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[Events in Bosnia and Herzegovina.]

Highness, centuries of suffering have determined our brethren of Bosnia and of the Herzegovina to appeal to arms and to fight for their rights as men and as a nation.

The sight of their blood revolts our brotherly sentiments. Their cries of despair find a noble echo among other civilized nations. It is impossible that we should remain indifferent to their fate..

The National Assembly is filled with the deepest sense of gratitude for the efforts of your Highness to help to restore definitively tranquillity to these distracted countries, and to ensure a lasting contentment to our cruelly tried brethren.

In this patriotic path your Highness may also count entirely on the support of the people of Servia. They are ready to put at your Highness' disposal all the means needful for the happy realization of this great work. The National Assembly, in name of the people of Servia, give your Highness the assurance that, to this end also, it will not flinch from any sacrifice, being convinced that your Highness, together with the Government, will devise the means by which Servia may best respond to her duty.

The National Assembly will deliberate on the long-expected projects of laws, mentioned in the Speech from the Throne. It will discuss them with all the attention due to their importance, and will make a point of legislating upon them during the present Session.

The Assembly, on its side, will also make some propositions, which it considers urgent, for the development of our national institutions. These propositions will have in view the modification and the completion of certain dispositions of the Constitution, both in the sense of extending Ministerial responsibility, and of adapting our legislation still more closely to the spirit of our national life and to its wants, as well as of arriving at a mode of simplifying our judicial and administrative system.

The people of Servia have learnt with feelings of the greatest pleasure that your Highness has made choice of a consort, and has presented us with a Princess in the person of Nathalie Pétrovna, of Russian origin, and consequently our kinswoman. Nathalie Pétrovna will adorn the Throne, and at the same time ensure the dynasty of the Obrénovitch, to which the people are so deeply attached.

The Assembly, while offering its heartiest congratulations to

[Events in Bosnia and Herzegovina.]

your Highness, can but join its voice to that of the whole people in imploring the Divine benediction upon the happy union of your Highness and of our future Princess Nathalie.

The Servian people, Highness, have ever felt the necessity of concord, but this want makes itself more especially felt under existing circumstances. The Assembly shares the conviction of your Highness that that is the starting point-the most solid basis of our strength and of our future.

Lastly, the National Assembly invokes the blessing of the Almighty upon your Highness and on our dear country; may He grant the strength necessary to the arm of Servia to raise aloft the standard of liberty; and, led on by the glorious Obrénovitz, the people of Servia will join in the universal cry of—

Long live Prince Milan M. Obrénovitch IV!

Long live Servia!

Kragouïévatz, 7th September, 1875.

[Reforms.]

No. 454.—TURKISH IRADÉ promulgating Reforms. Constantinople, 2nd October, 1875.

[Referred to in the Andrassy Note of 30th December, 1875, No. 456.]

TABLE.

Reduction of Tithes.

Remission of Arrears of Taxes.

Administrative Councils.

Provincial Delegates.

Collection of Taxes, &c.

(Translation as laid before Parliament.)

All the subjects of His Imperial Highness the Sultan, without distinction, are the constant object of his especial care and of his never-ceasing kindness. Those who wander from the path marked out by the duties of subjection, and who are guilty of illegal acts, they only will be deprived of the enjoyment of benefits, and they will have to blame themselves for it. This Imperial solicitude is now once more evinced with respect to the honest and peaceful agricultural populations of the Empire.

Reduction of Tithes.

In the first place, the immediate exemption of these populations from the quarter of the Tithe formerly established has been decreed.

Remission of Arrears of Taxes.

Further, all arrears of Taxes accumulated up to the date of the year 1289 (1872) have been abandoned for their advantage; the records of these arrears have been ordered to be cancelled in the Treasury Registers, and publicity will be given to this. There shall be excepted from this measure the farmers of taxes and sureties, and the well-to-do classes as regards their debts to the Treasury.

Administrative Councils.

The different communities are to be represented in the Administrative Councils by persons of their own selection, and really enjoying their confidence. The opinions of these latter persons, enunciated within the limits of the law and common sense, will be taken into serious consideration.

[Reforms.]

Provincial Delegates.

The principle, according to which a delegation was authorized, in accordance with the Organic Law' of the Vilayets, to proceed to Constantinople, in order to submit the demands of the Annual General Assemblies of the provinces, and which has been abandoned for some time, has been re-established. Honourable persons possessing the consideration of their respective communities will be called in groups, and not in a mass, from the vilayets and the mutessarifats. The information gained, either by this or by other means, will serve as basis for the reforms and modifications to be adopted in furtherance of well-being, prosperity, and general progress.

Collection of Taxes, &c.

Agents and special controllers will be selected as required, to ensure the distribution and collection of the Taxes, in accordance with the existing law, and with the principles of justice.

Orders have just been transmitted to all the vilayets for the carrying out of these measures; investigations, with a view to transform the tithes into a land tax, are proceeding, so as to establish an equitable system, and one likely to meet requirements. It will moreover be sought to introduce an uniform fiscal system as regards the taxes.

It is decided to carry out these reforms gradually, as also those which relate to the organization of the Police.

May a Divine Providence grant a long life to our august and magnanimous Sovereign, for the glory of the Empire and the happiness of his subjects.

Constantinople, 2nd October, 1875.

[Reforms.]

No. 455.-TURKISH FIRMAN, granting Immunities and Favours to Ottoman Subjects.* 12th December, 1875.

[Referred to in the Andrassy Note of 30th December, 1875, No. 456.]

TABLE.

Judicial Reforms.

Taxes.

Collection of Tithes.

Collection of Taxes.

Titles to Real Property.

Police (Zaptiés.)

Forced Labour.

Agriculture, Industry, and Commerce.

Religious Equality, Churches, Schools, &c.

Non-Mussulman Subjects: Admission to Public Functions, &c.

Military Service.

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Right to possess Land.

Wills.

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(Translation as laid before Parliament.)

To you, my Illustrions Vizier, Mahmoud Nédim Pasha,

CIVILISED States should consecrate their efforts to secure public rights. All the means which should combine for the security and the maintenance of this principle can be obtained only by a strict application of justice to all without distinction, and by a regular organisation of its administration. Individual interests are secured only by the order and prosperity of the country, private interests being closely associated with the general welfare.

Since our accession to the throne our Imperial intentions and sentiments, already brought to the knowledge of all, have had for their object, with the help of God, the greatness and glory of our Empire, the tranquillity and welfare of all classes of our subjects, and the development of progress for the benefit of the wealth and prosperity of our territories. In order to realise these intentions yet more completely we have resolved to grant

A Turkish Circular to Ottoman Representatives at Foreign Courts was issued on the same day.

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