BELGIUM. 



73 



electors were the agriculturists and farmers, 

 who numbered 25,039. The literary men and 

 journalists were the least numerous class, 

 numbering only 69. Of chiefs of institutions, 

 professors, and teachers, there were 1,120, of 

 clergymen 2,738. The number of persons who 

 were eligible for the Senate on account of their 

 paying the 1,000 florins of direct taxes pre- 

 scribed by Art. LVI. of the constitution was 

 453, or 0.086 per cent, of the population. The 

 electors for the provincial assemblies numbered 

 219,619, or 4.180 per cent, of the population; 

 those for communal elections, 347,441, or 6.613 

 per cent. 



The number of teachers in primary schools 

 was 10,629, of whom 7,032 were laymen and 

 3,597 members of religious orders, or clerics. 

 The latter class has increased since 1851 by 

 1,098, the former only by 624. The schools 

 for adults numbered 199,957 pupils, 9,219 more 

 than in 1848, being 3.98 per cent, of the popu- 

 lation. The aggregate expenditures made for 

 primary instruction in 1874 were as follows : 



National Government 6,643,415 17 francs. 



Provinces 1,584,010 45 " 



Communes 5,863,561 37 " 



Total. 14,090,986 99 francs. 



Of 43,311 men who were drafted for the 

 militia in 1874, 8,727 could neither read nor 

 write, 1,976 could only read, 15,726 could read 

 and write, 16,228 had a higher education, and 

 of 654 the degree of instruction was unknown. 



The standing army is formed by conscription, 

 to which every able-bodied man who has com- 

 pleted his nineteenth year is liable. Substi- 

 tution is allowed. The legal term of service 

 is eight years, but two-thirds of this time are 

 generally spent on furlough. The strength of 

 the army is to be 100,000 men on the war foot- 

 ing, and 40,000 in times of peace. On June 

 1, 1874, the actual number of soldiers under 

 arms amounted to 37,391 rank and file, com- 

 prising 24,409 infantry, 5,114 cavalry, 6,331 

 artillery, 667 engineers, and 570 train. The 

 civic militia or national guard numbers 125, 000 

 men without and 400,000 with the reserve. 

 Its duty is to preserve liberty and order in 

 times of peace, and the independence of the 

 country in times of war. A royal decree, 

 dated October 20, 1874, divided the kingdom 

 into two military circumscriptions, one em- 

 bracing the provinces of Antwerp and West 

 and East Flanders, and the second the others. 



The condition of the merchant marine dur- 

 ing the time from 1843 to 1873 is shown by 

 the following table : 



The commerce of Belgium during the year 

 1873 was as follows: 



The aggregate length of the railroads in op- 

 eration on January 1, 1874, was 3,370 kilometres 

 (1 kilometre = 0.62 mile), of which 1,636 were 

 state railroads, and 1,734 belonged to private 

 companies. The aggregate length of the lines 

 of electric telegraph was, in 1872, 4,430 miles; 

 that of wires, 15,802 ; the number of telegraph- 

 offices was, in 1871, 478. 



Sir H. Barron, secretary of the British lega- 

 tion at Brussels, reports that the quantity of 

 coal raised from the Belgian coal-fields in a 

 year advanced in 1872 to the unprecedented 

 amount of 15,658,948 tons, and the export of 

 the coal to 5,630,197 tons. Many cargoes of 

 Belgian coal were shipped to England, even to 

 Newcastle itself. Sir H. Barron states that the 

 coal-beds of Belgium, perhaps the main source 

 of her wealth, are being rapidly consumed; 

 that whatever coal is left at the end of another 

 century must be raised at a vastly-increased 

 expenditure of labor and life, and that this 

 must ultimately put an end to the working of 

 the mines. In his opinion the Government 

 should endeavor to check the waste of the na- 

 tional capital, and he suggests that the prefer- 

 ential tariff on the state railway in favor of 

 coal for export is impolitic, and that an export 

 duty might well be imposed. He quotes Mr. 

 McOulloch's opinion that the retention of the 

 export duty on British coal (abolished in 1845) 

 would not have materially affected the export, 

 and that it would not be easy to show how a 

 revenue of two or three millions a year could 

 be raised with less inconvenience. 



The most important event in the history of 

 Belgium during 1875 was the diplomatic com- 

 plication with Germany. On February 3d, the 

 German embassador in Brussels, Count Per- 

 poncher, presented to the Belgian Government 

 a note from Prince Bismarck, complaining of 

 several hostile demonstrations of Belgians 

 against Germany. The first complaint was 

 against the pastorals of the Belgian bishops in 

 1872 and 1873, and against some other publi- 

 cations by clerical committees offensive to the 

 German Government and calculated to encour- 

 age the resistance of the German Ultramon- 

 tane clergy, but without specifying any of these 

 publications. The second complaint referred 



