55

served  property,  as  if  a  territory  -  could  be  separated  from  all  the  investments
made,  for  placing  it  in  a  position  to  live  normaly  in  the  state  of  the  evolution
of  modern  civilisition.
The  operations  for  estimating  these  properties,  both  as  regards  Austria  as
well  as  regards  Hungary,  are  in  course  before  the  Commission  of  reparations
which  latterly  has  heard  the  experts  of  all  the  interested  parties,  and  has  still
to  give  its  final  decision.
In  this  matter  we  must  remark  lhat  the  Commission  of  reparations  giving
an  unjustified  scope  to  the  idea  of  »biens  et  propriety  -  in  the  text  of  article
208,  and  191  of  the  Treaties  of  Saint  Germain  and  of  Trianon,  drew  up  an  inventory ­
  of  the  property  which  was  to  be  estimated,  and  in  which  are  included
certain  items  which  in  no  case  can  come  within  the  notion  of  »biens  et
proprietes".
In  order  to  illustrate  this  interpretation  we  can  quote  the  claim  of  estimating ­
  and  putting  on  Roumania’s  account,  the  unknown  contents  of  the  soil,
and  the  natural  products  (forests,  etc.),  which  cannot  be  considered  as  -Mens
et  proprietes«  except  for  them  who  extract  them,  and  make  them  yield  alter
they  are  found.
Even  in  the  limits  of  the  principles  admitted  in  the  matter  of  restituting
the  value  of  transferred  goods  by  compensation,  a  broadening  of  the  interpretation ­
  like  the  one  we  quoted  above,  must  be  erroneous,  as  on  the  one  hand
the  quantities  of  hypothetical  goods  would  be  reckoned  (salt,  me  th  an  gaz
metals  which  might  be  found)  and  on  the  other  hand  the  restitution  of  the
value  of  riches  produced  by  nature,  for  creating  which  the  former  Austro-Hungarian
  monarchy  did  nothing,  will  have  to  be  restored.  Such  an  interpretation ­
  could-be  extended  to  any  length  so  as  to  consider  as  riches  to  he  transferred ­
  the  very  agricultural  soil  or  human  energ\.
In  this  same  inventory  formed  by  the  Commission  of  Reparations,  were
also  put  down  as  transferred  "biens  et  proprietes«,  balances  in  cash,  balances
in  books,  private  deposits,  as  claims  of  Austria  and  Hungary,  without  considering ­
  that  such  values  could  not  appear  in  the  assets  of  these  states,  unless
on  the  one  part,  these  balances  had  been  found  effectively  at  the  moment  the
territories  were  transferred  or  if  Austria  and  Hungary  should  undertake  to
discharge  all  the  debts  and  liabilities  which  these  States  owed  to  their  nationals. ­
  .  .  ,  .  ,
The  Roumanian  experts  discussed  the  estimates  in  the  inventory  which
was  presented  to  their  examination  but  they  made  the  reserves  on  the  validity
of  inscribing  in  the  inventory  certain  property  which  could  not  appear  under
that  chapter.  .
The  Commission  of  reparations  will  have  to  examine  and  to  decide  in  c  ue
time  on  the  just  objections  raised  by  the  Roumanian  State.
Whatever  may  be  the  final  estimate  of  the  goods  and  properties  ol  Hungary ­
  and  of  Austria,  our  point  of  view  is  that  their  can  be  no  question  ol  an
elective  payment  of  the  sum  estimated,  but  at  the  most  ol  a  discount  upon  all