ls, live-stock, &c., involved a
further loss of L118,000, and an increase of over L1,000,000 in
expenditure was budgeted for. The accounts for 1907 showed a total
revenue of LE.16,368,000 and a total expenditure of LE.14,280,000, a
surplus of LE.2,088,000. The annual growth of revenue for the previous
five years averaged over LE.500,000. About one-third of the annual
revenue is derived from the land tax; customs and tobacco duties yield
about L3,000,000, and an equal or larger amount is received from
railways and other revenue-earning departments. The chief items of
ordinary expenditure are tribute and debt charges, the expenses of the
civil administration, of the Egyptian army (between L500,000 and
L600,000 yearly), of the revenue-earning departments and of pensions.

It will be convenient here to summarize the position of the Egyptian
debt at the close of 1905, that is at the period immediately following
the liquidation of the Daira loan. In a previous table it has been
shown that under the Law of Liquidation of 1880 the total debt was
L98,640,000. In 1883, the first complete year after the British
occupation, the capital of the debt--then exclusively held by the
public--was L96,457,000. In 1885 the Guaranteed loan, the nominal
capital of which was L9,424,000, was issued, and in 1891 the debt
reached its maximum figure of L106,802,000. At that period the charge
for interest and sinking fund was L4,127,000. On the 31st of December
1905 the total capital of the debt was as follows:--

Guaranteed 3% L7,849,000
Preference 3-1/2% 31,128,000
Unified 4% 55,972,000
Domains 4-1/4% 1,535,000
----------
Total L96,484,000

The charge on account of interest and sinking fund was L3,709,000.
Thus the capital of the debt in 1905 stood at almost the exact figure
it did in 1883, although by borrowing and conversion operations nearly
L17,000,000 had in the meantime been added to the capital. This
reduction was brought about by surplus revenue, and by the operation
of the sinking fund in the case of the Guaranteed loan, while
L15,729,000 had been wiped out by the sale of Daira and Domains
property. These figures do not, however, indicate fully the prosperity
of the country, for although the nominal amount of the capital was
practically identical in 1883 and 1905,