1) ers 
vill RIVERS AND LAKES 295 
south, until it reaches St. Genix, where it falls 
into and adopts a transverse valley which 
properly belongs to the little river Guiers; it 
subsequently joins the Ain and finally falls 
into the Sadne. If these valleys were attrib- 
uted to their older occupiers we should there- 
fore confine the name of the Rhone to the 
portion of its course from the Rhone glacier to 
Martigny. From Martigny it occupies succes- 
sively the valleys of the Dranse, Guiers, Ain, 
and Sadne. In fact, the Sadne receives the 
Ain, the Ain the Guiers, the Guiers the 
Dranse, and the Dranse the Rhone. This is 
not a mere question of names, but also one of 
antiquity. The Sadne, for instance, flowed 
past Lyons to the Mediterranean for ages 
before it was joined by the Rhone. In our 
nomenclature, however, the Rhone has swal- 
lowed up the others. This is the more curious 
because of the three great rivers which unite 
to form the lower Rhone, namely, the Sadne, 
the Doubs, and the Rhone itself, the Sadne 
brings for a large part of the year the 
greatest volume of water, and the Doubs 
has the longest course. Other similar cases 
