national
assembly of Greeks.

The first great question on which the government of King Otho was expected
to decide, was the means necessary to be adopted for discharging the
internal debt contracted for carrying on the war against the Turks. This
debt resolved itself into two heads: payment for services, and repayment
of money advanced. The national assemblies which had met during the
revolution, had decreed that every man who served in the army should, at
the conclusion of the war, receive a grant of land. It was proposed that
King Otho should carry these decrees into execution, by framing lists of
all those who had served either in the army, the navy, or in civil
employments. The same registers which contain the lists of the citizens of
the various communes, could have been rendered available for the purpose
of verifying the services of each individual. A fixed number of acres
might then have been destined to each man, according to his rank and time
of service. This measure would have enabled the Greek government to say,
that it had kept faith with the people. It would have induced many of the
military to settle as landed proprietors when the first current of
enthusiasm in favour of peaceful occupations set in, and it would have
been the means of silencing many pretensions of powerful military chiefs,
whose silence has since been dearly purchased.

The royal government always resisted these demands of the Greeks, and the
consequence was, that when it was necessary to yield from fear, Count
Armansperg adopted a law of dotation, which, under the appearance of being
a general measure, was only carried into application in cases where
partisanship was established; and yet national lands have been alienated
to a far greater extent than would have satisfied every claim arising out
of the revolutionary war. The king, it is true, has in late years made
donations of national land to favoured individuals, to maids of honour,
Turkish neophytes, and Bavarian brides; and he has rewarded several
political renegades with currant lands, and held out hopes of conferring
villages on councillors of state who have been eager defenders of the
court; but all this has been openly done as a matter of royal favour.

With regard to the second class of claimants. Common honesty, if royal
gratitude go for nothing in Greece, required that those who advanced money
to their country in her day of need, should be repaid their capital. All
interest m