The survival of such a relic of medieval political disorders was due to the impossibility of making a settlement between the two claimants of its territory. In the fifteenth century its mines were the property of the Dukes of Limburg, who had leased them to Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy. Shortly after the French Revolution, they were declared national property by the French Republic and were operated by the government.[22] With the fall of Napoleon, the estate passed under the management of both Prussia and Holland. After the Belgian revolution of 1830, however, the entire property became part of Belgium’s share. A demand for rents in arrears from the lessee by Prussia, although recognized as valid by the courts of Liége, was not approved by the new Belgian state and the only compromise that could be reached was a declaration of the neutrality of the territory. The Belgian question as well as the related Luxemburg and Moresnet problems, the latter being of slight significance, present themselves today as economic settlements no less than political adjustments. The inner reason which had led German hope to dwell on the annexation of Belgium is the knowledge that such an addition in territory would convert Germany into the dominating industrial nation of Europe. This position of superiority would be firmly established if, in addition, the French basins of Longwy and Briey could be turned into Reichslands, as had been done with Alsace-Lorraine in 1870. Fortunately for Europe, the developments of the armed contest begun in 1914 proved that the threat of this economic vassalage is no longer to be feared. Incidentally it is worth remembering that its realization would obviously have been followed by the loss of Holland’s independence. Belgium’s political independence is therefore a necessity for the fine adjustment of the balance of European industrial life. And there are quarters where such economic considerations carry greater weight than national sentiments. The main point to be made, however, is that Belgian nationality is entitled to survival, whether it be examined from a material or a moral standpoint. Changes, if any, of its frontiers are indicated in the east, where Malmedy and its environs in Rhenish Prussia constitute a domain of French language. The exchange of this territory for districts of German speech in Belgian Luxemburg and the strategic reinforcement of this eastern frontier, as a safeguard against future aggression, are desirable for Belgians as well as for Germans. TABLE I FRENCH- AND FLEMISH-SPEAKING INHABITANTS OF BELGIUM Census of December 31, 1910