public exchequer. The officer or officers shall likewise be summoned against whom is brought the charge which originated the action, and he or they may be present at all proceedings if they consider this to be their interest.

ART. 77. An extract from the complaint, signed by the clerk of the court, in which shall be given the name, surname, and domicile of the plaintiff, the amount claimed, and a brief statement of the facts in the case, shall be immediately published in some newspaper printed in the chief town of the department, if any is printed there; and if there is none, in some of those printed in the nearest town. This shall be published at the expense of the plaintiff.

ART. 78. Any citizen who is not debarred from so doing by any legal impediment may appear as a party opposing the action brought, in addition to the persons mentioned in article 76.

ART. 79. In these suits the testimony of witnesses shall not be admitted as evidence unless it is shown that the officer who caused the injury or condemnation refused to give suitable documentary evidence thereof, or unless it shall appear evident, from the nature and circumstances of the case, that it was absolutely impossible to obtain such documentary evidence.

ART. 80. In order to make better provision, the court may cause all such probatory measures to be taken as may best conduce to the establishment of the truth.

ART. 81. A plaintiff who shall have manifestly exaggerated the amount of the damages or injuries suffered shall be liable to the payment of a fine equal to 25 per cent of the sum claimed, and shall also be liable to have any other civil or criminal action brought against him that may result from the suit. It shall be the duty of the judge executing the sentence to collect the fine, for which purpose he may resort to coercive measures. If an indeterminate value is claimed in the suit, the plaintiff, in the cases mentioned in this article, shall be required to pay a fine of not less than five hundred nor more than a thousand dollars. In case of the plaintiff's insolvency, he shall be imprisoned one day for each dollar that he fails to pay.

ART. 82. In no case shall it be claimed that the Nation is under obligations to pay for damages, injuries, or condemnations that have not been done or executed by the legitimate authorities or their agents, acting in their public character.

ART. 83. All persons, not holding official positions, who shall order contributions or forced loans, or who shall commit acts of spoliation of any kind whatever, and also those who shall obey such orders, shall be responsible to the parties injured, both directly and personally, with their property.

ART. 84. The Government shall order the payment of such sums as the courts may decide to be the amount of the damages and injuries done, provided that a copy be presented, in due form, of the judicial decision declaring that the public treasury is bound to pay the indemnity asked for.

ART. 85. The Nation shall assert its right to cause the responsible officer to refund to the public treasury the amount that it shall have disbursed by reason of the condemnatory sentence pronounced in favor of the claimant.

TITLE VII.

SOLE CHAPTER.-Naturalization of foreigners.

ART. 86. In order to become naturalized, according to paragraph 3, article 7, of the constitution of the Republic, the following shall be the proper mode of procedure: A person desiring to become naturalized must furnish evidence to the political chief of the department that he has resided in the Republic for two years; that his conduct has been good, and that he has an income, profession, art, trade, or other proper means of earning his livelihood. The evidence on these points may be either documentary or furnished by the testimony of one or more witnesses. The papers in the case having been prepared, the political chief shall send them to the department of foreign relations, and when the application shall have been examined, the President of the Republic shall issue an order granting naturalization if the conditions required shall have been complied with. The order having been issued, a copy of it shall be sent to the officer having charge of the Civil Register, so that he may record it, as required by law.

ART. 87. In order to make the reservation regarding nationality which is mentioned in article 7 of the constitution of the Republic and the statement referred to in article 6 of that instrument, the interested parties shall apply, in writing, to the departmental political chiefs, who, after having caused them to ratify their applications, shall send the latter to the department of foreign relations, which shall issue the proper certificate on payment of one dollar, which payment shall cover all charges except that for the stamped paper used. This certificate, in order to have proper legal effect, must be recorded in the Civil Register.

ART. 88. Any foreigner, without distinction of origin, may be naturalized in accordance with the provisions of article 86.

ART. 89. Naturalization may be express, tacit, or presumptive. ART. 90. Certificates of naturalization are divided into two classes, viz, concessory and declarative certificates. By the former, naturalization is expressly, granted; the latter contains a declaration that the parties interested have become naturalized according to law, owing to their having complied with certain requirements, or, what amounts to the same thing, they contain a declaration of tacit naturalization.

ART. 91. A certificate declarative of tacit naturalization is retroactive in its effects to the time when the loyal act was consummated which effected the change of nationality; whereas a concessory certificate produces its effects on and after the day of its issue.

ART. 92. No certificate of naturalization can be granted to a subject of a nation that is at war with Guatemala, or to a person who is reputed to be or who has been legally convicted, in any country, of being a pirate, a slave trader, an incendiary, a poisoner, a parricide, or a counterfeiter of coin or bank notes, or of other paper serving as a substitute for coin.

ART. 93. Tacit naturalization is secured

I. By not making the reservation referred to in paragraph 1, article 7, of the constitution of the Republic.

II. By accepting one of those public offices which are reserved for Guatemalans.

ART. 94. A naturalized person acquires all the rights and contracts all the obligations of Guatemalans, unless such rights and obligations are excepted in the following articles:

TITLE VII.

SOLE CHAPTER.-Concerning expulsion.

ART. 95. The territory of Guatemala is an asylum for all foreigners. ART. 96. The Government exercises over foreigners all the rights of inspection and vigilance which belong to it, according to the laws and police regulations, which foreigners, without exception, are required to obey.

ART. 97. If foreigners who have taken refuge in Guatemala shall (misusing the right of asylum) conspire against the country or endeavor to overthrow or modify its institutions, or to disturb in any way the public tranquillity and peace of a friendly nation, the Government may order their expulsion from the national territory.

ART. 98. Foreigners who, not having permission from the Government to remain in the country as domiciled persons, shall fail to furnish evidence that they possess adequate means of subsistence, may be sent to the frontier of the country from which they come, or put on board of a vessel in one of the ports of the Republic.

ART. 99. A foreigner temporarily residing in the country, or an immigrant, who endangers public tranquillity by his conduct, or who has been prosecuted for or convicted in another country of one of the crimes or offenses for which extradition is granted, may be compelled by the Government to leave a determinate place, or to reside in such place as may be assigned to him, and finally to leave the Republic.

ART. 100. An immigrant who, being unable to identify himself, shall be guilty of falsehood in stating his name and circumstances may be expelled from the territory of Guatemala by order of the President of the Republic, as may be any person presenting fraudulent documents for the purpose of identification.

ART. 101. Political chiefs and municipal alcaldes shall take care that indigent foreigners, and also those who are sick and in need, be always assisted by the charitable establishments and board under their control, and they shall in all cases, acting in concert with the consular officers of the nation to which such foreigners belong, take proper measures to return them to the country whence they came.

ART. 102. The same course is to be pursued in the case of abandoned children, the offspring of foreigners. In such cases the effort. shall always be made to reconcile the interests of good order and a proper police system with the sacred duties of humanity.

ART. 103. Decisions respecting sick and indigent foreigners and foreign children who have been abandoned shall always be brought to the knowledge of the proper consular officer, who shall be requested to take charge of persons belonging to the former of the above-mentioned classes of persons, on his own responsibility.

ART. 104. If a foreign government shall request, on grounds considered sufficient, the internment of one of its subjects who resides in a town or locality near to the frontier of such country, the Government of Guatemala may intern him, and designate as his residence such place or territory as it may think proper.

ART. 105. Only in exceptional cases connected with the preservation of public order can foreigners be expelled who are married to Guatemalan women, and who have resided in the country for a period exceeding five years. The same rule applies to those whose option of nationality is still pending.

ART. 106. The person whom the order of expulsion concerns shall in all cases be notified thereof, and at least twenty-four hours shall be allowed him in which to obey it. The procedure in cases of expulsion is simply executive.

ART. 107. In case of disobedience, the public force shall proceed to effect the expulsion, and if the expelled person shall return to the territory of Guatemala he shall be tried by the courts of the Republic and shall be punished for disobedience, in pursuance of article 142 of the Penal Code; but when he shall have paid or served out the penalty to which he shall have been sentenced, he may again be expelled from the territory of the Republic, to which end the judge who shall have tried the case shall take care to notify the minister of the interior in due time and through the proper channel.

TITLE IX.

ART. 108. The purchase of wild lands in territory on the frontier is absolutely prohibited to the native citizens of nations bordering on Guatemala, and to those who have become naturalized therein.

ART. 109. A foreigner who is allowed by law to purchase wild lands may preempt a number of caballerias' not exceeding fifteen; in no case, however, shall he be allowed to transfer his property, or any real estate that he may have acquired in the Republic, to any foreign government.

TITLE X.

CHAPTER I.-Concerning criminal cases.

ART. 110. The laws relating to police and public safety are subject to no exception whatever, and are binding upon all persons residing within the territory of the State. Foreigners are, therefore, amenable to the laws and courts of Guatemala for any crimes that they may commit within the territory of Guatemala.

ART. 111. The following persons are excepted from the provisions of the foregoing article: Princes of reigning families, Presidents or Chief Magistrates of other countries, ambassadors, ministers plenipotentiary, ministers resident, chargés d'affaires, and foreigners who are permanently employed at legations. Such persons, when they commit a crime, shall be placed at the disposal of their respective governments. ART. 112. Cognizance of crimes whose commission has been begun in Guatemala, and consummated or frustrated in foreign countries, shall be taken by the courts and judges of Guatemala, in case the acts perpetrated in Guatemala constitute crimes in themselves, and only with respect to such crimes.

ART. 113. Foreigners shall be tried by the judges and courts of the Republic when they shall have committed one of the following crimes outside of the territory of the nation: A crime against the independence of the Republic, the integrity of its territory, its form of government, its tranquillity, its internal or external safety, or against the chief magistrate of the State, or the crime of forging the signature of the President of the Republic or of the ministers of state, or of counterfeiting the public seals, the legal coin of Guatemala, the paper money of Guatemala which legally is in circulation, bonds, certificates, or other docu

1A caballeria of land is equal to about thirty-three and one-third acres.

ments of the national public credit, or notes issued by a bank doing business in the Republic in pursuance of its laws and authorized to issue such notes, and also the crime of introducing such counterfeit papers or money into the Republic and circulating the same therein.

ART. 114. If persons guilty of the crimes enumerated in the foregoing article shall have been acquitted or punished in a foreign country, their cases shall not be reopened, provided that (in the latter case) they shall have suffered the full penalty to which they were sentenced. The same shall be the case if they have been pardoned, except when they have been guilty of the crime of treason. If they have suffered a part of the penalty, allowance therefor shall be made, and it shall be deducted from that which they would otherwise have to suffer.

ART. 115. The provisions of the foregoing articles apply to foreigners who have committed any of the crimes therein enumerated, when they are apprehended in Guatemalan territory or when their extradition is obtained.

ART. 116. The following persons shall also be tried by the judges and courts of the Republic, unless there is something to prevent in the existing international treaties:

1. Foreigners who commit a crime on the high seas on board of a Guatemalan vessel.

2. Foreigners who commit a crime on board of a foreign merchant vessel anchored in a Guatemalan port, or being in the territorial waters of the Republic, unless such crime is committed by a person belonging to the crew against another member of the same crew.

3. Foreigners, members of the crew of a foreign merchant vessel, even though they have committed a crime against a person belonging to the same crew, if the aid of the Guatemalan authorities is asked for on board of the vessel, or when the tranquillity of the port is endangered by the perpetration of the crime.

4. Foreigners who have committed against Guatemalans, in a foreign country, the crime of arson, murder, robbery, or any other for which the perpetrator is extraditable, provided that a charge has been made by a person having a legal right to make charges.

ART. 117. The ordinary courts are competent to take cognizance of offenses committed by foreigners, and the judges of the place where they are committed shall be the only ones having authority to try their perpetrator.

ART. 118. Foreigners may enter a complaint on account of offenses committed against their persons or property, or the property of those whom they represent, security always being furnished previously, the amount of which shall be fixed by the competent court or judge, subject to such exceptions as may be authorized by treaty or by the principle of reciprocity.

ART. 119. The statements of foreigners who are brought to trial, and who are ignorant of the Spanish language or those of witnesses who are unable to express themselves in Spanish, shall be made through a sworn interpreter, and the questions and answers shall be recorded in the national language and in that of the prisoner or the witness making the statement. When this is not possible, the papers containing the questions and answers shall be sent to the office of the official translator.

ART. 120. In no case shall the sentences pronounced by foreign courts be executed in Guatemala, nor shall they occasion the additional punishment curtailed by a repetition of the offense.