534 
DRAINING OF THE ZUIDERZEE. 
twenty feet above tbe level of the Rhine, and hardly two hun¬ 
dred yards wide. There is no present adequate motive for 
this diversion, but it is easy to suppose that it may become ad¬ 
visable within no long period. The navigation of the Lake 
of Constance is rapidly increasing in importance, and the 
shoaling of the eastern end of that lake by the deposits of the 
Rhine may require a remedy which can be found by no other 
so ready means as the discharge of that river into the Lake of 
Wallenstadt. The navigation of this latter lake is not import¬ 
ant, nor is it ever likely to become so, because the rocky and 
precipitous character of its shores renders their cultivation 
impossible. It is of great depth, and its basin is capacious 
enough to receive and retain all the sediment which the Rhine 
would carry into it for thousands of years. 
Draining of the Zuiderzee. 
I have referred to the draining of the Lake of Haarlem as 
an operation of great geographical as well as economical and 
mechanical interest. A much more gigantic project, of a sim¬ 
ilar character, is now engaging the attention of the Nether¬ 
landish engineers. It is proposed to drain the great salt-water 
basin called the Zuiderzee. This inland sea covers an area of 
not less than two thousand square miles, or about one million 
three hundred thousand acres. The seaward half, or that por¬ 
tion lying northwest of a line drawn from Enkhuizen to Sta- 
voren, is believed to have been converted from a marsh to an 
open bay since the fifth century after Christ, and this change 
is ascribed, partly if not wholly, to the interference of man 
with the order of nature. The Zuiderzee communicates with 
the sea by at least six considerable channels, separated from 
each other by low islands, and the tide rises within the basin 
to the height of three feet. To drain the Zuiderzee, these 
channels must first be closed and the passage of the tidal flood 
through them cut off. If this be done, the coast currents will 
be 1 estored approximately to the lines they followed fourteen 
or fifteen centuries ago, and there can be little doubt that an 
