Description of the Landes of Acquitania. 65 
is said to acquaint the natives of large continents of their approach 
to the shores of the ocean, and this is in some degree the case with 
the river Garonne ; but, as in the Forth, whose windings are most 
remarkable near Stirling, its irregularities occur near Marmande, 
‘or previous to its exit into the firth of the Gironde. But as the 
existence of this physical fact, must depend on the mineralogical 
nature of the bed, so it is liable to much inconstancy ; and while, 
in the same country, the Rhine and the Seine are in the same po- 
sitions remarkably tortuous, the Loire, under similar circumstances, 
only becomes more direct in its course. 
Rivers and rivulets running into the sea, that might, under ordi- 
nary circumstances, be considered to join a prolongation of another 
river forming the hydrographical basin of that country, may be con- 
sidered as forming part of that basin; but this is not the case with 
the Adour, whose waters empty themselves into the ocean at wide 
angles to the Garonne, leaving between the two, the waste sandy 
space, which has been the object of our present descriptions. 
The Adour, though chiefly supplied by large streams descending 
from the Pyrenees, is also nourished by some rivers from the north- 
east, bordering the extensive plains of the Landes. The bed of the 
Adour, whose width at its mouth was near 900 feet, was reduced 
to 372 feet by a decree of the late emperor, accompanied with a 
prohibition to cut the pines on its borders. It is unnecessary to 
illustrate at length the fact of the changes undergone in the course 
of this river: it is at once attested by valid historical records, con- 
tained in the registers of Bayonne, in those of Cape Breton, and of 
Vieux Boucau, and by physical phenomena, whose indices may be 
traced at every step. It is one of these changes so ordinarily pro- 
duced by motions of the sand, and yet so interesting in districts of 
this nature. Nor can we see how far originally such changes may 
have been influential in driving back the Garonne to the rocks 
above Bordeaux on the one hand, or the Adour to the recks of Cape 
St. Martin and the Basque country on the other, leaving between 
them these plains, still covered with a virgin soil. On them the 
uniformity of level, the little imbibing power of the pan, and the 
retentive properties of the substratum, give rise, as previously men- 
tioned, to extensive sheets of water, and for four months in the 
year the Landes are every where occupied by mares, or collections 
of water, seldom exceeding two feet in depth. These expanded 
sheets are soon evaporated by the heat of summer, leaving few 
traces of their existence. Plants, whether aquatic or terrestrial, 
germinate in the frigid and temperate zones during the mild sea- 
sons of the year ; few aquatic plants, therefore, mark the residence 
of these winter waters. Some plants are observed to undergo a 
slight change: the Plantago coronopifolia, growing on the oceanic 
shores with hoary leaves, has its leaves smooth when met with on 
these spots. Now and then a few Junci are to be met with ; among 
them Juncus gracilis, J. Jacquini, J. bufonius ; also Peplis Pertu- 
la, Elatine Hydropiper, E. Alsinastrum, Chara vulgaris, (often 










