In that country power had been assumed by the eldest son of the late last Stadtholder of the former Dutch Republic on 6 December 1813, under the new title "Sovereign Prince.
The thirty most prominent families of Brussels expressed the wish to restore the old Governorate-general of the Austrians, and this was provisionally instituted by the Allies in February 1814 as their military government.
The gist of the protocol was determined by the Sovereign Prince himself in a letter of 16 May 1814 to his minister of Foreign Affairs, baron Van Nagell.
William sent a final draft of the Convention, as edited by Clancarty's Dutch colleague Anton Reinhard Falck, to the ministers of the other three Great Powers, Metternich, Nesselrode, and Hardenberg on 30 May.
Article 7 The expenses requisite for the building and maintenance of the frontier fortresses of the new State shall be borne by the public chest as concerning the security and independence of all the provinces of the whole nation.
Article 8 The cost of the making and upkeep of the dykes shall be at the charges of the districts more directly interested, except in the case of an extraordinary disaster.
[8] He subsequently tried to get the assent of the (carefully selected) representatives of the Belgian people to the Dutch constitution, but encountered opposition from those who were suspicious of designs to undermine the position of the Catholic Church in those provinces.