NEWS OF THE WEEK.
THE long-expected Austrian Note which is to be presented to the Porte has at last been submitted to the European Cabinets. It has been accepted by Russia, Germany, and France, and will, it is expected, receive the adhesion of Great Britain. It is a very mild document. According to analyses which have appeared -simultaneously in different papers, Count Andrassy suggests that the Porte should establish religious equality in Bosnia and the Herzegovina; should sweep away the existing Courts and substi- tute pure tribunals ; should abolish the present system of taxation in favour of definite payments ; should leaie a portion of the revenue to be spent within the Province itself ; and should -appoint a mixed Commission of Mussulmans and Christians to see these reforms worked out. The Note contains no suggestion of a guarantee for the execution of these reforms, nor is it proposed that they should be embodied in a treaty. The proposals will, we presume, be accepted gladly by the Porte ; but, :as we have tried to show elsewhere, they must be illusory, and it is difficult to believe that they are entirely sincere. Count Andrassy knows perfectly well that while Constantinople holds a Christian province, it will plunder that province, let its pro- clamations be as meekly philanthropic as they may.
