ENCEOACHMEISTTS OF THE SEA. 569 



Tliis earth, with a portion of the sand, is swept off by northwardly 

 and southwardly currents, and let fall at other points of the coast, 

 or carried off altogether out of the reach of causes which might 

 bring it back to its former position. 



Although, then, the eastern shore of the German Ocean here 

 and there advances into the sea, it in general retreats before it, 

 and but for the protection afforded it by natural arrangements 

 seconded by the art and industry of man, whole provinces would 

 soon be engulfed by the waters. This protection consists in an 

 almost unbroken chain of sand banks and dunes, extending from 

 the northernmost point of Jutland to the Elbe, a distance of not 

 much less than three hundred miles, and from the Elbe again, 

 though with more frequent and wider interruptions, to the Atlan- 

 tic borders of France and Spain. So long as the dunes are main- 

 tained by nature or by human art, they serve, like any other em- 

 bankment or dike, as a partial or a complete protection against the 

 encroachments of the sea ; and on the other hand, when their 

 drifts are not checked by natural processes or by the industry of 

 man, they become a cause of as certain, if not of as sudden, de- 

 struction as the ocean itseK whose advance they retard. On the 

 whole, the dunes on the coast of the German Sea, notwithstand- 

 ing the great quantity of often fertile land they cover, and the 

 evils which result from their movement, are a protective and bene- 

 ficial agent, and their maintenance is an object of solicitude with 

 the Governments and people of the shores they defend.* 



The eastward progress of the sea on the Danish, JS^etherlandish 

 and French coasts depends so much on local geological structure, 

 on the force and direction of tidal and other marine currents, on 

 the volume and rapidity of coast rivers, on the contingencies of 



* " We must, therefore, not be surprised to see the people here deal as gin- 

 geriy with their dunes as if treading among eggs. He who is lucky enough 

 to own a molehill of dune pets it affectionately, and spends his substance in 

 cherishing and fattening it. That fair, fertile, rich province, the peninsula of 

 Eiderstadt in the south of Friesland, has, on the point towards the sea, only a 

 tiny row of dunes, some six miles long or so ; but the people talk of their fringe 

 of sand-hills, as if it were a border set with pearls. They look upon it as their 

 best defence against Neptune. They have connected it with their system of 

 dikes, and for years have kept sentries posted to protect it against wanton in 

 jury." — J. G. KoHi,, Die Inseln u. Marsclien Schleswig-Holstdna, ii., p. 115. 



