78 



BELGIUM. 



under the guarantees of the powers, Belgium 

 maintains a considerable army for the defense 

 of her territory. It is recruited by enlistments 

 and conscription. The infantry numbers, un- 

 der the army law of 1873, 25,671 men and 

 1,676 officers in active service, and about 52,- 

 200 men on the war footing; the cavalry, 6,680 

 men and 296 officers on the peace footing; the 

 artillery, 7,559 men and 466 officers on the 

 peace footing; the engineers, 1,571 men and 

 135 officers; the train, 377 men and 26 officers. 

 The total effective, including the gendarmerie, 

 is, in time of peace, 46,272 men and officers, 

 with 10,014 horses and 204 pieces of field-ar- 

 tillery; in time of war, 103,683 men, 13,800 

 horses, and 240 guns. The civic guard in 1881 

 numbered 30,954 men in active service. 



Finances. The receipts of the treasury in 

 1880 were as follow : 



RECEIPTS. Francs. 



Directtaxes 4^.572,000 



Customs . 21,637,000 



Excise ....'.'.'.'...'.'...'.'..'.'..'.....'.". 32,243,000 



Various taxes 450,000 



Registration duties, etc 55,029,000 



Tolls and dues 9,481,000 



Railroads 109,817,000 



Telegraphs 2,615,000 



Other revenues 10,157,000 



Repayments 6,420,000 



Extraordinary receipts 909,000 



Total ordinary receipts 292,880,000 



Special revenues 101,386,000 



Total receipts 394,216,000 



The expenditures under the various heads 

 were of the following amounts : 



EXPENDITURES. Francs. 



Public debt 82,553,000 



Dotations 4,641,000 



Justice 15,562,000 



Foreign Affairs .. 2,214,000 



Ministry of the Interior 9,462,000 



Public Instruction 17,801,000 



Public Works 95,834,000 



War 44,028,000 



Gendarmerie 8,424,000 



Finance 15,022.000 



Repayments, etc 1,479,000 



Total ordinary expenditures 292.020,000 



Special services 90,899,000 



Total expenditures 882,919,000 



The budget voted for 1882 fixed the total 

 ordinary receipts at 296,647,709 francs, and the 

 expenditures at 310,755,895 francs. The budget 

 for 1883 made the receipts 299,571,760 francs, 

 and the expenditures 322,870,816 francs. The 

 total nominal amount of the public debt in 

 1883 was 1,959,292,744 francs, on which the 

 annual charge is a little over 4 per cent. 



Political Crisis. The movement for the secu- 

 larization of education in France, extending 

 into Belgium, caused the overthrow of the 

 Malou ministry, which had been in office eight 

 years, in the elections of 1878. Frere-Orban, 

 with Van Humbeek as Minister of Education, 

 accepted the task of reforming the schools on 

 liberal principles. The education act of 1879 

 repealed the law of 1842, which vested the 

 control of state schools to a large extent in 

 the clergy, and provided that religious instruc- 



tion should form no part of the regular lessons, 

 but that the priests might have the buildings for 

 that purpose after school-hours. The Govern- 

 ment devoted the resources of the state without 

 stint to the improvement of the state schools. 

 A system of public education, unequaled in its 

 pedagogic and sanitary arrangements, was soon 

 developed. The Conservative party identified 

 itself with the Catholic clergy in opposing the 

 "godless schools." Political passion and re- 

 ligious hatred combined divided the people into 

 hostile camps. The antagonism was more bit- 

 ter than in any other country. The clergy 

 employed the enormous wealth of the Belgian 

 Church in improving the clerical schools, and 

 in establishing others where none existed. Par- 

 ents incurred spiritual penalties and social os- 

 tracism by sending their children to the public 

 schools. In many places Conservatives and 

 Liberals held no communications with each 

 other. The Government were provoked by 

 the furious opposition of the Clericals to repri- 

 sals which detracted from the strength of their 

 cause, such as the prosecution of Canon Ber- 

 nard, the refusal to pay public honors to the 

 Archbishop of Mechlin, and the attempt to 

 suppress the procession of the Holy Blood at 

 Bruges. The Government were put to much 

 greater expense than they anticipated in order 

 to compete with the lavishly endowed Catholic 

 schools. Even in the cities, parents generally 

 preferred religious instruction for their chil- 

 dren. Throughout the country the clerical 

 schools were attended by three and a half times 

 as many pupils as the state schools. The se- 

 rious error was committed of saddling every 

 village with a state school, although in many 

 every family sent its children to the church 

 schools. The expense of these empty school- 

 houses and idle teachers, defrayed partly by 

 the general taxes and partly by the local rates, 

 angered the Flemish peasantry, and plunged 

 the Government into financial difficulties. 



Extravagant expenditures on the fortifica- 

 tions of Antwerp and the valley of the Meuse, 

 and upon the Palace of Justice, and other im- 

 provements at Brussels, swelled the annual defi- 

 cits, to meet which, and the expense of adding 

 20,000 men to the reserve of the army, an in- 

 crease in taxation was necessary. The Radi- 

 cals, under the lead of Paul Jan son, endeav- 

 ered .to extend the contest with the Clericals 

 to other questions, and gave the Catholic party 

 various causes of offense by irritating inves- 

 tigations and menaces against the rights and 

 property of the Church. Their tactics excited 

 distrust, although M. Frere-Orban with firm- 

 ness confined the anti-Clerical policy of the 

 Government mainly to the establishment of 

 the principle of state education. In spite of 

 the doctrinarian zealotry that imposed the un- 

 denominational schools on the unwilling half 

 of the community, and of the fierce popular 

 passions inflamed against them, the Government 

 schools advanced in public favor. The Gov- 

 ernment went before the people in the bien- 



