FORMATION OF FORE LANDS. 365 



its waves passed over Nord Strand, Eyderstede, and Dit- 

 marsch, near 10,000 of their inhabitants perished. Again, 

 in 1300, seven parishes in Nord Strand and Pell worm 

 were destroyed; and in 1338, Ditmarsch experienced a 

 new catastrophe, which swept away a great part of it on 

 the side next Eyderstede : the dike of the course of the 

 Eyder between the sand-banks was demolished, and the 

 tides have ever since preserved their course throughout 

 that wide space. Lastly, in the year 1362, the isles of 

 Fora and Sylt, then forming but one, were divided, and 

 Nord Strand, then a marsch united to the coast, was sepa- 

 rated from it. 



During a long time, the inhabitants who survived 

 these catastrophes, and their successors, were so much 

 discouraged, that they attempted nothing more than to 

 surround with dikes like the former such spaces of their 

 meadow-land as appeared the least exposed to these ra- 

 vages, leaving the rest to its fate. But the common 

 course of causes continually tending to extend and to 

 raise the grassy parts of the sand-banks, and no extra- 

 ordinary combination of circumstances having interrupt- 

 ed these natural operations, later generations, farther 

 advanced in the arts, undertook to secure to themselves 

 the possession of those new grounds. In 1525, they 

 turned their attention to the indentations made, during 

 the preceding catastrophes, in the borders of the marsches; 

 the waves, confined in these narrow spaces, sometimes 

 threatening to cut their way into the interior part. In 

 the front of all the creeks of this kind they planted 

 stakes, which they interlaced with osiers, leaving a cer- 

 tain space between the lines. The waves, thus broken, 

 could no longer do injury to the marsch ; and their se- 

 2 



