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BELGIUM 195 Belg-aum, a town and district of British India, in rates were Rs.22,51,550, the incidence of assessment being the Carnatic or Canarese-speaking division of Bombay The town is situated in 15° 5T IST. lat. and 74° 34' E lon«- * about 15 annas per acre; the number of police was 877. Out nearly 2500 feet above sea-level; it is a station on the ni-?tal cultivated area in 1897-98 of 1,714,200 acres Southern Mahratta railway, 245 miles south of Poona 51,069 were irrigated, including 5479 from government The population in 1881 was 32,697; in 1891 it was canals. _ The principal crops are millet, rice, wheat, other 40,737; and in 1901 it was 26,237. Belgaum contains a tow!nam%iPU Se’ 0ll'seeds’ cotton> sugar-cane, spices, and lere are con cantonment which is the headquarters of a military district c oth The mi 1itown siderable manufactures of Gokak is known for its dyes, ofitscottonpaper, with a garrison of all arms. It is also a considerable centre and itswooden and earthenware toys. The West Deccan line ot trade and of cotton weaving. There are two cotton mills with a capital of Bs. 3,20,000, working 52,000 spindles’ f mm ™ twem M;,lhrat ta railway runs through the district T and employing 2186 hands, of whom 909 are children. ’ S0Uth wTth iTl L PUP i S - 1 Inl897 -98 there were 311 schools, The district of Belgaum has an area of 4657 square Tverv 0ne villa e with a 1 7 ! ’, school to y 17 square miles, and P9 pupils Sto every 100 of the miles. The population in 1891 was 1,013,261, being 217 persons per square mile. Classified according to religion mX" 0Di 1 PW0 high SCJl00ls at Be]Sa™ town are numbered 873,051; Mahommedans, 80,484; Jains’ maintained by Government and by the London Mission • 52,048 ; Christians, 7617, of whom 1454 were Europeans: tota pupils about 830. There are nine printing-presses’ Parsees, 61. In 1901 the population was 994,209, showing most of which issue a vernacular newspaper. In^ 1897-98 a decrease of 2 per cent., compared with an increase of 17 _ he municipalities had a total income of Rs.1,09 980 the per cent, m the preceding decade. The land revenue and incidence of taxation being 13 annas per head ’The death-rate in 1897 was 42 per 1000. BELGIUM. Geography amp Statistics. S 4 6 000 ; fr 1880 t0 1 90 55 000 from ? 1 ’ 8 ’ U t; of a total 1890 to 1899, over BBLGIUM (French Belgique, Flemish Belgie, German 7? 0O O ’ A t tr o,Oby,/6^ 3,326,190 were fmales 6 669 732 If326^ 90° f ’ and ° , 3,343,542 females populationThe of Belgzen), a kingdom of Europe, lying between 49° 31' and deaths per 1000 inhabitants have since 1876 undergone and 51 30 N. latitude and between 2° 36' and 6° 3' E. abirths gradual diminution, the births however continuing in marked longitude. Its frontier touches the North Sea, Holland’ excess over the deaths, as shown in the following table Rhenish Prussia, the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg, and Average Year] Year. y Deaths 1 ranee. Gradually rising towards the S.E., Belgium lies 1S77/-AQOO 1SS« . Per #1000Sl’zl Inhabitants, per 1000OlInhabitants. AO/ .

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very low in the provinces of Antwerp and Flanders1887-1896 . . . 29-25 20-92 reaches over 300 feet in height a little to the S.E. of 1898 . . . 28-62 Brussels; 650 feet near the Sambre and the Meuse • 1640 C enta e / varied irom 7 2 to 8 76. P% The 1871 ISTlvarieZfrom , annual S of immigration illegitimacy since has since plat aux of the oeoL0nfeet r the on ? E. frontier Province of Luxembourg

over has varied from 15,000 to 27,000, and, since that date has been

AlOO the of the province of Liege emi rati The land is traversed from S. to N. by the Scheldt and its maximum g °n, which in 1898 reached 2,8 0 n the its affluent the Lys, and by the Meuse and its affluent the in 1890 lborn ’ Aln Population of foreign 1890, 64,800 were in France; 47,459 in Holland • 38birth 367 T°, & Sambre. . To the S. of the Sambre and the Meuse the in Germany ; 9266 in the Grand Duehy of Lnxembon o and ilOa country is, in general, undulating. The valleys of the 1SrKTemiehb^r#*"/' ts . f lemish, to the N. ot a line stretching from nearinto Warneton ,Belgi, “1 ia distribntef three Meuse, the Ourthe, the Ambleve, the Lesse, the Semois, on the Lys eastwards to Vise on the Meuse • French Tn the ike., are highly picturesque; the natural grottos of Han country of the Walloons, to the S. of that line; German in tlie on the Lesse being celebrated, and the grotto of Remou- r d e n f Arlon At the census of 1890 there were efiamps and the prehistoric caverns of Furfooz being no 2 744 97i ™h v! less remarkable. The mean annual temperature is 49-1° F speaking only FLmJhT wlm, r^Vp'ertm^^akfflg in the central part, but sinks to 44-6° F. on the highest 32io?s “ kingo°tly7Ge?maknng b<>tl1 rrenCh “d Flemish i and P plateaux. The most frequent winds are S.W. and W. Constitution and Government.—The constitution, adopted in bringing with them the humidity of the Atlantic. The reV 9 With a VieW to extension of of Suffmge Tbe f f the rights 0 average annual precipitation in rain and in snow amounts sentativc °i-? °f Sovernment is a constitutional, repred heredltar at Brussels to 28‘8 inches. ^W y fr0m monarchy. The constitution declares tlle eo le and !uthorities Te^T? P P ’ establishes three autnorities legislative, executive, and judicial. The legislative f com jrisos ■,The>.area l square 2,945,589 r 29,456 kilometres, or 11,3/3 English miles, hectares, and the 6 0tion the e senate, and the king. The members of the chamber ^ »f «preseftattoeof s total population at the end of 1899 numbered 6,744 000 an SrTnate Slf ^? average of 593-11 per square mile. The nine provinces the£ representatives are elected for four years, the half of them 4 retiring every two years. Their number must not exceed the were6-5—^ area,S, P0Pulatlons> and densities at the end of 1899 proportion of 1 to every 40,000 inhabitants. To be elected a nmsthateX4 d 6 be a ?el&ian bF birth or bJ uaturalization, Area in „ . PopulaJielgmm. No condition is required. Every member in Belghim Nn other G ^ twenty-five years, and be domiciled English Population Provinces. tion per square at1899 ^ sq. mile, m em miles. ' 1899. I d esentatlve "ity of 4000 francs (£160) for dfsoCging was based^ni1 ly r 0nre^ Antwerp . t lf census -^Before 1893 the electoraUaw 1093 825,000 ? 5 i - citizens The members chamber of 754-8 Brabant . representatives were elected by payingofinthetaxes a fixed 1268 1,281,000 1010-2 Ves 1249 Flanders j( East i j 811,000 649-3 tfflf ii4 Ktmrlyn42 francs > 32 centimes). After the revision of 1893 1158 1,035,000 893-7 who bad ained -° ri?fnted l1*0 riSht of suffrag° to every citizen Hainault . 1437 1,134,000 789-1 fnr nnf i es the age of twenty-five years and been domiciled Liege 1117 §43,000 754-7 nipnt s than one year the citizen same commune. A supplemenury vote is allowed to inevery fulfilling certain conLimbourg. 931 242,000 259-9 Luxembourg nS ln res ec a e 1706 221,000 Tyvn . P t °t g > family, and personal or property tax. . 129-5 iwo supplementary votes are accorded to every citizen whose Namur 1414 352,000 248-9 1 ession, or the possession of a diploma or a certificate, attests an average level of higher instruction. No person, however, can Total 11,373 6,744,000 I 59.3 dispose of more than three votes. In 1892, before the revision, From 1876 to 1880 the average annual increase of population the number of electors was 36,775. In 1900, after the revision it had risen to 1,432,232. Further, the law of 29th December