extravagant waste, and corruption, which flourished for want of efficient checks, the Andrassy era came to an end by a process of which there is scarcely another instance in the history of constitutional states. The party declared itself insolvent and incompetent, and voluntarily resigned the reins of power to Tisza and the Left. Andrassy's genius for far-reaching political combinations is exemplified by the course of action that he adopted as Prime Minister of Hungary, which has resulted, as he foresaw and intended, in the present European equilibrium. If he had not inristed on his constitutional right to be consulted segarding the foreign policy of the empire, and even gone beyond it in his efforts to influence the mind of the Emperor, Count von Beust might have dragged Austria-Hungary into an alliance with France in his desire to thwart the aims of Bismarck and, by crippling her victorious rival, regain for Austria her dominant position in Germany.. This traditional and apparently inevitable policy Count Andrassy, as the representative of Magyar antipathy to the Germans and to Prussian absolutism with its leanings toward Russia, could have been expected heartily to support; yet he exerted his whole influence to

resist it, because he foresaw that if Austria resumed her preponderant position among German states the revivified Hungarian institutions would be swept away by a new tide of Germanization. The man who shaped the policy of strict neutrality naturally succeeded to the direction of the Foreign Office when the speedy downfall of the military power of France demonstrated its success and obliged Count von Beust to retire. He was anxious to knit Germany to Austria-Hungary in an indissoluble alliance, and with deep prudence and penetration allowed Bismarck to draw him into the semblance of a triple alliance between the three absolute monarchies-Austria, Germany, and Russia-at the same time working to defeat Bismarck's hidden purpose of annihilating France, annexing the Low Countries, and dragging German Austria into the empire ruled by the Hohenzollerns, allowing Russia to compensate herself by going to Constantinople, and eventually engulfing the Slav nationalities. While assisting at the imperial interviews, he protested against Russian activity in the East, and when the decisive moment came, rejected Bismarck's proposal of compensation by marching to Salonica. As the guardian of Hungarian interests, Andrassy circumvented the subtle schemes of the German Chancellor, whose eyes were not opened until, in 1875, he received the distinct warning that Russia would intervene in the event of an aggressive attack against France. The prospect of a Franco-Russian alliance compelled Bismarck to reflect upon the consequences of Andrassy's declared policy of absolute neutrality, though with characteristic toughness, each clung to his preconceived aims. When the Russian army stood before the gates of Constantinople, it was Austria and England who ordered a halt, and in the Berlin Congress Count Andrassy took the leading part in compelling Russia to recede from the treaty of San Stefano. In accepting the mandate to occupy Bosnia and Hervzegovina as compensation for the Russian gains, he desired to defeat the Panslavistic idea and make valid geographical and strategical, rather than ethnological principles in respect to the eventual partition of the Turkish Empire. The occupation was unpopular with the Austrians, and still more so with the Magyars, who were indignant at their countryman for taking part in the dismemberment of the Ottoman Empire. He anticipated no difficulty in taking possession of the provinces. It would be simply a military promenade, he promised, “with bands playing." The Ministry of War was as unready as usual, drawing from him the jibe that it was

with horses, not asses" that he expected to march to Serajevo in a few days. The revolt of the Bosnians rendered the role of joint protectress of the Christians of Turkey ridiculous for Austria, and the ridicule was borne by the minister whose shrewd stroke of policy had apparently miscarried. In 1879 the Austro-German alliance was concluded-not in the form that he desired of a solemn treaty, ratified by the Reichsrath and the Hungarian Parliament, but as a secret pact between the princes. It was Bismarck who dominated the situation that Andrassy had labored to bring about. Two great minds were not needed to direct the course of

the league. The Iron Chancellor, who intended to make use of the league as a prop for the principle of absolutism and for his reactionary and repressive methods of government, had no desire to work with a statesman who not only was his equal in the field of high politics and diplomacy, but was a conspicuous representative of parliamentarism and modern liberalism. In Austria Andrassy's position was impaired by his unpopular Oriental policy. He had been always disliked in the Conservative court circles as a rebel, an advocate of subversive ideas, and he incurred the active hostility of a large number of influential people during the period of his ascendency over the mind of the Emperor by working out a great plan for the reorganization and invigoration of the civil departments and military administration that would drive a host of sleepy placemen from their sinecures. That he had lost his complete ascendency, was revealed to him when Franz Josef refused to make public the German alliance, and still more clearly when the Emperor expressed displeasure and annoyance at Andrassy's having signed a convention reaffirming the Sultan's suzerainty over the occupied provinces and permitting Turkish troops to share the duty of garrisoning the frontier towns. The minister, wishing to retire to private life for a while, in order to restore his fortune, which he had seriously impaired by his magnificent hospitalities, resigned in the confident expectation of being recalled. All Europe wondered at the unaccountable withdrawal of one of the directing minds in international politics, and in the Hapsburg dominions no one could understand how the affairs of the monarchy could be carried on while the towering personality who had acted as chancellor and adviser of the ruler on all important matters stood idly by. Every one looked for his recall; every one knew that if he raised his voice in Parliament or in the delegations, he might have returned to the palace on the Ballplatz with the whole Hungarian nation at his back. The foreign policy of the empire followed the course that he had marked out for it. When Italy entered the league of peace, Prince Bismarck found himself compelled, after all, to act with the ministers of a modern constitutional state. Count Kalnoky did not combat the designs of Russia as vigorously as he would have done, yet he refrained from every word or act that could cause embarrassment, and awaited with dignity and patience the moment when the Emperor should call him back to his old place. When difficult questions came up, the Emperor always called him into consultation. In 1885 he rendered Tisza an important service by inducing the Hungarian aristocracy to accept the reform of the House of Magnates, and in 1890, while tortured with the fatal malady of cancer of the bladder, he sent his son to urge in his name the passage of the new Honved bill.

ANGLICAN CHURCHES. Statistics of Benevolent Contributions and Confirmations.-The Year-Book of the Church of England gives from year to year tables and reviews showing the condition and advance of the numerous institutions and enterprises connected with the Church of England, and usually contains new matter concerning interests not before,

or only briefly noticed. The eighth volume, for 1890, includes enlarged reports of convalescent homes; a new table of Sunday-School associations, containing a list of two hundred such bodies arranged by dioceses; and a digest of the discussions and acts of the various Church bodies

convocations, the House of Laymen, and diocesan conferences-during the past four years. Its tables show that the Church spends a million sterling or more every year on fresh enterprises of church extension, while also increasing nearly every year the sums raised for home and foreign missions, elementary education, hospitals, and other educational and benevolent objects. Since 1811 nearly £33,000,000 have been devoted to the building and maintenance of training schools and colleges, £17,500,000 having been spent in this manner since 1870, when the first education act was passed. In 1888 the sum voluntarily given to these purposes exceeded £888,000. The increase in the number of persons confirmed, as recorded in former YearBooks, is maintained and enlarged. From 1874 to 1876 the number averaged 144,000 a year; in the past three years the average was 220,000, showing an increase of more than 50 per cent. This growth appears to have been concurrent with the establishment of six new dioceses, and with an increase in the number of centers in which confirmations were held from less than 1,700 to more than 2,300. Of the £38,240 contributed in 1889 to the Metropolitan Hospital Sunday fund, the Church furnished £30,611. Of the whole amount of the collections for this fund for seventeen years, since it was instituted, £512,476, the Church has given £389,542, or fully 75 per cent. The record of a movement for pro-, moting higher religious education among all classes, and more particularly among those who have some leisure on week days, is noticed in the Year-Book for the first time. It began in the diocese of Oxford, and has extended to the dioceses of Winchester, Salisbury, Exeter, Bath and Wells, and Hereford. Its method of operations consists in providing popular lectures on a Scriptural or other ecclesiastical subject for a term of weeks or months, giving individual help in classes, inviting candidates to examination, and generally inducing people to seek precise and definite knowledge on religious subjects.

Society for the Propagation of the Gospel.-The annual meeting of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts was held May 1. The Archbishop of Canterbury presided. The gross income of the society for the year had been £125,038. There were now on the list of the society's agents, including 10 bishops, 646 ordained missionaries, of whom 205 were laboring in Asia, 147 in Africa, 14 in Australia and the Pacific, 210 in North America, 35 in the West Indies, and 35 in Europe. Of the whole number 121 were natives laboring in Asia, and 26 in Africa. There were also in the various missions about 2,300 lay teachers, 2,650 students in the colleges, and 38,000 children in the mission schools in Asia and Africa. A mission to North Borneo had been added to the society's enterprises in the previous year; the new features of the present year had been the departure of the first Episcopal Missionary to New Guinea and the consecration of the first Bishop of Corea.

Twenty-five pew missionaries had been recommended for appointment.

Church Missionary Society. The ninetyfirst annual meeting of the Church Missionary Society was held in London, May 6. The receipts for the year had been £260,582, and the payments £224,585. The society had in its service, at 297 stations, 282 ordained, 51 lay, and 57 women—in all. 390 European missionaries, with 287 native and Eurasian clergy, and 4,210 native teachers. The number of native Christian adherents was 187,785; of native communicants, 46,520; and of schools, 1,772, with, so far as was reported, 72,277 pupils.

Convocation of Canterbury.-The Convocation of Canterbury met for the dispatch of business Feb. 12. A petition was presented in the upper house submitting that the trial of bishops by their metropolitan otherwise than in their provincial synods is contrary to the primitive constitution and order of the Church. On a question that had arisen concerning the relations and privileges of the two houses, the upper house concurred with the lower house that declarations were objectionable which might seem either to narrow or widen the present limits of discussion in that body; defined it to be the duty of the lower house in cases in which it is proposed that the result of the discussion of any question should be the passing of a synodical act or the making of a declaration upon doctrine to bring the subject under the notice of the upper house by way of petition; and stated that the publication of documents, other than reports in their proper form, on the sole authority of the lower house, is at variance with the ancient custom and constitution of Convocation. The lower house expressed the opinion, in a resolution, "that the time has come when the Church can with advantage avail herself of the voluntary self-devotion of brotherhoods, both clerical and lay, the members of which are willing to labor in the service of the Church without appealing for funds to any form of public support," and that "the members of such brotherhoods shall be allowed to bind themselves by dispensable vows of celibacy, poverty, and obedience."

The House of Laymen declared that an early settlement of the tithe rent-charge in the present session of Parliament was urgently desired, and that such settlement should follow the lines of the Government bills of 1888 in providing for the payment of the rent-charge out of the rent of the land when the ownership and occupation are severed, and for the recovery of the rent-charge by county court proceedings. A resolution was unanimously adopted condemning the traffic in strong drink carried on by European traders among the native races of Africa "as a serious obstacle to the progress of Christianity and civilization, and opposed to the true interest of commerce. In another resolution a number of modifications were specified as required in the Burial Acts and their administration. A report, denying the power of Convocation to change its own constitution and declaring that such power lies only in the Crown and ministers, and that no effectual reform can be carried out without the intervention of Parliament, was referred back for further consideration. Resolutions were adopt ed respecting Sunday observance.

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The Convocation met again May 6. The upper house considered and approved a revision of the form of 1714 "for admitting converts from the Church of Rome, and such others as shall renounce their errors, and for restoring those who have relapsed." The report on sisterhoods and deaconesses having been brought forward, the first section, declaring that the house, "recognizing the value of sisterhoods and deaconesses and the importance of their work, considers that the Church ought to extend to them her care and guidance," was adopted. The second section, permitting those who enter a sisterhood, after an adequate term of probation, to undertake life-long engagements to the work of the community, was amended by adding a proviso that such engagements shall be liable to release by competent authority. A statement was made in the presence of the prolocutor and assessors of the lower house, who attended for the purpose of receiving it, on question of the privileges of the lower house, in reference to which a resolution had been passed in February, and a point demanding definition was referred to the archbishop. The lower house, in reference to this subject, requested the president (the archbishop) to appoint a committee of the upper house to confer with the committee of the lower house. Resolutions passed in reference to the Educational Code embodied a declaration respecting "free education" that the house regarded it essential that no new restrictions should be placed upon the teaching of the Christian faith as held by the Church of England, or upon the moral training founded thereon in Church schools. A resolution was adopted in favor of making, in connection with the next decennial census, an enumeration of the people by their denominational affiliations. The House of Laymen adopted resolutions respecting the observance of Sunday; approving a system of diocesan church trusts; favoring a summary and inexpensive procedure for the trial of criminous clerks; inviting the institution of a "higher class" of lay readers appointed by and responsible to the bishop; recommending the institution of brotherhoods, whose rules should be approved by the bishop of the diocese, and who should work in subordination to him, and on the invitation and under the sanction of the incumbent of the parish; and opposing the Deceased Wife's Sister Bill. A resolution was adopted to the effect that the Church of England contains the framework upon which an organization for the encouragement of national thrift might be constructed, and favoring the formation of committees for the circulation of information on the subject.

Convocation of York.-The Convocation of York met for the dispatch of business April 15. A message on the subject of lay representation, submitted to the upper house by the president, was agreed to, to be transmitted to the lower house. It proposed the appointment during the year of a house of laymen. The president, in offering it, suggested that the step should be regarded as an experiment subject to revision in the first year of the next convocation, and that no part of the scheme should be regarded as final. He had been advised, and was convinced that he had no right to sanction the appointment of a lay house to sit with the House of

Laymen in the province of Canterbury. The proposed house, therefore, would be in connection with the York Convocation only. Resolutions were passed favoring the formation of boards of conciliation and the extension of cooperative associations for production; approving, in its main features, the Tithe Rent-Charge Recovery and Redemption bill; and approving the proposed new code as conducive to the best interests of elementary education. The lower house likewise approved the proposed new educational code and the Tithe Rent-Charge Recovery and Redemption bill; disapproved the Parish Councils bill; and declared the proposals contained in Mr. Osborn Morgan's Burial bill in many respects objectionable and hostile to the ancient rights and laws of the Church, and not required by liberty of conscience and freedom of worship.

The Liberation Society.-The annual meeting of the Society for the Liberation of Religion from the Patronage and Control of the State was held in London, May 7. Mr. John E. Ellis, M. P., presided. The income of the society had been £5,536, and its expenditure £5,334. A hundred more meetings in advocacy of disestablishment had been held during the past year than in the previous year. The division on Dr. Cameron's motion for disestablishment in Scotland was regarded in the annual report with great satisfaction. The committee believed the tithe bill, whether passed or not, would advance the cause of disestablishment. A dozen measures were before Parliament designed to promote religious equality, but the appropriation of so much time by the Government prevented any progress being made with them. Attempts were made to secure the power of self-government for the Church without lessening its privileged position; but such attempts must be resisted while the Church remained established. Resolutions were passed expressing satisfaction at the progress of disestablishment in Scotland; favoring disestablishment in Wales; affirming the necessity of popular control as an accompaniment to free education; calling for the national appropriation of tithes; and opposing the inquiry into religious professions, which it was proposed to include in the decennial census about to be taken, as being beyond the province of the state and likely to produce untrustworthy and misleading results. At the public meeting of the society Mr. Campbell Bannerman, M. P., asserted that the cause of disestablishment was moving forward in Parliament "by leaps and bounds." In 1886, only 366 persons, including pairs, had voted on Mr. Cameron's motion for Scotch disestablishment; in 1888 the number rose to 528; and in the vote taken a few days before it was 560. Forty-three Scotch members were in favor of it, to 24 against it.

The "Bell Cox Case."-Final judgment was given by the House of Lords early in August in the case of the Rev. J. Bell Cox, of Liverpool, who was imprisoned for illegal practices in ritual, but was discharged on habeas corpus. The promoter of the suit appealed, and the judgment of the court below was reversed. The judgment of the House of Lords is to the effect that no appeal court can interfere with a subject when once set at liberty under a habeas corpus.

The main question, concerning the legality of Mr. Cox's position on ritual, is not affected by this decision.

The Church House.-The annual general meeting of the Church House Corporation was held on its newly purchased premises in Westminster, June 26. The Archbishop of Canterbury presided and set forth the present condition of the Church House enterprise. The greatest difficulties had been overcome; the body was in possession of its property, a corporate seal had been obtained, and the library had grown to nearly 9,000 volumes. It was agreed to begin immediately the erection of a permanent building, the estimates for which called for the sum of £35,000. Of this, £9,200 were in hand.

Church Congress.-The annual Church Congress met at Hull, Sept. 30. The Archbishop of York, who was to have presided, being ill, the Bishop of Durham occupied the chair and delivered an address in which he discussed the "social question" as in its amplest range a religious question. The subject of “Church and State was considered under the heads of "Different Forms of Relation in our Own and Other Churches and Results of Relation to Church and State respectively " and "Experiences of Disestablished and Free Churches," by Mr. J. G. Talbot, M. P., Bishop Barry, the Rev. T. Moor, and Chancellor Dibdin. The discussion of the next subject, “The Church's Attitude toward Strikes and Wages' Disputes with Reference to (a) Laborers, Skilled and Unskilled, (b) Combinations of Employers, and (c) the General Public," was participated in by Prebendary Harry Jones, Mr. David Dale, and several impromptu speakers; that of "Systematic Instruction in Religion (a) in Schools and Universities, (b) in Pulpit Ministrations, and (c) by Literature and Lectures," by the Bishop of Edinburgh, the Rev. Principal Moule, the Rev. Canon Woelledge, of Imro Cathedral, and the Rev. A. R. Buckland. Questions respecting sanitation were presented under the three heads of "Acquaintance with and Obedience to Sanitary Laws a Christian Duty; Present Condition of Laborers' and Artisans Dwellings, in View of Recent and Proposed Legislation; Duty of the Church in the Promotion of Practical Reforms," by the Bishop of Bedford, the Rev. Arthur Robins, Dr. Alfred Carpenter, and volunteer speakers. The discussions of the second day's session included "Home Reunion-Common Grounds of Union; Differences which most hinder Reunion; and Suggested Schemes of Reunion and Intercommunion," by the Archbishop of Dublin, the Bishop of Glasgow, the Rev. Prof. Lumb, Canon George Venables, the Rev. Principal Moule, Mr. P. V. Smith, Bishop Barry, Major Seton Churchill, and Canon Fremantle; "Foreign Missions, with Special Reference to Africa-(a) Present Condition and Prospects, and (b) Equipment and Training of Missionaries," by Sir John Kennaway, M. P., Bishop Smythies, Commander Cameron, the Bishop of Sierra Leone, and others; Betting and Gambling," by the Rev. and Hon. E. Carr-Glynn, Major Seton Churchill, the Rev. W. Allen Whitworth, the Dean of Rochester, and in general discussion; "Faith as a Principle of Action, considered as a Duty, (a) as a Natural Principle, and (b) as a Christian Prin

ciple," by the Bishop of Wakefield, the Rev. Dr. Wace, the Bishop of Sodor and Man, Canon Woelledge, Sir Andrew Clark, M. D., and others; "Women's Work among Women, at Home and Abroad," by Mrs. Sumner, of the Mothers' Union, Winchester, Miss E. Mulvaney, the Bishop of Southwell, and informal speakers; and Socialism (a) Modern Theories and Aims of Socialism; (b) Examination of them in the Light of Christianity," by the Bishop of Durham, the Rev. M. Kaufmann, the Hon. Judge Hughes, Sir John Gorst, M. P.. Bishop Barry, and general discussion. The third day's session was opened with a discussion of the subject of "Brotherhoods: Recent Proposals for their Formation; Alternative Schemes," by Archdeacon Farrar, the Bishop of Liverpool, the Rev. W. H. Hutchings, and speakers in general debate. Other subjects treated of during the day were "The Due Limits of Ritual: how to define them and how to secure them," by the Bishop of Guildford, Viscount Halifax, the Dean of Windsor, the Dean of Peterborough, Canon Bardsley, Archdeacon Straton, and others: "The Inspiration of the Holy Scripture," by the Dean of Peterborough, Prof. Margoliouth, the Rev. Canon Tristram, Principal Waller, and the Dean of Armagh; "The Work of the Church and the Responsibility of Employers with Respect to the Spiritual Welfare of those whom they employ, (a) Ship-owners and Seamen; (b) Contractors and Navvies: (c) Manufacturers and their Workpeople," by the Bishop of Newcastle, the Rev. E. Grimston, the Rev. C. M. Woosnam, and the Rev. W. B. Forwood; " Free Elementary Education; its Results in Foreign Countries; its Effect on Education generally; and its Effect on Religious Teaching and Voluntary Schools," by Mr. J. R. Diggle, chairman of the London School Board, the Rev. J. C. Thompson, and the Rev. C. Dunkley. The subjects for the fourth day were Reverence (a) for the Name and Power of God; (b) for God's Holy Day; (c) for the Holy Spirit in Young People and Children," considered in papers by Canon Newbolt, the Rev. J. E. C. Welldon, the Bishop of Wakefield, Archdeacon Blunt, the Rev. E. A. Stuart, and Canon Girdlestone; "The Ethics of Commerce, (a) Christian Conception of Commerce; (b) Speculation and Christianity; (c) Commerce and the Spread of Christianity in Other Lands," by Archdeacon Farrar, Mr. Sydney Gedge, M. P., Canon W. H. Fremantle, Mr. Stephen Bourne, the Rev. Dr. Cunningham, of Cambridge, Sir Albert Rollit, M. P., the Rev. J. Grant Mills, and the Bishop of Wakefield; and Country Parishes, their Difficulties and Needs and Modes of meeting them," by the Rev. Chancellor Espin, Canon Temple, the Rev. Prebendary Ainslie, and other speakers.

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A General Synod in Canada.-A scheme was approved at a meeting held in Winnipeg, Manitoba, in August, for the formation of a general synod to embrace the Dominion of Canada and Newfoundland, in which the several synods shall be represented by delegates. It provides for the retention of the existing systems of diocesan and provincial synods, so that the organization of the Canadian Church will be in three grades of jurisdiction, represented by the diocesan, the provincial, and the General synods. The president of

the General Synod-having the title of primatewill be elected from among the provincial metropolitans. The plan of representation contemplates that dioceses having fewer than twentyfive licensed clergymen shall be entitled to one delegate for each order; those having more than twenty-five and fewer than fifty, two for each order; dioceses having more than fifty and less than a hundred licensed clergymen, three for each order; and larger dioceses four for each. The synod shall consist of two houses, the bishops constituting the upper house, and the clergy and laity together the lower house. The primate shall hold office for life, or so long as he is a bishop in any diocese in the General Synod. Such objects will come properly under the jurisdiction of the General Synod as matters of doctrine, worship, and discipline; agencies employed in carrying on the work of the Church; missionary and educational work; the adjustment of relations between dioceses in respect to clergy, widows' and orphans', and superannuation funds; regulations respecting the transfer of clergy from one diocese to another; education and training of candidates for holy orders; constitution and powers of an appellate tribunal; and the erection, division, or rearrangement of provinces. The synod is to meet for the first time in Toronto on the second Wednesday of September, 1893. ANTI-SLAVERY CONFÉRENCE. The general act of the Berlin Conference, signed Feb. 22, 1885, contains an article whereby the powers exercising rights of sovereignty or any influence in the territories of the conventional basin of the Congo undertake to watch over the preservation of the native races and the improvement of their moral and material conditions of existence, and to co-operate in the suppression of slavery, and especially of the negro traffic; also to protect, without distinction of creed or nationality, institutions created for this object or tending to instruct and civilize the natives. At the suggestion of the British plenipotentiaries another article was added containing a declaration of the same powers that the territories over which they exercise sovereignty or influence can not serve as a market or means of transit for slaves, and a promise on their part to employ all means in their power to put an end to the traffic and to punish those who take part in it. In March, 1889, pending the blockade of the coast of Zanzibar, the British House of Commons adopted a resolution calling on the Government, in view of the increasing and extending desolations in Africa caused by the slave trade, to take steps to ascertain the willingness of the powers to meet in conference for the purpose of devising measures for its suppression that should be at the same time effective and in accordance with justice and international law, giving complete effect to the declarations delivered by the Congress of Vienna in 1815 and the Conference at Verona in 1822. The British Government resigned the initiative to King Leopold, who consented to summon a conference of the powers signatory of the Berlin general act to meet at Brussels in the autumn to consider the present condition of the slave trade by land and sea, and to deliberate on measures for arresting or mitigating its evils. The object, as defined in his circular, was to "effectively prevent the slave