HYACINTH CULTURE AT HAARLEM 155 



unequal and different in parts. By measuring it they test 

 the value of the ground, and not less is the value measured 

 by the length of time the sea has withdrawn from the surface. 

 There is no doubt this sand is from the sea-bottom, whether 

 it was the sea's action that brought it, or whether it has been 

 blown and driven by the wind. The dunes have so often 

 shifted that a knowledge of the variations due to the shifting 

 of the sand in the dunes is enough to account for sand- 

 layers, for it can be driven very far indeed by wind from 

 the sea. 



A little while ago the village of Sheveling, near the 

 Hague, was surrounded by the dunes, which were at that 

 time some distance from the church, now it is much nearer, — 

 the church cannot have moved. On the same coast the 

 mouth of the Rhine has been choked with sand, and the sea 

 now covers the castle of Bret, facing Catwick-sur-Mer. The 

 castle can still be seen at certain seasons at low tide. The 

 sea has remade other dunes, half a league farther inland. 

 All along the coast near Haarlem, beyond the canal which 

 connects Haarlem with Leyden, the main road cuts through 

 these dunes in several places. In the island of Walcheren, 

 in Zealand, at very low tide can be seen vestiges of the 

 ancient town of Domburg, where they fish up statues of 

 Nehellenia, a heathen goddess, and also early Roman 

 inscriptions. 



In the present day dunes 100 feet high separate the new 

 Domburg from the one invaded by the sea, and the Zea- 

 landers, through their marvellous and inventive industry, 

 have succeeded not only in fortifying themselves against 

 encroachments from the sea, but have made very extra- 

 ordinary dykes, like the one at West Cappel, which 

 you cannot see when you are standing upon it, as it is 

 nothing but a very long sloping bank or glacis of timber- 

 work, but the slope is so gradual that the only resistance 



