HIDING A SURPLUS.

Waikato Times, Volume XXX, Issue 2492, 30 June 1888, Page 2 (Supplement)

HIDING A SURPLUS.

The Greek Treasury has just been the scene of a curious episode. M. Tricoupis who is Prime Minister, Minister of Finance, and several other things besides, and who is said to work 19 hours every day, has devoted unsparing labour to the work of the Treasury, and promised himself and the country a neat little surplus. With the trade of the country improving, and the taxes becoming more productive, he felt justified in announcing this. But while the revenue looked all right on paper the returns made by the chief central cashier of the sums actually in the treasury were most disappointing and perplexing. Moreover, the tone of the Opposition became defiant and sceptical on the subject of this promised surplus. The lower the cash balances in the Treasury were, compared with what they ought to be, the fiercer and more scornful became the tone of the Opposition. Had M. Tricoupis been a racing man he would have said that the only reason for the Opposition laying against his surplus was that he was, in some way, being got at." Some such suspicion must have crossed his mind, for he went down to the Treasury department at 7 o'clock one morning aml_ constituted himself and three of the leading officials a special committee for ascertaining the exact state of the Treasury. When the chief cashier came he was greatly surprised and shocked at beina asked to deliver up his keys and books, and when M. Tricoupis and his committeemen opened the safes and dived into them they found—-not that the money which the balance sheets showed was not there, but there was very much more. Bundle after bundle of bank notes for thousands of franks rolled into their hands ; fresh research produced bags of dollars and piles of napoleons ; and when the corners of the strong room had been ransacked the delighted Minister found himself the custodian of some 9,500,000 f. more than he believed there was in the Treasury. It does not appear that the chief cashier is suspected of dishonesty for his own personal profit; but the surmise is that he was keeping these millions of franks, pending the fall of the Ministry, to hand them to the successor of M. Tricoupis. But how lie expected M. Tricoupis to account for the deficit or his successor to account for the surplus it is difficult to understand. —Yorkshire Post.