186 GERMANY. 



On issuing from this ancient "Sea of Swabia," the Rhine once more returns to 

 Switzerland ; but having forced its way through the Jura, it abruptly turns to 

 the north on reaching Basel, and leaves the region of the Alj)s for ever 

 behind it. 



The course of the Rhine below Basel naturally divides itself into three 

 sections. From Basel to Mayence the river meanders over a broad plain, once 

 occupied by an ancient inland lake. At Bingen, below Mayence, it enters a 

 mountain defile, which it leaves at Bonn, after which it traverses a wide alluvial 

 plain, and bifurcating, reaches the sea through several arms, into the principal 

 amongst which the Meuse (Maas) discharges itself. Each of these sections is 

 characterized by special features. 



There exists no evidence of the wide lacustrine plain of the Middle Rhine, 

 between Basel and Bingen, having ever been occupied by a glacier. JN^o traces 

 have been discovered there of the vast river of ice which from Switzerland 

 spread over the plateau of Swabia, nor have erratic blocks been found on the 

 Taunus or the Niederwald, ranges of hills which bound the alluvial plain iu the 

 north. Yet, although the ice may not actually have invaded this vast depres- 

 sion, 170 miles in length and 18 wide, it is to glacial action that the débris, gravel, 

 and sand which fill it now must in a large measure be traced. The vast deposits, 

 which now cover to an unknow^n depth an area of 3,000 square miles, have been 

 conveyed thither by glacial currents. Most of these deposits are traceable to 

 the Alps and the Jura, and along the sides of the valle}'' they are partially 

 concealed beneath layers of gravel derived from the Vosges and the Black 

 Forest. The lateral terraces of the valley, up to a height of 300 and even 600 

 feet above the Rhine, are in many localities covered with a deposit of loess, or 

 loam, some 250 feet in thickness. This loess consists of finely comminuted 

 sand and pulverulent loam combined with carbonate of lime, and is replete with fresh- 

 water shells of species still living in the arctic regions ; and the bones of extinct 

 mammals have also been found in it. The Rhine has scooped itself out a passage 

 through this loess, and although no longer the mighty river as of yore, the 

 matter held in suspension by it and carried down stream is immense. At 

 Germersheim the bed of the Rhine is supposed to contain 1,000 cubic yards 

 of gravel to every yard of length, and to carry this mass annually a distance 

 of 275 yards down stream. The mud yearly washed past the same place has 

 been calculated at 2,710,000 cubic yards. M. Daubree estimates that the mud 

 annually carried down the Rhine would form a cube having sides 340 feet in 

 length. The sand of the Rhine contains a few particles of gold, but the quantity 

 is so small now as not any longer to repay the labour involved in searching for 

 it. Up to 1850 about £2,000 worth was abstracted every year. 



The Rhine, in its progress through the wide valley extending from Basel to 

 Mayence, winds much about, and the floods, which occur annually, continually 

 change its channels and displace its islands. Neuburg, a village near Germersheim, 

 was built in 1570 on the right bank of the river, but stands now on the left 

 bank, its original site not having been changed. In the time of the Romans 



