Appletons' Annual Cyclopaedia and Register of Important Events: Embracing ...

teachers, 48,973; Sunday-school scholars, 296,512; day schools, 44; scholars in the same, 4,317.

The fifty-fourth Conference met in London, June 11th. The Rev. S. Autliff was elected president. The Missionary Committee reported the year's contributions greater than ever before. The gross amount was £32,257, 11s. 1d. The missions were generally in good condition. Additional missionaries were needed for the colonies and Africa. The reports of the statistical committee showed a decrease of 806 in the number of members from the previous year.

The report of the Primitive Methodist Missionary Society, which was made April 29th, shows that the society had in the United Kingdom 64 missions, 11 circuit missions, and 126 missionaries; in Canada, 38 missions, and 46 missionaries; in New Zealand, 6 stations and 7 missionaries; in New South Wales and Queensland, 22 missions and 22 missionaries; in Victoria and Tasmania, 12 missions and 12 missionaries; in South Australia, 6 missions and 7 missionaries; in Africa, 4 stations and 6 missionaries: in all, 150 missions and 226 missionaries. The sum of £32,257 had been expended during the year in the support and enlargement of missionary opera

tions.

The following are the statistics of the Prim itive Methodist Connection in Canada: Number of ministers, 91; local preachers, 270; class-leaders, 269; connectional churches, 196; other preaching-places, 121; parsonages, 31; value of church property, $218,037; church debts, $25,190; Sunday-schools, 136; teachers, 1,170; scholars, 8,260; church-members in Sunday-schools, 6,609. The reports show a decrease of 238 members.

The following are the statistics of the Primitive Methodist Churches in the United States, as reported at the two Conferences in May, 1873:

Eastern District, Conference held at Plymouth, Pa., May 14th to 19th: Circuits, 16; members (approved, 909; probationers, 214), 1,123; traveling preachers, 10; local preachers, 89; class leaders, 64; churches, 17; other preaching-places, 24; Sunday-schools, 26; teachers, 360; scholars, 1,918; missionary contributions, $371,64.

Western District, Conference held at New Diggings, Wis., May 22d to 27th: Circuits and missions, 19; members (approved, 1,632, probationers, 110), 1,742; traveling preachers, 18; local preachers, 102; class-leaders, 93; churches, 36; other preaching-places, 42; Sunday-schools, 42; teachers, 463; scholars, 2,495. Contributions for missions, $1,413.58; for the superannuated preachers' fund, $161.90. Total members in the two Conferences, 2,865; traveling preachers, 28; local preachers, 191. XI. UNITED METHODIST FREE CHURCHES.The following are the statistics of this denomination, as presented at the Conference of

1873: Ministers, 329; supernumeraries, 24; local preachers, 3,374; leaders, 4,309; members, 66,566; members on trial, 4,861; chapels, 1,303; preaching-rooms, 277; Sunday-schools, 1,218; teachers, 24,152; scholars, 160,037; day-schools, 91; teachers, 180; scholars, 11,148; chapels registered, 978; chapels settled on the connectional deed, 335. The reports of the home circuits showed a decrease of 676 members, while those of the foreign circuits showed an increase of 335 members. Thus there appeared a net decrease of 341 members. A communication was received from the Vigilance Committee appointed at the conference of Churchmen and Nonconformists which had recently been held, asking the assembly to aid the committee in their efforts against ritualism and the confession. The resolutions adopted by the assembly in reply to this communication expressed regret at the progress of "anti-Protestant teachings and practices in the Established Church;" advised ministers and members to cooperate with all true Protestants in efforts to disseminate information among the people on the points of difference between Protestantism and Roman Catholicism; expressed the belief that "Romanizing doctrines and practices," so far as Protestants are concerned, were almost exclusively confined to the Established Church, and that the privileges of this Church were used by "a large and rapidly-increasing section of the clergy," to the subversion of the Protestant faith; and declared that it saw in these facts additional evidences of the desirability of disestablishing the Church.

XII. BIBLE CHRISTIANS.-The fifty-sixth annual conference of the Bible Christian Connection met at Landport, Portsmouth Circuit, July 30th. The Conference was composed of sixty ministers and ten lay delegates. The Rev. J. B. Vanstone was elected president. The statistical reports showed the numbers, etc., in the Connection to be as follows: Itinerant preachers, 259; local preachers, 1,727; chapels, 870; other preaching-places, 202; members, 25,815; on trial, 612; teachers in schools, 9,411; scholars, 48,678. The number of members had decreased 394. The receipts of the Missionary Society for the year were £6,253, or £300 more than those of the preceding year, and considerably more than those of any previous year. The amounts contributed for the support of the ministry were about £250 moro than those of any previous year.

The Canadian Conference of the Bible Christian denomination was held at Lindsay. The Rev. E. Roberts was chosen president. A small increase was reported in the number of members.

XIII. WESLEYAN REFORM UNION.-The annual delegate meeting of the Wesleyan Reform Union in England was held at Bakewell, commencing August 19th. It was ordered that a friendly letter be sent to those circuits which had reported a decrease in membership, urg

ing them to increased efforts for usefulness. The relation of Sunday-schools to the Union was discussed.

XIV. PRIMITIVE Wesleyan METHODIST CONNECTION. The churches of this body are all in Ireland. The body originated in a separation from the Wesleyan Methodist Church, which took place in 1816, on a question of the administration of the sacraments. The primitive Wesleyans hold that while the Methodist organization is competent to provide for other functions, only ministers of Episcopal ordination are qualified to administer the sacraments. Consequently, they have received the communion from the Church of England. The Conference met in Dublin, in July. The subject of union with the Irish Methodist Conference occupied a considerable share of attention. A representative committee was appointed to meet a minister and a layman who had already been designated by the Wesleyans as their committee, and arrange a basis of satisfactory union. The action of the Conference on this subject was unanimous.

MEXICO (REPÚBLICA MEXICANA), an independent state of North America, extending from latitude 15° to 32° 42′ north, and from longitude 86° 30' to 116° 50' west. It is bounded north by the United States; east by the Gulf of Mexico, the Caribbean Sea, and British Honduras; south by Guatemala; and south and west by the Pacific Ocean; and its area, according to official returns of 1869, is 1,030,442 square miles. Señor Don Antonio García y Cubas, however, in his geography, published in the same year, sets down the area at 1,972,648 square kilometres, or only 761,640 square miles. The republic is divided into twenty-seven States, one Territory, and one Federal District, which, with their populations (in 1869), and capitals, are respectively as follows:

The geographer already mentioned gives 8,743,614 as the total population of the republic, distributed according to races as follows: 1,750,000 pure-blooded Indians; 2,331,000 whites; and 4,662,000 mestizoes.

Wappæus estimates the population at about 8,000,000 in 1861, thus far agreeing with Sr. García y Cubas; but his estimate of the number of Indians and mestizoes 4,800,000 of the former, and 1,190,000 of the latter-is probably farther from the truth; inasmuch as the mixed race is, by all authorities, admitted to be by far the more numerous of the two.

The following is a list of the Mexican cities having more than 20,000 inhabitants:

Sebastian Lerdo de Tejada (elected November The President of the republic is Señor Don 2, 1872); Minister of the Interior, Gomez del Palacio; Minister of Justice and Public Instruction, José Diaz Covarrubias (Director); Minister of Finance, Francisco Mejía; Minister of War and Marine, General Ignacio Mejia; Minister of Public Works, Blas Balcárcel.

tice is General Porfirio Diaz.
The President of the Supreme Court of Jus-
The present
Archbishop of Mexico is P. A. de Labastida;
Archbishop of Michoacan, Dr. Arciga; and of
Guadalajara, Dr. P. Loza. Mexican minister
plenipotentiary to the United States, Sr. Don
Ignacio Mariscal; consul-general at New York,
Sr. Don N. Navarro.

The national income and expenditure for the fiscal years 1871 and 1872 are given as follows: