Such is also the municipal administration in the Prussian towns on the Rhine.

Then, in Bonn, for instance,[4230] the municipal council, elected by the inhabitants "goes in quest" of some eminent specialist whose ability is well known.

It must be noted that he is taken wherever he can be found, outside the city, in some remote province; they bargain with him, the same as with some famous musician, for the management of a series of concerts.

Under the title of burgomaster, with a salary of 10,000 francs per annum, he becomes for twelve years the director of all municipal services, leader of the civic orchestra, solely entrusted with executive power, wielding the magisterial baton which the various instruments obey, many of these being salaried functionaries and others benevolent amateurs,[4231] all in harmony and through him, because they know that he is watchful, competent, and top quality, constantly occupied with am overall view, responsible, and in his own interest, as a point of honor, wholly devoted to his work which is likewise their work, that is to say, to the complete success of the concert.
Nothing in a French town corresponds to this admirable type of a municipal institution.

Here, also, and to a much greater extent in the village, the effect of universal suffrage has been to discredit the true notables and to incite the abdication or insure the exclusion of men who, by their education, the large proportion of the taxes they pay, and still greater influence or production on labor and on business, are social authorities, and who should become legal authorities.