CATARACTS, AND INUNDATIONS. 27 



arches. Meissen, ten miles north-west of Dresden, is likewise situ, 

 ated on this river, over which is a bridge, supported by stone piers, 

 but the upper part is of wood : this bridge is considered as a master- 

 piece of art, the middle arch, which is seventy-five paces wide, being 

 kept together by a single wooden peg. The Elbe bounds the Old 

 Mark of Brandenburg toward the east, and there receives the Havel. 

 It is the principal river in Lower Saxony. At Hamburg it becomes 

 extremely broad, and has sufficient depth for large ships: it dis. 

 charges its waters into the German Ocean, by the fortress of Gluk- 

 stadt. Few kinds of fishes are found in this river. 



The principal rivers of FRANCE which have their sources in that 

 kingdom are the Loire, the Garonne, and the Seine; these all dis- 

 charge their waters into the Atlantic. The LOIRE is a larger river 

 than the Rhone. It rises in the mountains of Cevennes, in Lan~ 

 guedoc (now distributed into five departments) ; it takes its course 

 north and north-west, till it passes the city of Orleans, in the Or- 

 leanois (now the department of the Loire); it afterward pursues a 

 course south-west and west, by Tours and Angers, and discharges 

 itself into the Bay of Biscay, forty miles below Nantes ; its whole 

 course, with all its windings, is computed to be five hundred miles, 

 receiving in its progress the Allier, Cher, Indre, Creuse, Vienne, and 

 Maine. It has a communication with the Seine by means of the 

 canals of Briate and Orleans, In November 1?9^ it overflowed its 

 banks, and laid a large extent of country under water. 



The GARONNE rises at the foot of the Pyrenees, in the county of 

 Cominges; it becomes navigable at Muret, on the confines of Lan- 

 guedoc; in its course it is joined by many rivers ; it passes Toulouse 

 and Bourdeaux, below which it receives the Dordogne, a river nearly 

 equal to it in consequence ; these united streams then take the name 

 of the Gironde, become very broad, and disembogue into the bay 

 of Biscay. By means of this river, and a noble canal, a junction has 

 been formed between the Mediterranean Sea and the Atlantic 

 Ocean. This canal is a work of such grandeur and utility that we 

 cannot consent to pass it by without a more detailed description. 



The ROYAL CANAL, formed in order to make a communication 

 between the Atlantic Ocean and the gulf of Lyons, in the Mediter- 

 ranean, of such extent, that vessels might pass from one sea into the 

 other without going round by Spain, is in truth one of the noblest 



