special,—general including all exports and imports whatever, and special taking in only imports meant for home consumption and 5,196,629 were imports and 3,177,569 exports. An idea of the remarkable progress of its commerce may be obtained by comparing these figures with the following: In 1833 the total Greek commerce amounted to 671,499, and in 1840 to 1,036,374; in 1860 it was 3,147,000, and in 1870 5,354,000. England occupies the first place among countries trading with Greece, its transactions being more than double those of any other country, and amounting in 1873 to 41 per cent., and in 1875 to 38 per cent., of the whole commerce of Greece. Taking the average of the six years ending 1874, Wyndham calculates that 6075 per cent, of the exports of Greece go to England, and that 28 85 per cent, of its imports come from England. Turkey and Austria, its nearest neighbours, stand next. 25 per cent, of its imports are cereals and flour, the cereals from Russia, Turkey, and Roumania, the flour from France; and 20 per cent, are tissues, mainly from England. Though timber is so abundant, it still is one of the largest imports, amounting to 187,778 in 1875. The other chief imports are cattle, salt meat, rice, coals, butter, iron, and paper. The principal item of export, amounting to half the whole, is currants; this in 1875 was 1,350,467, of which 1,083,482 went to England ; then come oil, hides, lead, figs, valonia, wines and spirits, tobacco, cotton yarn, &c. The Greek coasting trade is not open to foreigners. The steamers of the Hellenic Company possess a monopoly of the coastage of those waters, the object being to encourage the development of native steam navigation.
There is only one railway in Greece, if we except the private one already mentioned belonging to the Laurium Company. It is from Pirreus to Athens, is ! miles long, belongs to Government, and carries passengers only. Another railway is projected from the Piraeus to Lamia (Zeitoum) in the north (140 miles), with the view of connecting Greece with the general railway system of Europe. There were 1235 miles of telegraph in Greece in 1875, the property of Government, and worked at a considerable loss. The postal system is a Government undertaking, and has been a source of profit only since 1861, when postage stamps were introduced. In 1875 there were 131 post-oftices in Greece. There are two banks, the National, with its head office at Athens, and the Ionian, with its head office at Corfu. The National had in 1868 a paid-up capital of 540,000, with a reserve fund of 215,000.
The currency of Greece is that of the Latin monetary league, which it joined in 1868, and which allows it to strike 26,000,000 silver francs and as much gold as it thinks proper. Under Otho, Greece had a coinage of its own, on the basis of a double standard and the decimal system, the unit being the drachma (equal to 8Jd. ), which was divided into 100 equal parts called leptas. Coins of various values were struck, but only 4000 in gold pieces, and only 36,000 in silver, an amount quite inadequate for the trade of the country, and quickly disappearing altogether, so that there is probably not a single coin of them now left in Greece. It became necessary therefore to declare the gold and silver coins of other countries a legal tender in Greece ; and these, with the notes of the National and Ionian Banks, became, and still remain, the practical currency of the country, so that the simplest payment may require a puzzling arithmetical calculation, for people have to pay in sovereigns and thalers prices stated in drachmas and leptas. Though the unit of the Latin currency is the franc, the official accounts of Greece are still reckoned in old drachmas, in distinction from which the franc is termed the new drachma. There are 28 old and 25 new drachmas in the pound sterling.
The system of weights and measures is the Turkish. Their measures of length are the pique, which is equal to 27 inches ; the . royal pit, equal to 1 metre, or 3 "2808 feet; the stadion, equal to 10 62 English miles. Their measures of superficial extent are the stremma, equal to one-fourth of an English acre, and the hectare equal to 10 stremmas. Their standard of weight is the eantar or quintal, equal to 123 ft avoirdupois. It is divided into 44 okes, an oke being equal to 2 "84 lb, and subdivided into 400 old and 12SO royal drams. A kilo, used lor weighing corn, is half a eantar, or 22 okes. 816 kilos are equal to 100 quarters.
The financial condition of Greece is unsatisfactory. Its annual Finance expenditure usually exceeds its income, and it is deeply in debt. The new kingdom was born in debt, and contracted to pay the expenses of the revolution that gave it being, and to that original burden it has from time to time added fresh liabilities, till it has now no longer any credit in the money markets of Europe, and is deeper in debt in proportion to its revenue than any European country except Spain. The total debt of Greece was 15,360,103, according to Mr Malet s report in 1875, and, what with the accumu lation of interest and the contraction of a fresh debt for army extension during the Servian insurrection of 1876, it must now be over 16,000,000. This debt consists of two kinds foreign and internal. The foreign debt is of two parts. There are first the original two loans, amounting between them to 2,300,000, which were negotiated by the revolutionists in 1824 and 1825 with two English houses at 59 and 55 per cent. , and whose coupons are now held mainly by Dutch speculators. On this Greece has never paid a farthing of interest. The Greek treasury, although it accepts the obligation, puts it off from year to year under the heading "Deferred Debt." With accumulating interest at 5 per cent., it had increased to 8,084,500 in 1874. The second part of the foreign debt is a loan of 2,400,000 guaranteed by the three protecting Iiowers on the accession of Otho in 1832, and negotiated with lothschild at 94. On this Greece paid interest for a few years, but its payment has so fallen into arrear that in 1874 this debt had grown to 3,870,000. There is also a small debt due to the Bavarian Government, amounting now to 250,000, and there are some still smaller debts to other foreign creditors. The internal debt of the country consists partly of indemnity due to sufferers in the "War of Independence, partly of loans contracted with capitalists within the kingdom after its credit abroad was gone ; it now amounts in all to 5,270,339.
The revenue for 1877, according to the estimate in the budget, was 1,401,687, and the expenditure 1,466,708. The actual receipts usually fall short of the budget estimate, for Greece per mits her subjects to fall much into arrear with the payment of their taxes ; and in 1867 it was calculated there was an aggregate of arrears of taxes amounting to 2,226,000. This revenue is received partly from direct taxes on land and property ; partly from indirect taxes ; partly from the public services, the post-office, telegraphs, and printing; partly from the rent of the public domains, mines, quarries, hot springs, salt, fisheries, fruits, olive gardens, vineyards, and currant plantations ; and partly from the sale of national lands and the ecclesiastical revenues. The largest sources of revenue are the land tax, which brought in 8,500,000 drachmas in 1877 ; the customs, 13,400,000 ; and the stamps, 4,200,000. The cost of collecting the land tax is very extravagant. It takes 25 to collect 100, or ten times more than it does in France. The Greeks are not sorely taxed. Pvangabe estimates that they pay 23 "43 drachmas (about 1 7s. ) each in the year as taxes.
Of the expenditure of Greece, nearly one-fourth part goes to pay interest on its debt, another fourth to maintain its army and navy, and a large sum (£136,386) to pay pensions to persons who suffered in the revolution, or who possessed interests in the Ionian Islands at the time of their cession. The education and worship of the country cost £75,427, and the foreign office and diplomatic service only £40,257. The administration of justice takes £107,716, and the department of the interior, including the post-office and many other outlays, 171,526. The salaries of members of the chambers of deputies come, to 16,071.
Literature.—Bursian, Geographie von Griechenland (Leipsic, 1862) ; Tozer, Lectures on the Geography of Greece (London, 1873) ; Kruse, Hellas (Leipsic, 1825-27) ; Julius Schmidt, Beiträge zur physikalischen Geographie von Griechenland (Leipsic, 1864-70) ; Finlay, History of Greece (Oxford, 1877) ; Maurer, Das Griechische Volk in öffentlicher und privat-rechtlicher Beziehung (Heidelberg, 1835) ; About, La Grèce Contemporaine (Paris, 1854) ; Rangabe, Greece, her Former and Present Position (New York, 1867) ; Strickland, Greece, its Condition and Resources (London, 1863) ; Wyse, Impressions of Greece (London, 1871) ; Tuckerman, The Greeks of To-day (London, 1873) ; Moraitinis, La Grèce telle qu' elle est (Paris, 1877) ; Sergeant, New Greece (London, 1878) ; and the annual reports of the British secretaries of embassy and legation and of the British consuls.
PART II.—GREEK HISTORY.
Section I.—Greek History to the Death of Alexander the Great.
The early history of Greece is the first chapter in the political and intellectual life of Europe. In contrast with nations still in the tribal stage the Greeks have already the life of cities ; in contrast with the despotic monarchies of tli3 East they recognize the principle that no personal rule should be unlimited. From the first they appear as a people obedient to reason and to a native instinct of measure. In the political sphere this leads them to aim at a due balance of powers and tendencies in the state, at the definition of duties and the protection of rights. In the intellectual sphere it leads them to explore causes, to interpret thought in clear forms, to find graceful expression
