128 A REVISION OF THE TREATY chap.

Germany 's capacity to make vast payments. Whatdoes it amount to in relation to the bill against her ?The bill is 138 milliard gold marks, on which interestat 6 per cent for one year is 8280 million gold marks.That is to say, Germany 's Mercantile Marine in itsentirety, of which the surrender humbled so muchpride and engulfed so vast an effort, would about meeta month's charges.

EXCURSUS VI

THE DIVISION OP RECEIPTS AMONGST THE ALLIES

The Allied Governments took advantage of theSpa meeting (July 1920) to settle amongst themselvesa Reparation question which had given much troublein Paris and had been left unsolved, 1 —namely, theproportions in which the Reparation receipts are tobe divided between the various Allied claimants. 2The Treaty provides that the receipts from Germany will be divided by the Allies " in proportions whichhave been determined upon by them in advance, ona basis of general equity and of the rights of each."The failure, described by M. Tardieu, to reach anagreement in Paris , rendered the tense of this pro-

1 M. Tardieu (The Truth about the Treaty, pp. 346-348) has given anaccount of the abortive discussion of this question at the Peace Conference. The French obtained at Spa a ratio very slightly more favourable to them-selves than that which they had claimed and Mr. Lloyd George had rejectedat Paris.

2 For a summary of the text of this Agreement see Appendix No. I.