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POLITICAL ECONOMY OF THE GREEKS. 141The indirect taxes, by which we mean the duties paid onthe importation and exportation of articles, as also on theirconsumption, were probably as common in the Greciancities, as those above mentioned. The instance of the cityMenda, which we have already cited, shows that they werepreferred, at least in some instances, to the direct taxes.the situationMuch that related to them, was decided byand chief employment of the cities. The duties were naturally a much more productivesource of revenue to themaritime and commercial towns, than to the cities of theinterior. But where these taxes were introduced, they werea constant source of income ;while the taxes on propertywere each time imposed anew. From this it naturally resulted, that 'they were chiefly destined to meet the usualexpenditures.Our knowledge of the organization of the Grecian customs, is very imperfect. Yet we cannot doubt, that dutieswere almost universally common. But they were mostprobably limited to the sea-ports and harbours; in connexion1with these, they are almost always mentioned; 1 know ofno instance of customs in the interior.They were, according to Aristotle, levied on imported and exported articles. 2 In Athens, the customs are frequently mentionedby the orators ;the revenue 3;in Thessaly they formed the chief source ofand they were not of less moment in Macedonia. 4 When the Athenians became the masters of the,jEgean Sea, they appropriated to themselves, in all subjectislands, the collecting of the customs, instead of the tributewhich had before been usual. 5The same was done with thevery productive customs of Byzantium, which all the commerce to the Black Sea was obliged to discharge/ just asbusiness. Thus in Chios, all private debts were entered in a public book, sothat itmight be known, what capital was lent out. Aristot. Op. ii. p. 390.In the Athenian colony Potidsea, in a time of war, when money was wanting,every citizen was obliged to specify his property with exactness, and the contributions (aor^opal) were apportioned out accordingly. He who possessed noproperty, Krrjfia ov9ev, paid a poll tax his ; person being reckoned as a capitalof two minse, (about thirty dollars,) he paid the tax due on such a sum.*Aristot. 1. c.Hence the phrase Xi^vas RapTovaOai, to collectthe customs in the Tiarlours, Demosthen. i. 15.2 Aristot. 1. C. rA eitray&yifiatccti ra s Igctywyi/m. Demosth. 1. C.*They were commonly rented out in that country for twenty talents ;which sum Callistratus knew how to double. Aristot Op. ii. p. 393.5Thucyd. iv. 28.* Demosth. Op, L p. 475.