The attitude of
Prussia compels all the little states to keep up armies, which eat up
their substance, and burden the people with taxes. This is the more
to be regretted now, when Bavaria is undergoing a peaceful
revolution, and throwing off the trammels of galling customs in other
respects.
THE EMANCIPATION OF MUNICH
The 1st of September saw go into complete effect the laws enacted in
1867, which have inaugurated the greatest changes in business and
social life, and mark an era in the progress of the people worthy of
fetes and commemorative bronzes. We heard the other night at the
opera-house "William Tell" unmutilated. For many years this
liberty-breathing opera was not permitted to be given in Bavaria,
except with all the life of it cut out. It was first presented entire
by order of young King Ludwig, who, they say, was induced to command
its unmutilated reproduction at the solicitation of Richard Wagner,
who used to be, and very likely is now, a "Red," and was banished from
Saxony in 1848 for fighting on the people's side of a barricade in
Dresden. It is the fashion to say of the young king, that he pays no
heed to the business of the kingdom. You hear that the handsome boy
cares only for music and horseback exercise: he plays much on the
violin, and rides away into the forest attended by only one groom, and
is gone for days together.
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