410 



GREECE. 



GUATEMALA. 



Treaty and the Halepa pact, while Great Britain 

 withheld the promised intercession. (See TUR- 

 KEY). Official pressure was used as unscrupu- 

 lously as by any of his predecessors ; and yet in 

 the general election in October the opponents of 

 Tricoupis triumphed beyond their own expecta- 

 tions. A new Young Greek party, founded in 

 the summer by Ralli, to efface the differences 

 between the two old parties whose contests have 

 been largely actuated by greed for office, and to 

 turn the energies of the nation to the realization 

 of Hellenic aspirations, won a large number of 

 seats. Of 41 followers of Tricoupis who claimed 

 seats in the new Chamber when it came together, 

 23 were refused admission on the ground of ille- 

 galities, and new elections were ordered. The re- 

 maining 109 Deputies were supporters of Delyan- 

 nis and of Ralli. The heroic financial methods of 

 Tricoupis were turned against him in the can- 

 vass, and the farming population were taught to 

 question whether the still dubious credit, pur- 

 chased by trebling the taxes and doubling the 

 debt, was better than repudiation. The Opposi- 

 tion promised to ease the burdens of the peas- 

 antry by repealing the tax on plowing animals, 

 and reducing that on sheep and cattle, and to 

 place a protective duty on animals imported from 

 abroad. The army, in spite of the efforts of 

 Tricoupis to make it effective, was so deficient in 

 discipline and training, as it possessed no reli- 

 able corps of under officers, as to be pronounced 

 worthless by military critics. Tricoupis, who be- 

 gan with a policy of peace and recuperation, was 

 suspected latterly of having fallen under Russian 

 influence, and to have entered into a Greco-Servo- 

 Montenegrin league that would soon embroil 

 Greece and Turkey, and set Macedonia afire. 

 He boasted that the three new ironclads could 

 sweep the JEgean. and was credited with a plan 

 by which it was proposed to cut off communica- 

 tions between Constantinople and Crete, and seize 

 and hold Smyrna to be ransomed by a cession of 

 Turkish territory. 



Change of Government On Oct. 28 Tri- 

 coupis handed in his resignation, and the King 

 charged Delyannis with the formation of a new 

 ministry. He found the task so difficult that 

 the Cabinet was not constituted till Nov. 5. It 

 was made up as follows : President of the Coun- 

 cil, Minister of the Interior, and ad interim 

 Minister of War, Delyannis ; Minister of For- 

 eign Affairs, Deligeorgis; Minister of Finance, 

 Karapanos ; Minister of Justice, Zaimis ; Minis- 

 ter of Marine, Koumoundouros ; Minister of 

 Education and Ecclesiastical Affairs, Gerokos- 

 topulos. None of the ministers, except Delyan- 

 nis, had h'eld office before. He entered office as 

 Minister of Foreign Affairs in 1863, was a mem- 

 ber, with Tricoupis, of the coalition Cabinet 

 known as the (Ecumenical Ministry, served later 

 under Koumoundouros, who was the father of the 

 new Minister of War, represented Greece at 

 the Berlin Congress, became Prime Minister in 

 1885, and ceded his place to Tricoupis, in 1886, in 

 consequence of the joint naval demonstration of 

 the European powers which prevented him from 

 carrying out his aggressive designs in Turkey, 

 to obtain in Epirus compensation for the aggran- 

 dizement of Bulgaria, after he had spent the 

 enormous sum of 100,000,000 drachma! in mili- 

 tary preparations. 



GUATEMALA, a republic of Central Ameri- 

 ca. The Constitution is that of December, 1879, 

 with modifications proclaimed in October, 1889. 

 Gen. Manuel Lisandro Barillas was elected Presi- 

 dent, in 1886, for six years. 



Area and Population. The area of Guate- 

 mala is estimated at 46,800 square miles, and the 

 population was computed to be 1,427,116 at the 

 beginning of 1889. About three fifths of the peo- 

 ple are of pure Indian blood. Guatemala la Nueva, 

 the capital, contained 65,796 inhabitants in 1889, 

 of whom about one tenth were of European ori- 

 gin. Education is gratuitous, obligatory, and 

 secular. The state, in 1888, expended $525,625 

 on the schools. There were 1,242 teachers and 

 49,247 pupils in the primary schools in 1887, and 

 in the seven high schools there were 1,185 pupils. 



Commerce. The trade of Guatemala in 1889 

 was very satisfactory. The imports amounted to 

 $7,075,000, and the exports to $9,960,000. The 

 crop of coffee was large, and prices ruled high. 

 The export was valued at $9,550.000. The other 

 exports, consisting of hides, sugars, indigo, rub- 

 ber, and bananas, are of trifling value. The im- 

 ports from Great Britain amounted to $1,595,000, 

 the United States coming next with $1.330,000 

 of imports. Coffee planting increased tenfold 

 in four years, and the lands advanced to two or 

 three times their former price. 



Finance. The foreign consolidated debt 

 amounted, at the end of 1888, to $4,610,000, 

 and the internal debt, which, like the other, is 

 mainly held in England, to $4,880,000. A new 

 loan of $21,000,000 had been negotiated in 

 France, when the political disturbances broke 

 out to interrupt the transaction. 



War against Salvador. The idea of a 

 union of the five Central American republics, 

 which has been entertained by the most pro- 

 gressive statesmen, and has played an important 

 part in the politics of those countries ever since 

 the disruption of the old Confederation in 1847, 

 received a serious check in 1885, when Barrios 

 lost his life in the attempt to accomplish it by 

 force. Since the Pan-American Congress in 

 Washington the movement has been revived. 

 It had among its supporters the Presidents of 

 Guatemala, Salvador, and Honduras. In Oc- 

 tober, 1889, a Congress was held in San Salva- 

 dor to devise a plan for carrying out the idea of 

 union, and the question was adjourned to a Cen- 

 tral American Union Congress, to be held in the 

 capital of Honduras, on Aug. 20, 1890. Among 

 the people of the republics it is not very popu- 

 lar, as they fear that it will lead to a loss of their 

 liberties, and that under a single strong Govern- 

 ment they will be more at the mercy of dictators 

 and corrupt politicians than at present. This 

 feeling is strong in Salvador, whose inhabitants 

 dread the domination of the more backward and 

 lethargic people of the sister republics. It has 

 been shared by Costa Rica and Nicaragua, all 

 three fearing the preponderance of the other 

 two, and more especially of Guatemala. In Sal- 

 vador, a conflict in June, 1890, between the Un- 

 ionists arid the party of independence was at- 

 tended with the death of President Menendez 

 and anarchic conditions, out of which Gen. Car- 

 los Ezeta emerged as Provisional President (see 

 SALVADOR). President Barillas issued a procla- 

 mation calling upon Gen. Ezeta to lay down the 



