[Sidenote: The Appropriation Accounts.] Meanwhile the Comptroller and Auditor General--who holds his office during good behaviour, with a salary paid by statute directly out of the Consolidated Fund, and who considers himself in no sense a servant of the Treasury, but an officer responsible to the House of Commons[289:2]--examines the accounts of the several departments. This is a matter requiring much time, and it is not until the opening of the next regular session that he presents what are known as the Appropriation Accounts,[289:3] covering in great detail the actual expenditures in all the supply services, with his reports and comments thereon.[289:4] [Sidenote: The Committee of Public Accounts.] His accounts and reports are referred to the Committee of Public Accounts, which consists of eleven members of the House chosen at the beginning of the session,[289:5] and includes the Financial Secretary of the Treasury, some one who has held a similar office under the opposite party, and other men interested in the subject. It inspects the accounts and the Comptroller and Auditor General's notes of the reason why more or less than the estimate was spent on each item. It inquires into the items that need further explanation, examining for the purpose the auditing officers of the departments, and other persons; and it makes a series of reports to the House, which refer in detail to the cases where an excess grant must be made by Parliament, or a transfer between grants in the military departments must be approved.[290:1] The Committee of Public Accounts has undoubtedly great influence in keeping the expenditures very strictly within the appropriations, and from time to time it expresses its opinions strongly about any laxity in that respect--remarks that are not forgotten by the officials. But there has been much complaint that the House itself, while criticising the administrative conduct of the government freely in the discussion of the estimates, takes little interest in their financial aspect; and, therefore, the recent Committee on National Expenditure has suggested that one day, at least, should be set apart for the discussion of the report of the Committee on Public Accounts.[290:2] [Sidenote: Indian Revenue Accounts.]