thus acquire and the consciousness of doing their duty. So far as paid judges are con cerned there seems to be the greatest dis crepancy between the various countries. While the Lord Chief Justice of England receives £8,000, the Master of the Rolls £6,000, and the judges of the King's Bench and the Chancery Courts get £5,000 each, the chief judge of the French Court of Ap peals receives only £1,200, and the Presi dent of the German Court of last resort only £1,250. Some of the French, German and Italian judges of the rank of American cir cuit judges or English High Court judges are paid only £200 to £700. One of the noticeable features of the judicial system that prevails on the continent is the reluc tance to have courts constituted of one judge only, and it may be said that this disinclina tion is not unnaturally the greatest in these countries in which the judges receive the lowest salaries. In the French Court of Cassation, for example, no case can be heard unless at least eleven judges are pres ent on the bench to hear it! The obvious moral is that it is cheaper and altogether more satisfactory to have a highly paid ju diciary, small in numbers, constituted of the very best material the bar affords, than poorly paid judges of whose abilities there is such distrust that it is necessary to em ploy nearly a baker's dozen of them to hear an important case on appeal. At the recent annual Congress of the Trades Unions of England the naturalization laws of the country were considered and resolutions were passed urging Parliament to reduce the cost of obtaining naturalization, and to simplify the procedure. At present, under the Act of 1870, a foreigner desirous
of becoming an English citizen must have resided in England, before presenting his petition, a complete period of five years. His petition must be presented to one of the' Secretaries of State, accompanied by sworn declarations from two householders, them selves citizens, that they have personally known the applicant during the five years of his residence in England, and by the declara tion of two other householders that they be lieve the applicant to be a fit and proper person to become a citizen of the country of his adoption. In the ordinary practice a period of nearly six weeks elapses between the filing of the petition and the granting of the certificate of citizenship, and the cost of the procedure is about thirty dollars. While this must seem a vigorous measure in con trast with the ease with which foreigners become citizens of the United States, it cer tainly has the result of ensuring that only those who are qualified and who are willing to make some sacrifice for the privilege shall become citizens. It is remarkable, however, that the trades unionists, who are generally bent upon excluding from the working force of the community all outside their own ranks, should be disposed in this instance to open wider the doors of admission to the country. The motive probably lies in the fact that there are now within their membership a large number of foreigners who, as such, are not entitled to the suffrage, and who are not qualified or willing under the present restrictions to obtain it. If the mountain is brought to Mahomet they will acknowledge the courtesy by voting for labor members of Parliament — a scheme that may not com mend itself to our law makers. Stuff Gown.
