Omaha daily bee., 1903-06-06
OTHER LANDS THAN oURs.

@6 49, my - kNANg NAaA JOS
steadily grown for the past twenty years.
The vote of the party in 1881 was $4,000.
At each Of the Ave subsequent elections
It made gains, casting in 1898 2,i07,O76 votes;
and this year it is expected that the
number will reach 100000 AMI elect 100
members of the Reichstag. The demands
OF the social democrats in Germany are
very different from what they are in this
country. With three exceptions, we should
hardly call them socialists at all. These
exceptions are gratuitous legal proceed
ings, free medical attendance and burials,
and progressive income and inheritance
taxes. Most OF their other demands would
seem reasonable to Americans, however
radical they may appear to Germans. They
include freedom Of speech and the press
which has about It a flavor of old
fashioned familiarity-legal equality of the
sexes; free nonsectarian schools with
compulsory attendance; responsibility of
the government to Parliament; disestab-
lishment of the churches; substitution OF
the militia system for a great standing
army, etc. AS all candidates for the
Reichstag must have an absolute majority
before there can be a choice, 1t was nec-
essary to vote over again IS per cent of
the constituencies at the last election, and.
at the second poll all other parties com
bined against the social democrats, 1t is
said that this is not likely to happen
again. According to the writer of the ar
ticls from which these figures are taken,
they form by far the best led, best man
aged and most homogeneous party in Ger
many
Athens, the only capital in Europe which
cannot be reached by the main trunk lines,
is separated by several hundred miles from
the European main railway system, Of
which Brindisi, SaIonica and CONSTANT
nople may be regarded as the three south
ern termini. There is now projected a
line from Athens to salonica. which will
put the Greek metropolis in direct con-
\ nection with the whole continent. 1t Is to
have the standard continental gauge of
four feet eight inches, and when 1t is
completed it will be possible to run
through carriages from Calais to Athens.
The Greek capital will then be within
three days of London. At present the
quickest route between the two cities, by
way Of Brindisi and Patras, occupies five
days and involves a sea voyage almost as
long as that between Brindisi and Egypt.
Hitherto Athens has been the only Euro
pean capital to which there is not a daily
mail from Great Britain, a privilege en-
joyed even by Tangier, in that semi-civ-
ilised country Morocco. That reproach will
cease with the opening of the new line,
which will enable tourists to reach the
classic ground more rapidly, more con-
veniently and more cheaply.
The Paris correspondent of the London
Times, in a review of the present political
situation in France, says that the conflict
between church and state is becoming more
acute daily and that the extremists on both
sides are making moderate counsels inn
potent. II 1t had not been for the futile
resistance of the religious orders, he says,
and the vain attempt of the bishops to
arouse a popular agitation against the min
istry and the parliamentary majority, their
most active opponents would have failed
to secure anything more than a platonic
approval of their demand for the denuncia-
ton of the Concordat. The joint efforts of
the religious orders and of the majority of
the episcopate, headed by the archbishop
of Paris and three other Cardinals, seem,
he adds, to nave created a new situation
which must necessarily affect the policy of
the government. The premier himself de-
clared in Parliament a couple of months
ago that the Concordat could only be main
tanned so long as its provisions were 10y
ally observed by the church. A large and
active section of the republican party, pos
sibly al effective majority of the govern
ment's supporters, now contend that the
demonstrative disobedience of the episco-
pate is a direct breach Of the obligations
undertaken by the church in that agree
ment, and they are straining every nerve
to induce the government and the country
to rescind It.
The French. as well as the English and
Germans, are awakening to a sense of the
vast future possibilities Of the cotton grow
ing industry in Africa. The whole question
was discussed at a meeting of the French
Coloniol union in Paris the other day, when
General de Trentinian, pioneer of cotton
cultivation in the French Soudan, and other
influential persons were present. M. Pei
terie, president of the French Cotton asso.
citation. said that the experiments Of Gen
eral de Trentinian In the Soudan proved
that cotton OF good medium quality could
be grown In that region without any
Improvement in the method of cult
walton. Had his initiative been followed
France would now be several years ir
advance of her African neighbors In
Togoland and Lagos. He referred t.
the danger OF the absorption of the Euro.
PCdh ha0S ny IL CAllcu OtdleSI ant
maintained that French Africa and the
Soudan were better qualified than either
I Togoland or the Congo coast land for cot.
: ton growing. He deprecated the introduc.
ton of American methods of cultivation or
the ground that Africa was not ripe fol
: them, while the superior fertility of the sol
made them unnecessary. In a general dis.
cussion which followed special emphasI:
was laid upon the necessity Of encouraging
native cultivation by buying all the cottor
whiGh they produced.
A Shanghai paper, Shen Pao, publishe.
the text OF a treaty just concluded between
Siam and Japan, which is considered i'm.
portant not because OF Its wording, blu
. from the fact that 1t was negotiated i'm.
mediately after the lapsing of the Franco
4 Siamese convention. II is in four clause,
and is rather in the nature of a modui
8 vivendi than Of an actual treaty-"JapaI
and Slam are cordially DESTROYS that tn,
y two contracting parties should cbtaIr
D reciprocal commercial advantages. tn,
9 two allies will encourage the development
Of more and more amicable relations be
, tween the educated classes of the two coun
tries. and with this object in view genera
committees will be established in all tn
: important centers in order to facilitate voy
: ages from one country to the other. TIL,
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