A counfellor of ftate, who had neglected to have a velvet border ftript off a cloak, which he had worn for many years, was fummoned before the tribunal, whofe province it is to put the edict a gainst luxury in force, and received a fevere reprimand from thofe grave judges for the mifdemeanor. A lady alfo of the first quality, was obliged to appear before the fame tribunal, and underwent an equal cenfure for drinking a difh of chocolate in her box at the playhouse.

Among thefe regulations, many of which feem of a trifling nature, one has been made of the greatest importance; a law for enlarging the liberty of the prefs. By this edict, all perfons have liberty to write and reason, on all fubjects in general, and to publish their opinions. The laws of the kingdom, their utility, or their bad effects, are fubject to difcuffion and cenfure. All alliances ancient and modern, in which the kingdom is engaged, and all new ones which may be hereafter propofed, or even concluded, are subject to a free enquiry, and to have the good or bad confequences attending them point

ed out.

In order that the public may receive the moft authentic information upon all these points, every perfon has a right to demand, of the different colleges eftablished for the adminiftration of public bufinefs, from the fenate to the courts of the lowest jurifdiction, a communication of the regifters or journals, wherein all their decifions are entered. The courts are obliged to keep thefe journals very correct; and the debates; the dif

ferent opinions upon each fubject; the decifions in every caufe, with the reafons for them, are to be inferted. Any perfon, in whatsoever office, that refufes to communicate thefe registers, is to lofe his place.

The fenate alone has an exclufive privilege of not communicating its debates upon foreign matters; which it may for a time be requifite to keep fecret. Every perfon has liberty, during the feffions of the diet, to make obfervations on the debates and refolution of each deputation of the ftates, concerning any bufinefs whether general or particular, except fuch as regard the immediate adminiftration of government; and may print his obfervations on the fubject. And to facilitate a free enquiry; the king is to get an exact account of the fituation of the ftate in every department, made out and printed, before the meeting of each diet.

There are however fome reftrictions, which will fufficiently guard against the licentioufnefs of authors. No perfon is to write against the established religion of the kingdom, nor against the fundamental political conftitution, nor the rights of the different orders of the ftate. Personal satires and pasquinades, contrary to the refpect due to crowned heads, or injurious to the reputation of private perfons, are ftrictly forbid.

The printer is ordered to infert the author's name in the title-page of each book; in which cafe, the author alone is liable to be brought to an account for any exception.able paffage; but if the printer neglects this injunction, he is to be confidered as the author, and is

anfwer

anfwerable for the book. There is however an exception, that if a writer has particular reafons for not publishing his name, his leaving it in writing with the printer, to be produced if legally called for, will discharge the latter from all the confequences. This liberty, that is granted to the public, of investigating the principles up on which their own bufinefs is conducted, and of animadverting, as well upon the acts of the fenate, as upon thofe of the courts of juftice, and the other departments of the ftate, will be fo great a check upon the conduct of them. all, and attended with fuch manifest advantages to the people, that it requires no comment to explain them, and is fuch a precedent as may well deferve the attention of other ftates.

A general spirit of improvement feems to reign through the north. The young King of Denmark appears to fet out with all thofe difpofitions which can contribute to make his people happy, and the ftate refpectable.

His majefty is faid to have a scheme in agitation to reftore the peasants in his dominions to fome fhare of their natural liberties; in which, if he fucceeds, he will acquire great honour; and by granting to the lower and more numerous part of his fubjects the enjoy ment of perfonal freedom, will make amends to the country for the loss of their political conftitution.

The Empress of Ruffia ftill proceeds, on the fame enlarged and enlightened plan, which we have had occafion heretofore fo much to commend. She ftill continues to

cultivate and encourage the arts and fciences; to make her empire an afylum to the learned and ingenious; and to reform the manners and inftruct the minds of the people, through the extent of its most diftant provinces.

The tranfit of the planet Venus, over the fun, which is to happen in the fummer of 1769, has added a new opportunity of fhewing as well her munificence, as the attention fhe pays to aftronomy. This great princefs wrote a letter from Mofcow with her own hand, to Count Wolodimer Orlow, director of the academy of sciences at Petersburgh; wherein the defires the academy to inform her of the moft proper places in her dominions for the making of those obfervations; with an offer to fend workmen, &c. and to construct buildings in all thofe places, which the academy may think proper for the purpofe, and to grant every other affiftance to the undertaking which it may require. She also defired, if there was not a fufficient number of aftronomers in the academy to make obfervations in all the places required, to give her notice, that the might fend a proper number of the officers of her marine, to qualify themselves, under the eye of the profeffors in the academy, for that undertaking.

Such is the extent of this vaft empire, that the obfervations which are to be made, both on the tranfit and exit of this planet, the one in the frozen regions towards the pole, and the other on the borders of the Cafpian fea, are to be made within its own limits; to fome part of which,

aftro

aftronomers from every part of Europe are preparing to go, to be hold that remarkable event.

We obferve with pleasure, upon this occafion, that English artificers preferve the rank they have hitherto held in the mechanics .. fubfervient to this fcience. The academy at Petersburgh has applied to a member of the royal fociety of London, to procure the neceffary inftruments for the purpofe of proceeding fuccefsfully in that important obfervation. Mr. Ramoufky, who was the writer upon this occafion, candidly acknowledges the great joy of the academy, and their obligations to Mr. Short, for procuring them those inftruments; and confeffes their doubts of being able to anfwer the views of the Empress, till they had received his letter. Our readers will fee two letters upon this occafion, in the Appendix to the Chronicle.

With refpect to internal policy; the Emprefs of Ruffia has undertaken a great and arduous tafk, and worthy of an exalted mind. The laws of this vaft empire were voluminous to a degree of the greatest abfurdity, were perplexed, infufficient, in many cafes contradictory, and fo loaded with precedents, reports, cafes, and opinions, that they afforded an eternal fcene of altercation, and were scarcely to be reconciled or understood by the very profeffors of them. The particular laws of the different provinces were also continually interfering and clafhing, and caufed fuch confufion, that the whole prefented an endlefs chaos, and effaced almost every trace of original fyftem or defign.

This Augean ftable the Empress has determined to clean; to which purpose the fummoned deputies from every province in the empire to attend her at Mofcow, there to form an entire and new code of laws, for the government of the whole. The fuccefs, attending this patriotic attempt, will, we hope, make a part of the subject of our future obfervations.

We have already had an opportunity of taking notice of the good qualities of the prefent Grand Seignior; his humanity to his brothers, and the perfect and friendly good neighbourhood he has obferved in all the troubles of Poland, are much to his honour. He continues to give fresh opportunities of extolling his character, and has in a recent inftance again departed from the rigid policy of the Porte, by admitting the young prince of Wallachia to fucceed his father in that office. He has had

alfo an opportunity of fhewing his humanity and benevolence, on occafion of one of his men of war, which took fire in the harbour of Conftantinople, and was the cause of a great many fhips belonging to his fubjects being confumed. Upon this occafion, though it was after midnight, he attended in perfon, and gave his orders with the greatest activity, to prevent the farther dreadful effects of the conflagration; and gave directions that the unhappy fufferers fhould be paid their full loffes out of his treasury.

But the particular circumftance' of his life, which may poffibly preferve his name with great honour to pofterity, when even the Cruel and ferocious conquefts of his predeceffors are loft in obli

vion, is the encouragement he has given to the introduction of the art of printing in his dominions. He has alfo iffued orders for the tranflating of feveral of the moft valuable books from the European languages into the Turkish." It will not require the aid of a very warm imagination, in fome degree to conceive the great revolutions in the manners of the people, and in the policy of the ftate, which the introduction of learning into that mighty empire might probably occafion. Upon the whole, this prince's reign had been hitherto marked with a lenity, gentleness, and equity, which have been till now but little experienced under the Ottoman line.

The piratical ftates of Barbary have entirely thrown off that dependance which, ever fince the days of the famous Barbaroffa, for above two hundred years, they have had on the Turkish empire. A Serafkier, who was fent by the Porte to Algiers, to demand twenty years tribute, which was then due, was answered by the Dey, that he was firmly refolved, not only to refufe to discharge the arrear, but alfo to pay any tribute for the future: that the ftate of Algiers was abfolutely free and independant of the Porte; that it stood in no need of the Porte's protection; and that he, the Serafkier, might return to Conftantinople with that answer. The Serafkier was not more fortunate in the execution of his commiffion to the reft of thofe ftates, on each of whom he had demands of the fame nature, and received anfwers from them all nearly to the fame purpose. We do not find that the Porte has taken any measures in confequence

of this refufal, either to enforce the demand, or to refent the contempt fhewn to its authority; nor is it probable that the prefent ftate of its marine will admit of fuch an attempt.

In a government constituted like this, it is not eafy to fay what effects, causes, even in appearance the moft trifling, may produce. Many fymptoms of weaknefs manifeft themselves in this great empire. A little prince of Georgia has been capable of giving it a confiderable alarm. The piratical ftates of Barbary do not think it worth while, as we have seen, to purchafe its protection. An infurrection of peafants in a frontier province, which would in fome countries be little more than an object of policè, may have there serious confequences on the state.

An infurrection of this kind has happened this year in the province of Montenero, which is tributary to the Grand Seignior, but which borders upon the Venetian Dalmatia, The country is rough, mountainous, and in a great meafure inacceffible; the inhabitants partake of the nature of the foil and fituation, and are rude, ferocious, and warlike. Thefe people are of the Greek religion; and though they have at different times paid tribute, both to the Turks and Venetians, yet, from their fituation and other circumftances, they have escaped that total state of fubjection and fervitude, to which the neighbouring poffeffors of a happier foil, and more acceffible country, were fubject.

A foreigner, who exercifed the profeffion of a phyfician, and went by the name of Stefano, has for fome time refided amongst these

people.