According to a statement by M. Victor Turquan the number of paid officials, clerks, workmen, &c. (exclusive of the army and navy), employed in France and Algeria in 1896 was 384,038, and their payment amounted to 585,362,930 francs. The number includes 44,863 clergymen, 121,712 teachers, and 6,560 judges, magistrates, &c. The number of unpaid functionaries (mayors, councillors, &c.) is put at 462,500.

II. MOVEMENT OF THE POPULATION.
Births, Deaths, and Marriages.

Including still-births, the total number of births in 1903 was 865,786 of which 45 per cent. were still-births. Of the living births, 8.8 per cent. were illegitimate.

The number of divorces was 7,179 in 1899, 7,157 in 1900, 7,741 in 1901, 8,431 in 1902, 8.919 in 1903, the aggregate number of 119,517 divorces having been registered since the new law was voted in 1884.

III. PRINCIPAL TOWNS.

The following, according to the cnesus of 1901 are the 71 towns with a legal population over 30,000:

On March 29, 1896, and on March 24, 1901, the urban and rural population of France were :

In 1901 the resident population of the communes was as follows:

:

Population

For fiscal and electoral purposes the population of each commune is divided into agglomerated, scattered, and separated (comptée à part); the first two constitute the municipal population, and the third consists of garrison, college, prison, and hospital population. Different from this is the distinction between urban and rural population, a commune being urban where the agglomerated population is over 2,000, and rural where under 2,000. In 1891 the total urban population was 14,311,292 (37.4 per cent.); the rural, 24,031,900 (62.6 per cent). In 1896, of the 36,170 communes 28,005 had each a population under 1,000; 5,443 had a population from 1,000 to 2,000; 2,134 from 2,000 to 5,000; 337 from 5,000 to 10,000; 134 from 10,000 to 20,000; and 117 over 20,000.

Religion.

All religions are equal by law, and any sect which numbers 100,000 adherents is entitled to a grant; but at present only the

Roman Catholics, Protestants, and Jews have State allowances. For two years these grants were estimated as follows :—

There are 17 archbishops and 67 bishops; the number of Catholic ecclesiastical officials paid by the State in 1905, comprised 3,452 curés (or parish clergy), 185 vicars-general, 695 canons, and about 31,000 desservants over 60 years of age officiating in chapels of ease. The Protestants of the Augsburg Confession, or Lutherans, are, in their religious affairs, governed by a General Consistory; while the members of the Reformed Church, or Calvinists, are under a Council of Administration, the seat of which is at Paris. In 1905 there were 638 pastors of the Reformed Church, and 62 Lutheran, while the Jewish rabbis and assistants numbered 57. In the Protestant Theological Facultés of Paris and Montauban there were 110 students in 1903.

The religious associations law, passed July 1, 1901, requires religious establishments to be authorised by the State. According to published statistics there were in France and Algeria, on January 1, 1901, 3,216 recog nised establishments for men, 2,748 being for educational work, the whole comprising 30,136 members. For women there were 2,870 recognised establishments and 13,428 not recognised; total for women, 16,298, with 129,492 members. There is a dispute respecting the appointment of bishops, and between the French Government and the Vatican matters have become so strained that diplomatic relations are now suspended.

Instruction.

Instruction in France is regulated mainly by the laws of March 18, 1850; June 14, 1854; July 12, 1875; August 9, 1879; February 27 and December 21, 1880; June 16, 1881; March 20, 1882; October 30, 1886; July 19, 1889; July 25, 1893; and July 10, 1896. To these laws has to be added the Associations Law of July 1, 1901, and also the decree of June 27, 1902. The Minister of Instruction, seconded by the Government educational bureaus and inspectors-general, directs public and controls private schools. The Superior Council of 58 members has deliberative,

administrative and judiciary functions, and a Consultative Committee alvises respecting the working of the school system, but the inspectorsgeneral are in direct communication with the Minister. For local educational administration France is divided into 17 circumscriptions, called Academies, each under a Rector, and each provided with academy inspectors (one for each department) besides primary inspectors of schools (usually one for each arrondissement). Each department has a council for educational matters, the préfet being president, and this body has large powers with respect to the inspection, management, and maintenance of schools.

The law of June 28, 1833, was the first organic law of primary instruction; it obliged each commune to maintain at least one primary school, and each department one primary normal school, while, by means of school fees and the communal, departmental and State budgets, it provided the necessary resources. The law of March 15, 1850, which in certain respects impaired public instruction, rendered obligatory the maintenance of a school for girls in towns of more than 800 inhabitants; the law of April 10, 1867, extended this obligation to communes of more than 500 inhabitants.

The

it

Since 1878 primary instruction has been entirely reorganised and great progress has been made. The law of June 1, 1878, gave the impetus to the erection of schools, for which there was spent in 30 years by the communes, the departments, and the State, about 1,000 millions of francs. grants for school buildings in 1902 amounted to about six million francs. The law of August 9, 1879, rendered obligatory for each department the maintenance of two primary normal schools, one for school-masters, the other for school-mistresses; two higher normal schools of primary instruction have been established, one at Fontenay-aux-Roses for school-mistresses, the other at St. Cloud for school-masters. The law of June 16, 1881, made instruction absolutely free in all primary public schools; that of March 28, 1882, rendered it obligatory for all children from 6 to 13 years of age. The law of October 30, 1886, is the organic law of primary instruction now in force; it established that teachers should be lay; for infant schools substituted écoles maternelles for salles d'asile; it fixed the programmes of instruction, and established freedom of private schools under the supervision of the school authorities. The laws of July 19, 1889, and July 25, 1893, determined the payment of the teachers, who are nominated by the préfet on the recommendation of the Academy inspector under the authority of the minister, and who (except in towns of more than 150,000 inhabitants) are paid directly by the State, which itself receives the eight additional centimes for primary instruction, formerly collected on behalf of the communes and departments. Of army recruits in 1902, 1.25 per cent. could read but not write; 4 37 per cent. could neither read nor write. The following table shows the condition of primary instruction in 1876-77 and in 1901-02 and 1902-03 (in the figures of 1876-77 Algeria is not included; it has been included since 1887-88):

The number of pupils enrolled in the schools, public or private, is greater than the number attending them, since children changing their schools in the course of the year are enrolled several times. Of 1,000 pupils enrolled during the whole year, it was computed in 1897 that in the public schools there were enrolled in December 875, of whom 786 were present, and in the private schools 911, of whom 851 were present.

Since the year 1888-89, when there were 5,623,401 pupils (the maximum), there has been a yearly decrease in the total number of pupils of the primary schools, although not in 1897-98, 1898-99, and 1901-02 (the maximum was 5,526,800 in 1900-01); the principal cause of this decrease seems to have been the diminution of births. The decrease affected only the public schools up to 1900-01: 4,492,894 pupils in 1888-89, 4, 149, 202 in 1900-01, 4,175,575 in 1901-02; the number of pupils in the private clerical schools was 1,012,381 in 1888-89, and 1,256,381 in 1901-02 (the maximum in 1900-01 was 1,257,348). In the infant schools the number is increasing: 707,522 in 1888-89 and 753,708 in 1901-02.

The application of the law of July 1, 1901, as regards the teaching congregations, resulted in 1902-03 in the refusal of authorisation to the congregations applying for it and the closing of many private establishments. Statistics are not yet complete, but provisional returns up to October 12, 1903, show that about 10,000 clerical schools have been closed, and about 5,800 (including over 1,000 boys' schools) have been reopened under the direction of laymen or former clerics. A decree of June 27, 1902, closed 115 establishments open without authorisation since the passing of the law of June 1, 1901. In 1903 the Chamber of Deputies in agreement with the