Page:The Annual Register 1899.djvu/344

 336] FOKEIGN HISTOEY.

presenting the Chambers of Commerce constituted an actual authority in opposition to Parliament, and the hostility of the former, as had been shown, could close the purses of an important section to the demands of the latter. Arrests con- tinued to be made and votes of confidence in the Cortes obtained with more or less difficulty. The bill for the reduction of pensions was withdrawn, and a promise was given to set at liberty all those imprisoned for non-payment of taxes if the opposition to their payment would be stopped. At the same time the warship Carlos V. was sent to Barcelona harbour to receive prisoners, to which act the Chambers of Commerce replied by transmitting to the Ministry a demand for an imme- diate revision of the Budget, based on the reorganisation of the public service, giving precedence to productive over military expenditure, and ensuring thereby an economy of 50,000,000 pesetas.

On the latter point, the Government proving intractable, the Chambers of Commerce addressed a manifesto to the nation (Nov. 29) explaining their views, and the Government suddenly found it expedient to give way on all points. The imprisoned Catalans were released ; the state of siege was raised at Barce- lona, and negotiations on the proposed new charges were opened with the parliamentary Opposition. Finally the Chamber passed a vote authorising the postponement of the debates on the Budget of 1898-9 until the bill authorising the fresh expenditure had been accepted by the Cortes. In a word legal resistance triumphed all along the line, and a new social organisation seemed to be taking its place beside the old and now powerless parliamentary institutions, and Spanish militarism to be exhausted by its former excesses.

V. PORTUGAL.

On the assembling of the Cortes (Jan. 2) the Portuguese Government at once intimated its intention of remaining strictly neutral in any disputes arising among European Powers, just as it had done in the previous year during the quarrel between Spain and the United States. It had willingly in- timated its adherence to the principles of the Peace Congress, "and was equally ready to take part in any conference for the repression of the anarchists. The Ministry further promised that the Cortes should be duly informed at the proper moment of the negotiations which concerned the holders of the external debt.

In the speech from the Throne the Eling insisted that it was not enough to retain the colonial possessions in their absolute integrity, but that the sacred patrimony of the nation should be profitably developed, as intimately bound up with the economic generation of the mother-country.

The declarations of the Government, however, with regard to the external debt were not of a nature to satisfy the bond-