drawing, hygiene, singing and gymnastics. In the girls' schools needlework, domestic economy, and housewifery are added. In agricultural districts agriculture and horticulture are also taught. Further, the State subsidizes such initiative on the part of communes as the formation of classes (such as exist in Ghent, Brussels, and Liege) for backward and non-normal children, on the provision of 4th-degree instruction. This 4th degree, first adopted by the commune of St. Gilles. consists of technical instruction for children of 12 to 14. Its object is to give elementary training sufficient to enable the child to specialize as artisan or craftsman, and so to enter industrial life already qualified.
Belgium's efforts to develop the technical training of her population increased steadily during the last few years before the war, much being done in this way by the provinces and communes. Hainault (Hainaut) organized an admirable centre of technical instruction at Charleroi under the name of the Université de Travail. Future workers, male and female, are admitted to its courses at the age of 13 and they receive salaries, which enable them to pass through the necessary years of training. In 1912 1,700 pupils attended this school. All trades are taught there, each with the best possible equipment of tools and machinery. Reading-rooms are open to the pupils, and even also to workmen not attending the school who think they can in the slightest degree improve tools or machines. Concurrently with the technical courses, general courses are given, notably in foreign languages, so that pupils may be in a position to follow the technical periodicals of great neighbouring countries. The province of Hainault finds the large funds necessary for supporting this immense institution by means of a special tax on industrial profits. The great manufacturers of the province not only accepted this tax without complaint, but every year make many voluntary donations to the Université de Travail. To encourage the use of this school by the working-classes the employers of Hainault decided to accept no workers under the age of 18; while assuring well-paid posts to every pupil passing out of the Universite de Travail. This close collaboration of public authorities, manufacturers, and workers produced most remarkable results in the course of a few years. Besides the Universite de Travail there are provincial schools of arts and crafts, agricultural mechanics, hosiery-weaving, and industrial chemistry. The communes and many trade unions provide housewifery schools for young girls and schools for adults.
As regards agriculture, the State endeavoured to promote. specialization in the subject by courses of lectures given all over the country. Such efforts made by public authorities, more especially by the provincial and communal administrative bodies, whose powers are very extensive, are rendered necessary by the social conditions of the country.
Population.—A population which in 1900 numbered 6,693,548 had in 1910 become 7,423,782 an increase of 10.91%, or over 1% per annum. Density increased from 227 to 252 inhabitants per sq. kilometre. East Flanders contained 374 inhabitants per sq. km., the province of Antwerp, 342, Hainault, 331, the province of Liége, 306, West Flanders, 270, Limburg, 114, the province of Namur, 99, Luxemburg, 52. Thickly populated areas and urban centres developed with lightning rapidity: in Antwerp the population increased 187% in 50 years, in Charleroi 147%, in Liége 105%. The whole population depended for support on the internal resources of the country, emigration being almost negligible: in 1910 only 38,854 persons left the country (55% of them born in Belgium), principally for France (52%), Germany (13%) and Holland (12%). On the other hand, 44,950 immigrants settled in Belgium, coming chiefly from France (41%), Germany (21%) and Holland (16%).
To maintain such a dense population agriculture had to be brought to a pitch of intensiveness unknown elsewhere; and industry, with such vast numbers of hands to draw on, was able to develop with marvellous rapidity.
Industries.—The various industries of Belgium employ a large part of the population. In 1910 this industrial population comprised:—
| Employers, or persons employing members of their own families as employees or workers | Persons | Per cent. |
| 260,521 | 15·23 | |
| Members of families as above | 91,693 | 5·36 |
| Employees | 87,463 | 5·12 |
| Workers | 1,270,484 | 74·29 |
| Total | 1,710,161 | persons |
These were divided among the different branches of industry as follows:—
| Per cent. | |
| Textile industry | 15·36 |
| Metallurgical industry | 13·32 |
| MetallurgicalClothing industry„ | 11·94 |
| MetallurgicalBuilding industry„ | 9·58 |
| MetallurgicalMining industry„ | 9·08 |
| Timber and furniture-making | 8·30 |
In 1914 glass-making employed 12,000 workmen, maintained 19 furnaces and produced annually 400,000,000 francs worth of glass, or one-fifth of the world's entire output, 95% being exported. The unchallenged superiority of the Belgian glass-workers, with their centuries of specialization behind them, ensured a privileged position in the markets of the world. Even so, technical development was still advancing, and in 1914 the new Fourcault process had just been successfully introduced. By means of it glass is drawn without being touched by hand from the moment it comes out of the furnace until it is ready for sale as finished merchandise. There were, besides, seven factories producing annually 2,500,000 sq. metres of plate glass, representing a value of 28,500,000 francs, nine-tenths being exported; and the factory of Jumet produced annually 12,000,000 bottles. The Belgian cut-glass trade was equally important. The Val St. Lambert, with 5,300 hands, produced daily 250,000 pieces, an output (90% exported) realizing annually 13,000,000 francs.
In 1913 the metallurgical trade included: 21 high furnaces with 20,080 hands producing 96,000 tons of cast iron; 6 steel-works with 7,700 hands producing 1,134,000 tons of rough steel and 671,000 tons of finished products; 15 iron-works with 3,402 hands producing 27,100 tons of finished iron and 19,300 tons of finished steel. The steel industry, including coke-fired furnaces, employed in 1913 a total of 39,500 hands, and was represented by 41 factories with 2,498 coke-fired furnaces, employing 4,229 hands and producing 3,523,000 tons; 19 works with high furnaces, 5,289 hands, producing 2,484,690 tons; 28 Siemens-Martin furnaces producing 274,450 tons of rough steel; 84 converters producing 2,192,180 tons of rough steel and 1,409,940 tons of finished steel; 38 transforming plants producing 304,350 tons of finished iron and 448,400 tons of finished steel. The zinc industry possessed 14 foundries with 600 furnaces and 10 rolling mills, and produced annually 200,000 tons of rough zinc and 51,000 tons of sheet zinc. It employed 9,300 hands. The output, nine-tenths of which was exported, was worth 115,000.000 francs.
The collieries, the presence of which brought also the iron, zinc and steel industries to the provinces of Liege and Hainault the coal-yielding provinces occupied a particularly important place in Belgium; 125 collieries, possessing 305 pits and employing 145,337 men, were producing annually 22,841,590 tons. In quantity this output nearly sufficed for the needs of the country, which consumed 26,000,000 tons per annum. But in quality the deficit was considerable. The output of steam and domestic coal was excessive, permitting an export of 6,000,000 tons, 5,000,000 of which went to France; while the lack of gas and coking coal necessitated the importation of 9,000,000 tons from Germany.
Although since 1910 the import of coal had exceeded the export, the discovery of two new coal fields permitted the hope that in the future Belgium would produce a quantity far in excess of what she needed for internal consumption. In 1901 deposits of coal were found in the Campine at depths of 430 and 630 metres. The first concessions were granted in 1906, the first sinkings exceptionally difficult because of the water-bearing strata encountered begun in 1909. No pits had started work before the war. Experimental borings, commenced in the south of Hainault in 1908, established the existence of fresh deposits at depths of 400 and 800 metres. No concession had, up to 1921, been granted by the State in these coal fields.
There were 62 factories for making coal dust into briquettes and other forms of patent fuel. In 1913 these employed 2,000 hands and produced 2,608,640 tons.
Next to the mines must be mentioned the important industry of the stone quarries. In 1913 1,556 quarries, 481 of them subterranean, employed 34,893 workmen, and produced 70,500,000 francs worth of paving-stones, broken stone, hewn stone, marble, chalk, lime, phosphates, plastic clay, dolomite and slate. Depending on the quarries were 70 cement factories in a state of rapid development, the cement export having risen from a value of 12,000,000 francs in 1908 to that of 22,000,000 francs in 1912.
A third group of important industries consisted of the textile manufactures of Flanders (flax, cotton, hemp, jute), and of the Verviers district (wool). In 1910 they accounted for 270,000 workers, employees, and masters; while the related clothing industry employed another 200,000 persons. The total value of the products represented 800,000,000 francs, 350,000,000 of which came from export.
The following table will indicate the relative importance of the different textile industries, and their development during the last years before the war:—
| Persons Employed. | ||
| 1896 | 1910 | |
| Linen | 26,205 | 42,279 |
| Hemp and Jute | 3,610 | 6,509 |
| Wool | 32,285 | 32,846 |
| Cotton | 20,435 | 48,157 |
| Silk | 655 | 1,391 |
| Artificial silk | 0 | 3,573 |
| Lace | 47,571 | 81,213 |
Imports of raw materials, spun raw materials and woven goods amounted in 1911 to 838,700,000 francs, in 1912 to 985,300,000 francs, in 1913 to 998,400,000 francs. The exports of raw materials, spun goods, and woven goods amounted in 1911 to 871,400,000 francs, in 1912 to 1,033,400,000 francs, in 1913 to 998,700,000 francs.
