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Ch. xviii.] 



DELTA OF THE KHONE. 



427 



some conglomerate ; for here some high mountains of Alpine 

 limestone approach within a few miles of the sea. 



In the time of the Romans, the hot-baths of Monfalcone 

 were on one of several islands of Alpine limestone, between 

 which and the mainland, on the north, was a channel of the 

 sea, about a mile broad. This channel is now converted into 

 a grassy plain, which surrounds the islands on all sides. 

 Among the numerous changes on this coast, we find that the 

 present channel of the Isonzo is several miles to the west of 

 its ancient bed, in part of which, at Ronchi, the old Eoman 

 bridge which crossed the Yia Appia was lately found buried 

 in fluviatile silt. 



Marine delta of the Rhone. — The lacustrine delta of the 

 Rhone in Switzerland has already been considered (p. 417), 

 its contemporaneous marine delta may now be described. 

 Scarcely has the river passed out of the Lake of Geneva before 

 its pure waters are again filled with sand and sediment by 

 the impetuous Arve, descending from the highest Alps, and 

 bearing along in its current the granitic sand and impalpable 

 mud annually brought down by the glaciers of Mont Blanc. 

 The Rhone afterwards receives vast contributions of trans- 

 ported matter from the Alps of Dauphiny, and the primary 

 and volcanic mountains of Central France ; and when at 

 length it enters the Mediterranean, it discolours the blue 

 waters of that sea with a whitish sediment, for the distance of 

 between six and seven miles, throughout which space the 

 current of fresh water is perceptible. 



Strabo's description of the delta is so inapplicable to its 

 present configuration, as to attest a complete alteration in 

 the physical features of the country since the Augustan age. 

 It appears, however, that the head of the delta, or the point 

 at which it begins to ramify, has remained unaltered since the 

 time of Pliny, for he states that the Rhone divided itself at 

 Aries into two arms. This is the case at present ; one of the 

 branches, the western, being now called Le Petit Rhone, 

 which is again subdivided before entering the Mediterranean. 

 The advance of the base of the delta, in the last eighteen cen- 

 turies, is demonstrated by many curious antiquarian monu- 

 ments. The most striking of these is the great and unnatural 



