The Sun.
London, England, 1870-02-15 00:00:00

OPENING OF THE NORTH GERMAN

PARLIAMENT.

SPEEU OF THE KING OF PRUSSIA.

BERLIN, Feb. 14.
The North German Parliament was opened to-
day by the King of Prussia in person. His Ma-
jesty delivered the following speech from the
Throne :

Honoured Gentlemen of the Parliament of the
North German Confederation—ln the name of the
Confederate Governments I bid you welcome to the
last session of the legislative period. In this session
you will be called upon to complete and further
establish those institutions which have been created
with your co-operation, and have come into exist-
ence through the unanimous exertions of the Con-
federate Governments. To my great gratification
the devoted labours of those persons who were en-
trusted with the preparation of a penal code for the
North German Confederacy have resulted in Bring-
ing that important work to such a degree of com-
pletion that it has already received the approval
of the Federal Council, and is able to be laid be-
fore you to-day. While this code perfects the
national unity of the North German Confederation
in one of the most important fields of public law, it
contains at the same time features which are a
marked progress upon the penal laws at present in
force in the territories of the Confederation, and
which are in harmony with the requirements of
science and the results of fruitful experience. The
same aim has been sought in a kindred branch of
legislation, namely, in the proposed law for the pro-
tection of the rights of authors. The principle of
the common right of nationality(indigenat) founded
in the Federal Constitution, and further developed
in the laws upon freedom of residence and in the
trade regulations, will obtain its final extension in
several directions by the adoption of the laws to
be submitted to you. A bill respecting the ac-
quieement and deprivation of the rights of a
s nhject of the Bund or State will be presented
to meet the wish expressed by your last session.
The establishment of the principle of freedom of
residence has called attention to great inequalities
arising from the greatly varying regulations in the
several countries of the Bund in connection with
the rights of domicile and the support of the poor.
The removal of these inequalities, suggested, in-
deed, by you, could not be long delayed, and a
Relief and Dwelling-house Bill will be introduced
which is calculated to remove the most prominent
evils complained of. Those impediments still ob-
structing the full development of the principle of
freedom of residence, which arise from the State
laws on direct •taxation, are to be removed by a
Bill now before the Federal Council. A Bill will
also be brought forward to meet the oft-expressed
wish for the modification of the restrictions to
which ploti of land tire subject that are situated
ithin the limits of new or extended sites of forti-
fications. The position of the men belonging to the
former Schleswig-Holstein army claims the same
sympathy as that to which expression was
given in your last session but one, with
regard to the officers of that army. A bill on this
subject will be laid before you. The reservation
made in the Federal Consulates Law in favour of a
future settlement of the competency of the Federal
Consuls to celebrate marriages, and to authenticate
the position of individuals, will be dealt with by a
bill to be presented to you, and the bill respecting
the position of Federal officials will-agaiu be sub-
mitted to you for decision. Tho increase of trade
and the reform of the sugar, tax have enabled the
Government, while maintaining the ascertained
bases of prudent calculation, to fix in the Federal
Budget which is to be laid before you for 1871, at
a higher figure than in the previous Budget, the
estimates of the revenue from the Customs, the
taxes upon articles of consumption, and the
surplus from the postal service. A prospect is
therefore afforded that the greater portion
of the still overbalancing expenditure ne-
cessitated by the development of Federal
institutions, and especially by the projected com-
pletion of the Federal navy, will be covered by the
Bund's own revenue. Preparatory steps towards
the arrangement contemplated iu Art. 4 of the
Treaty of Prague for the national union of the
North German Confederation with the South Ger-
man States are the object of my incessant atten-
tion. A jurisdiction treaty, which will be submitted
to your approval, has been concluded with the
Grand Duchy of Baden, with the object of extend-
ing in a national sense beyond the frontiers of the
Federal territory, the principles of community of
legal protection which obtain throughout the North
German Coufedration by means of the law for
affording legal assistance. By a bill which• is to
be brought forward to supply defects in the law
on weights. and measures, it will become pos-
sible to establish a common system in that respect
with other German States by the mutual admission
of the reformed arrangements. In consequence of
my mediation the Band has willingly co-operated
in the establishment of a commission on the South
German fortresses, by agreeing to the continuance
of an undivided proprietorship in the fortifications.
The entirety of the treaties which connect the North
of iGermany with the South are a security for the
safety and welfare of the common *German
Fatherland, and afford those trusty guaran-
tees that are inherent in the strength
and complete organisation of tha North
German Bund. The confidence which our
South German allies repose in these guarantees
is based upon complete reciprocity. The senti-
ment of national unity to which the present treaties
owe their existence, the mutually pledged word of
German princes, and the community of supreme
national interests, lend to our relations with South
Germany a solidity which is independent of the
changing waves of political passions. When I spoke
to you last year from this place I expressed myself
confident that my sincere efforts to correspond
with the wishes of nations and the requirements
of civilization, by the avoidance of any disturb-
ance of peace, could not, with the help of Provi-
dence, fail of success. It does my, heart good
to be able to announce to-day from the same
place that my confidence was sully justified,
Among the Governments, as well as among the
nations of the present day, a conviction is success-
fully making way to the effect that to each political
community belongs the task and the duty of inde-
pendently fostering at home its own welfare, and
the principles of freedom and justice ; and that the
armed force of each country is destined to protect
its own independence, not to assail that of others.
The legislative period of the present Parliament is
approaching to a close. by its former successful ac-
tivity, and the fruitful co-operation with which the
ConfederateGovernmentsandParliament have com-
bined their labours, the Federal institutions have been
firmly founded, and have developed in a direction
destined to prove most beneficial to the interests of
the Fatherland. The deliberations of the present
session will be renewed, and your energetic activity
is again claimed for the furtherance of this object.
By fulfilling the tasks which will be laid before you,
you will bring the successful career of the present
Parliament to a termination, which will cause the
labours it has exacted to be rewarded with a
nation's thanks, and secure for it a prominent
place in the history of the institutions of the
Fatherland.

Mr. George Wood, of Wood's Museum, New
York, has tendered, for the purpose of an " Inventors'
Perpetual Fair," one or more of the largo hall sin his
museum, free to all inventors in tho United States, for the
exhibition of working models and, if necessary, working
machinery. Offers of the latest improved engines and
shafting, as Well as of a number of other machines, have
been already :eceivel, and the boilers have been set and
aro ready for connections. The plan proposed is to have
no admission fee to visitors, and no charge to exhibitors
other than their proportionate share of the expense for
gas and attendance.

A SILENT COAL SCUTTLE.—Great annoyance is
often caused to invalids by the ordinary method of putting
coals in the grate by means of a coal scuttle. A very
simple remedy, and one which should be introduced into
every sick room, consists in placing the coals in paper
bags, holding about 41bs. each, and laying them quietly on
the fire with the hands, when the bags ignite, and leave
the coals to be distributed noiselessly over the fire. We
notice the above in the San Francisco Scientist Press, and
the expedient appears so completely to inert the case, that
it is strange it has not been adopted before.