The financial situation, as we have seen, was from the outset full of difficulty.  The king was personally parsimonious, but his many projects for the general welfare of the land involved large outlay, and the consequence was an annual average deficit of seven million florins.  At first the revenue was raised by the increase of customs and excise, including colonial imports.  This caused much dissatisfaction in Holland, especially when duties were placed on coffee and sugar.  The complaint was that thus an undue share of taxation fell on the maritime north.  In order to lighten these duties on colonial wares, other taxes had to be imposed.  In 1821 accordingly it was proposed to meet the deficit by two most unwise and obnoxious taxes, known as mouture and abbatage.  The first was on ground corn, the second on the carcases of beasts, exacted at the mill or the slaughter-house—­in other words on bread and on butcher’s meat.  Both were intensely unpopular, and the mouture in particular fell with especial severity on the Belgian working classes and peasantry, who consumed much more bread per head than the Dutch.  Nevertheless by ministerial pressure the bill was passed (July 21, 1821) by a narrow majority of four—­55 to 51.  All the minority were Belgians, only two Belgians voted with the majority.  It is inconceivable how the government could have been so impolitic as to impose these taxes in face of such a display of national animosity.  The mouture only produced a revenue of 5,500,000 fl.; the abbatage 2,500,000 fl.

This amount, though its exaction pressed heavily on the very poor, afforded little relief; and to meet recurring deficits the only resource was borrowing.  To extricate the national finances from ever-increasing difficulties the Amortisatie-Syndikaat was created in December, 1822.  Considerable sources of income from various public domains and from tolls passed into the hands of the seven members of the Syndicate, all of whom were bound to secrecy, both as to its public and private transactions.  Its effect was to diminish still further the control of the Representative Chamber over the national finances.  The Syndicate did indeed assist the State, for between 1823 and 1829 it advanced no less than 58,885,443 fl. to meet the deficits in the budget, but the means by which it achieved this result were not revealed.

Yet another device to help the government in its undertakings was the million de l’industrie, which was voted every year, as an extraordinary charge, but of which no account was ever given.  That this sum was beneficially used for the assistance of manufacturing and industrial enterprise, as at Seraing and elsewhere, and that it contributed to the growing prosperity of the southern provinces, is certain.  But the needless mystery which surrounded its expenditure led to the suspicion that it was used as a fund for secret service and political jobbery.