258 A HISTORY OF THE COLONY OF VICTORIA 



overcrowded city to seek a more independent way of earning an 

 honest living. 



But the lines of the Gillies Ministry had fallen in pleasant 

 places. Nothing facilitates Parliamentary working like a sub- 

 stantial budget surplus. Nothing casts a greater damper over an 

 Opposition, or sheds more reflected lustre on a Treasurer, even 

 though he may be ignorant of the real economic causes of his 

 success, and be dependent upon a clerk in his department for the 

 form of its presentation. When the budget speech of Mr. Gillies 

 in July, 1886, showed a revenue of nearly 6,500,000, and de- 

 clared a surplus of 329,000 for the year, citizens smilingly said 

 that Service had a worthy successor at the Treasury, under whose 

 able management much existing taxation might be reduced, or 

 remitted. A year later the revenue had mounted to nearly 

 7,000,000, and again a surplus of 499,000 remained after the 

 year's largely increased expenditure had been met. On the 24th of 

 July, 1888, Mr. Gillies announced an almost incredible increase, the 

 revenue reaching 8,236,000, and leaving a surplus of 839,000. 

 Emboldened by such experience, the Treasurer ventured to estimate 

 a revenue of 9,000,000 for the year ending 30th June, 1889. In 

 this he was too sanguine, but it reached 8,675,000 the high- 

 water mark of Victoria's income. Still more startling was the 

 announcement by the Treasurer on 30th July, 1889, that the 

 accumulated surplus on that date stood at 1,607,000 ; and that he 

 estimated the revenue for 1889-90 at 10,608,000 and the ex- 

 penditure at 10,523,000. These radiant forecasts were neither 

 justified nor realised. They remain on the records of Parliament 

 as typical of the visionary wealth which cast such a glamour not 

 only over the Legislature, but which simultaneously irradiated the 

 ideas of all sorts and conditions of men. The gigantic surplus 

 itself took on much more humble dimensions within a month, when 

 certain immediately accruing liabilities had been brought into the 

 national ledger. Before the year was out, the whole newspaper 

 press of the colony was propounding the question, " What has 

 become of the surplus?" and the various replies elicited were 

 the despair of the most accomplished accountants to unravel. The 

 figures quoted above do not always accord with those of the Govern- 



