_Communications._--Trade is served by an excellent railway system and there are steamboat services on the navigable rivers, to the east by way of Passau on the Danube, and to the west by Ludwigshafen. The high roads of Bavaria, many of which are military roads laid out at the beginning of the 19th century, extend in all over about 10,000 m. There were 4377 m. of railways in operation in 1904, of which about 3800 were in the hands of the state, and about 440 m. belonged to the private system of the Palatinate. The principal canal is the Ludwigskanal, which connects the Rhine with the Danube, extending from Bamberg on the Regnitz to Dietfurt on the Altmühl. There is an extensive network of telegraph and telephone lines. All belong to the government post office, which forms an administrative system independent of the imperial German post office.
_Constitution and Administration._--By the treaty of Versailles (23rd November 1870) and the imperial constitution of the 16th of April 1871, Bavaria was incorporated with the German empire, reserving, however, certain separate privileges (_Sonderrechte_) in respect of the administration of the army, the railways and the posts, the excise duties on beer, the rights of domicile and the insurance of real estate. The king is the supreme chief of the army, and matters requiring adjudication in the adjutant-general's court are referred to a special Bavarian court attached to the supreme imperial military tribunal in Berlin. Bavaria is represented in the Bundesrat by six votes and sends forty-eight deputies to the imperial diet. The Bavarian constitution is mainly founded on the constitutional act of the 26th of May 1818, modified by subsequent acts--that of the 9th of March 1828 as affecting the upper house, and those of the 4th of June 1848 and of the 21st of March 1881 as affecting the lower--and is a limited monarchy, with a legislative body of two houses. The crown is hereditary in the house of Wittelsbach, according to the rights of primogeniture, females being excluded from succession so long as male agnates of equal birth exist. The title of the sovereign is king of Bavaria, that of his presumptive heir is crown-prince of Bavaria, and during the minority or incapacity of the sovereign a regency is declared, which is vested in the nearest male agnate capable of ascending the throne. Such a regency began on the 10th of June 1886, at first for King Louis II., and after the 14th of the same month for King Otto I., in the person of the prince regent Luitpold. The executive power resides in the king and the responsibility for the government of the kingdom in his ministers. The royal family is Roman Catholic, and the seat of government is Munich, the capital.