THE NETHERLAND DIKES. 411i 
Sea-dikes of the Netherlands. 
The formation of new banks by the sea is constantly going 
on at points favorable for the deposit of sand and earth, and 
hence opportunity is continually afforded for enclosure of new 
land outside of that already diked in, the coast is fast advanc- 
ing seaward, and every new embankment increases the security 
of former enclosures. The province of Zeeland consists of 
islands washed by the sea on their western coasts, and separated 
by the many channels through which the Schelde and some 
other rivers find their way to the ocean. In the twelfth century 
these islands were much smaller and more numerous than at 
present. They have been gradually enlarged, and, in several 
instances, at last connected by the extension of their system of 
dikes. Walcheren is formed of ten islets united into one about 
the end of the fourteenth century. At the middle of the fif- 
teenth century, Goeree and Overflakkee consisted of separate 
islands, containing altogether about ten thousand acres; by 
means of above sixty successive advances of the dikes, they 
have been brought to compose a single island, whose area is not 
less than sixty thousand acres.* 
In the Netherlands—which the first Napoleon characterized 
as a deposit of the Rhine, and as, therefore, by natural law, 
rightfully the property of him who controlled the sources of 
that great river—and on the adjacent Frisic, Low German, and 
Danish shores and islands, sea and river dikes have been con- 
structed ona grander and more imposing scale than in any other 
country. The whole economy of the art has been there most 
thoroughly studied, and the literature of the subject is very ex- 
tensive. For my present aim, which is concerned with results 
rather than with processes, it is not worth while to refer to 
* STARING, Voormaals en Thans, p.152. Kohl states that the peninsula of 
Diksand on the coast of Holstein consisted, at the close of the last century, 
of several islands measuring together less than five thousand acres. In 1837 
they had been connected with the mainland, and had nearly doubled in area. 
—Inseln u. Marschen Schlesw. Holst., iii., p. 262. 
