The President is now elected by popular vote every four years. The Executive power is in his hands, and he is assisted by two Vice-Presidents and a Council, including Ministers of the Interior, of Foreign Affairs, Justice and Worship, of Commerce and Finance, and of War and Marine.

There is now no Second Chamber, or Upper House, in Costa Rica.

The Chamber of Deputies is elected by universal suffrage, at the rate of one member for every 10,000 of the population. The constituencies return one member each. Half of the Chamber is renewed every two years, and the mode of election is by public assemblies of the voters in each district.

The country is divided into six Departments, of which two, San José and Cartago, contain more than half the population, and a still larger proportion of the wealth and enterprise of Costa Rica.

The judges are appointed by the President in Council, subject, however, to a vote of the Assembly.

The elementary schools are supported by the Education State, and the average attendance appears to and be considerably higher than in Guatemala- Religion. about one-half of the children of school age being on the rolls. The State religion is Roman Catholic, but others are tolerated.

Finance.

The finances of Costa Rica are in a very unsatisfactory condition. The country has been virtually bankrupt for some time past, and, with decreasing trade and increasing taxes, the revenue is considerably below the expenditure. The revenue in 1886 was about £477,400, of which one-third was produced by the tobacco

and brandy monopolies, and the remainder from customs and taxation. Public debt, £2,390,000.

ECUADOR.

The Republic of Ecuador (capital, Quito), formerly a part of the kingdom of New Granada, which was liberated from Spain by Simon Bolivar, dissolved its connection with its neighbours in 1830. It is separated from Colombia in part by the equator, and has the empire of Brazil on the east, and Peru on the south.

Area, about 248,370 square miles.

Population, about one million, of whom more than half are pure "Indios." There was a civil war in 1883.

GOVERNMENT.

The Constitution was adopted in 1830, and has been revised on several occasions. The President is elected every four years, by indirect vote-nine hundred Presidential electors being chosen by suffrage of the settled population, depending on educational and religious (Roman Catholic) tests. A Vice-President is elected at the same time. The President is assisted by a Prime Minister, who is also Minister of the Interior, and three other Cabinet Ministers. There is also a Council of State, composed of the Ministers above named and seven others, with the Vice-President as its President. (The last election of President was made by Congress, apparently without a popular vote, in the emergency of civil war.)

The Senate includes 16 members, two being returned for each of the eight Provinces, and is renewed by halves every two years. The House of Deputies includes 30 members, returned by the same suffrage as that fixed for

the election of Presidential electors, in the ratio of one for every 30,000 of the inhabitants. The elections to this

House are biennial.

The Constitution of Ecuador somewhat strictly limits the power of the President, who cannot veto a law, nor shorten the ordinary session of Congress, which meets. annually, without summons, on the 10th of June.

There is a Supreme Court of Justice in Quito, with four Courts of Appeal in the Provinces; also district courts and justices of the peace for minor criminal cases.

The State religion is Roman Catholic, and other forms are not tolerated. Ecuador, in fact, is the most loyal in religion of the old Catholic States of South America, and it continues to send a tithe of its ecclesiastical revenues to Rome. Education, however, is comparatively neglected. Tithes are levied on the inhabitants for the service of the Church, but about 30 per cent. of the amount is taken for the use of the State.

The estimated revenue for 1886 was £369,750, of which the greater part was derived from customs. Expenditure, £484,280. Public debt, over three millions and a quarter.

FRANCE.

The Republic of France (capital, Paris) has for neighbours the Kingdom of Spain, the two Great Powers, Italy and Germany, the Republic of Switzerland, the guaranteed Kingdom of Belgium, and the territory of Luxemburg, which was formally neutralized by the Treaty of London in 1867. The northern boundary of France is the English Channel, about 21 miles from England at its narrowest part. The present republican form of government was proclaimed Sept. 4, 1870. Pretenders to the

throne exist in the persons of Legitimist and Bonapartist princes.

The area, according to the census of 1886, is 204,177 square miles a decrease of 5,403 square miles having taken place after the war with Germany in 1870-1. Population, 38,218,903-the loss of population in 1870–1 being recovered for the first time in 1886. Average population to the square mile, 187.

The 87 Departments (including the district of Belfort) are as follows :

Average area of the Departments, nearly 2,346 square miles. Belfort contains 235 square miles; Seine, including Paris, 184 square miles.

Average population in 1886, nearly 439,296; population of Seine, 2,961,089.

"Of the total population, 1,230,000 of the inhabitants of Brittany are estimated, unofficially, as speaking the Breton Celtic, and of these 768,000 are stated not to understand French. In the Pyrenean Departments are 116,000 Basques, and in Corsica and Nice about 300,000 Italianspeaking population." *

GOVERNMENT,

The difference between the present Constitution of France and that of any other existing 'Republic rests mainly upon the facts that in this country four distinct attempts have been made within a hundred years to establish popular government on a durable basis, and that the struggle with the deep-rooted monarchical principle has not to this day been definitely brought to an end. In 1789 the Tiers État began the century of conflict with the old régime. In 1830 the fight with a restored monarchy was brief and inconclusive, resulting mainly in the substitution of one king for another. In 1848 the victory was somewhat more decisive, but within four years Cæsarism for the second time plucked the fruit of revolution. In 1870, on the morrow of Sedan, the Republic was proclaimed as the natural and inevitable. alternative to the Empire, and for more than seventeen years since that time France has enjoyed the institutions. * The Statesman's Year Book, 1887.