THE TUSCAN MAREMMA. 
m 
the coast, which is a recent deposit of the waters, is little 
elevated above the sea, and admits into its lagoons and the 
months of its rivers floods of salt water with every western 
wind, every rising tide.* 
The western coast of Tuscany is not supposed to have been 
an unhealthy region before the conquest of Etruria by the 
Romans, but it certainly became so within a few centuries 
after that event. This was a natural consequence of the neg¬ 
lect or wanton destruction of the public improvements, and 
especially the hydraulic works in which the Etruscans were so 
skilful, and of the felling of the upland forests, to satisfy the 
demand for w T ood at Rome for domestic, industrial, and mil¬ 
itary purposes. After the downfall of the Roman empire, the 
incursions of the barbarians, and then feudalism, foreign dom 
ination, intestine wars, and temporal and spiritual tyrannies, 
course. “ The condition of this marsh and of its affluents are now, No¬ 
vember, 1859, much changed, and it is advisable to prosecute its improve¬ 
ment by deposits. In consequence of the extensive felling of the woods 
upon the plains, hills, and mountains of the territory of Massa and Scarlino, 
within the last ten years, the Pecora aud other affluents of the marsh 
receive, during the rains, water abundantly charged with slime, so that 
the deposits within the first division of the marsh are already considerable, 
and we may now hope to see the whole marsh and pond filled up in a much 
shorter time than we had a right to expect before 1850. This circumstance 
totally changes the terms of the question, because the filling of the marsh 
and pond, which then seemed almost impossible on account of the small 
amount of sediment deposited by the Pecora, has now become practicable.” 
—Salvagnoli, Bapporto ml Boniftcamento delle Maremme Toscane , pp. 
li, lii. 
The annual amount of sediment brought down by the rivers of the 
Maremma is computed at more than 12,000,000 cubic yards, or enough to 
raise an area of four square miles one yard. Between 1830 and 1859 more 
than three times that quantity was deposited in the marsh and shoal water 
lake of Castiglione alone.— Salvagnoli, Baccolta di Document i, pp. 74, 75. 
* The tide rises ten inches on the coast of Tuscany. See Memoir by 
Fantoni, in the appendix to Salvagnoli, Bapporto , p. 189. 
On the tides of the Mediterranean, see Bottger, Das Mittelmeer , p. 190. 
Not having Admiral Smyth’s Mediterranean—on which Bottger’s work is 
founded—at hand, I do not know how far credit is due to the former author 
for the matter contained in the chapter referred to. 
