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POETRY.-Consolations for the Lonely, 205-M. F. Tupper to America; Bachelor's Complaint, 213-Man's Love; Woman's Love, 231-Love; Compass Flower, 238.

SCRAPS.-Imagination and Science; Irish Churchman Forty-Years ago, 205-American Microscope, 231-The Military Class, 232-Dr. Morrison; Dog-Chase, 233-Cotton Manufactures in Georgia, 235-New York Bank Notes, 236—Jamaica, 237-Grinding Organ, 238.

PROSPECTUS. This work is conducted in the spirit of Littell's Museum of Foreign Literature, (which was favorably received by the public for twenty years,) but as it is twice as large, and appears so often, we not only give spirit and freshness to it by many things which were excluded by a month's delay, but while thus extending our scope and gathering a greater and more attractive variety, are able so to increase the solid and substantial part of our literary, historical, and political harvest, as fully to satisfy the wants of the American reader.

The elaborate and stately Essays of the Edinburgh, Quarterly, and other Reviews; and Blackwood's noble criticisms on Poetry, his keen political Commentaries, highly wrought Tales, and vivid descriptions of rural and mountain Scenery; and the contributions to Literature, History, and Common Life, by the sagacious Spectator, the sparkling Examiner, the judicious Athenæum, the busy and industrious Literary Gazette, the sensible and comprehensive Britannia, the sober and respectable Christian Observer; these are intermixed with the Military and Naval reminiscences of the United Service, and with the best articles of the Dublin University, New Monthly, Fraser's, Tail's, Ainsworth's, Hood's, and Sporting Magazines, and of Chambers' admirable Journal. We do not consider it beneath our dignity to borrow wit and wisdom from Punch; and, when we think it good enough, make use of the thunder of The Times. We shall increase our variety by importations from the continent of Europe, and from the new growth of the British colonies.

The steamship has brought Europe, Asia, and Africa, into our neighborhood; and will greatly multiply our connections, as Merchants, Travellers, and Politicians, with all parts of the world; so that much more than ever it

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now becomes every intelligent American to be informed of the condition and changes of foreign countries. And this not only because of their nearer connection with ourselves, but because the nations seem to be hastening, through a rapid process of change, to some new state of things, which the merely political prophet cannot compute or foresee.

Geographical Discoveries, the progress of Colonization, (which is extending over the whole world,) and Voyages and Travels, will be favorite matter for our selections; and, in general, we shall systematically and very ully acquaint our readers with the great department of Foreign affairs, without entirely neglecting our own.

While we aspire to make the Living Age desirable to all who wish to keep themselves informed of the rapid progress of the movement-to Statesmen, Divines, Lawyers, and Physicians-to men of business and men of leisure-it is still a stronger object to make it attractive and useful to their Wives and Children. We believe that we can thus do some good in our day and generation; and hope to make the work indispensable in every well-informed family. We say indispensable, because in this day of cheap literature it is not possible to guard against the influx of what is bad in taste and vicious in morals, in any other way than by furnishing a sufficient supply of a healthy character. The mental and moral appetite must be gratified.

We hope that, by "winnowing the wheat from the chaff," by providing abundantly for the imagination, and by a large collection of Biography, Voyages and Travels, History, and more solid matter, we may produce a work which shall be popular, while at the same time it will aspire to raise the standard of public taste.

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Postage. When sent with the cover on, the Living Age consists of three sheets, and is rated as a pamphlet, at 44 cents. But when sent without the cover, it comes within the definition of a newspaper given in the law, and cannot legally be charged with more than newspaper postage, (1) cts.) We add the definition alluded to:

A newspaper is "any printed publication, issued in numbers, consisting of not more than two sheets, and published at short, stated intervals of not more than one month, conveying intelligence of passing events."

Monthly parts. For such as prefer it in that form, the Living Age is put up in monthly parts, containing four or five weekly numbers. In this shape it shows to great advantage in comparison with other works, containing in each part double the matter of any of the quarterlies. But we recommend the weekly numbers, as fresher and fuller of life. Postage on the monthly parts is about 14 cents. The volumes are published quarterly, each volume containing as much matter as a quarterly review gives in eighteen months.

WASHINGTON, 27 DEC., 1845.

Or all the Periodical Journals devoted to literature and science which abound in Europe and in this country, this has appeared to me to be the most useful. It contains indeed the exposition only of the current literature of the English language, but this by its immense extent and comprehension includes a portraiture of the human mind in the utmost expansion of the present age. J. Q. ADAMS.

LITTELL'S LIVING AGE.-No. 195.-5 FEBRUARY, 1848.

From the Edinburgh Review. 1. Verhandeling over de Stoombemaling van Polders en Droogmakerijen. Door G. SIMONS, en A. GREVE. (A Treatise on the Steam-Pumping of Polders and Artificially dried Lands. By G. SIMONS and A. GREVE.) 4to, pp. 198. Rotterdam: 1844. 2. Gedenkboek van Neerlands Watersnood in February, 1825. Door J. C. BEYER. (Memorials of Netherlands Water danger in February, 1825. By J. C. BEYER.) 2 vols. 8vo. Te s'Gravenhage: 1826.

3. Algemeen Verslag van de Doorbraak in de Droogmakery van Bleiswijk en Hillegersberg voorgevallen den 26 December, 1833. (Account of the Breaking of the Dyke in the Drainage (Drymakery) of Bleiswijk and Hillegersberg on the 26th December, 1833.) 8vo, pp. 50. Rotterdam: 1836.

4. Algemeen Verslag wegens den Staat van den Landbouw in het Koningrijk der Nederlanden gedurende het Jaar 1845. (General Sketch of the State of Agriculture in the Kingdom of the Netherlands during the year 1845.) 8vo, pp. 153. Te Haarlem: 1846.

5. Over de Noodzakelijkheid van de Beoeffening der Natuurkundige Wetenschappen voor den Landbouw in Nederland. Door A. H. VAN DER BOOM MESCH. (On the necessity of the Practical Application of Natural Science to Agriculture in the Netherlands. By A. H. VAN DER BOOM MESCH.) 8vo, pp. 59. Te Amsterdam 1846.

6. Die Marschen und Inseln, der Herzogthümer Schleswig und Holstein. Von J. G. KOHL. (The Marshes and Islands of the Grand Duchies of Schleswig and Holstein. By J. G. KOHL.) 3 bänd 8vo. Dresden und Leipzig: 1846.

7. On the Great Level of the Fens, including the Fens of South Lincolnshire. By JOHN ALGERNON CLARKE. 8vo, pp. 54 (in the Journal of the Royal Agricultural Society of England. Vol. VIII., Part I.)

all its difficulties, not only the greatest seamen, but the greatest lawyers, the greatest physicians, the most accomplished scholars, the most skilful painters, and statesmen as wise as they were just.”

The heart had been eaten out of the Italian Venice before her fall; and she remains an exception and a scandal to the north of Italy. Far different were the merit and the fortune of the Dutch Venices, of Rotterdam and Amsterdam. Their republic indeed is gone; but not its spirit,

at least in its first, most creative, and characteristic development. It will be our business on the present occasion, after showing how Holland was the work of the hands of its citizens, to show how the necessity of renewing it day by day has descended on their successors; and with what ability and resolution this obligation is still discharged.

The Rhine, escaping from the Alps of the Grisons and the Lake of Constance, flows northward through six hundred miles of varied country

receiving by the way many minor streams—and descends through the Rheinpfalz and the Rheingau to the low country below Cleves. Here its muddy waters, struggling for an exit, divide into two main arms-the Waal and the Lower Rhinewhich wind through the flat land between the moor of Cleves on the left hand, and that of Gueldres on the right.

The right arm, or Lower Rhine, soon sends off a branch-the canal of Drusus-into the Yssel at

Doesburg, and through this river to the Zuyder

Zee. Lower down it is called the Leck, and the Oude Rhyn, the Kromme Rhyn, and the Lower Yssel, form partial outlets for its waters—the main body becoming incorporated with the Maese, before it reaches the city of Rotterdam.

The left arm-the Waal-passing Nymegen, through a flat alluvial country, descends to Gorcum,

and the kingdom of Nÿmegen, and in its windings gently touched on the Waal at the head of the Bommeler Waard, till, mixing finally with its waters above Gorcum, it falls with it into the Biesbosch.

and loses itself in the Biesbosch. Meanwhile the Maese, coming from the borders of France, through SPEAKING of the fall of Venice, Mr. Rogers the forest of the Ardennes and the romantic scenery observes" There was in my time another repub- above Namur, has passed Liege and Maestricht, lic, also a place of refuge for the unfortunate-skirted the southern border of the moor of Cleves and, not only at its birth, but to the last hour of its existence-which had established itself in like manner among the waters, and which shared the same fate;-a republic, the citizens of which, if not more enterprising, were far more virtuous; and could say also to the great nations of the world, 'Your countries were acquired by conquest or by inheritance, but ours is the work of our own hands. We renew it day by day; and, but for us, it might cease to be, to-morrow!'-a republic, in its progress, forever warred on by the elements, and how often by men more cruel than they! yet constantly cultivating the arts of peace, and, short as was the course allotted to it, (only three times the life of man, according to the psalmist,) producing, amidst

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Below this point it is impossible to convey by words any clear idea of the maze of streams and outlets which intersect the scarcely dry land, and everywhere inosculate with each other. The Biesbosch, formerly a lake produced by one of the great river floods, is now nearly silted up, and forms a rich marshland, traversed-or irrigated rather-by the innumerable fingers into which the main arm of the river here divides itself. The scene, in which land and water, lying to the eye on the same level, are scarcely distinguishable

from each other, is most interesting to look upon. | Hills of drift sand had penetrated far into the counThe name of the Maese is preserved to that por- try, from certain parts of the coast; and on the tion of the waters which escapes from the Bies- moors of Guelderland and East Frieseland, an atbosch towards the north and west, and which, mosphere, ever loaded with moisture, had encourswallowing the Leck in its course, passes Rotter-aged the growth of vast thicknesses of the spongy dam, and falls into the sea at the so-called mouth hill-side peat, which now cover and enrich them. of the Maese. The larger portion, which flows southward and then west, forms the Hollandsche Diep, and, winding among the many low islands and slimy banks which make up the province of Zealand, mingles partly with the waters of the Scheldt, before it loses itself in the sea.

In brief, the great east and west valley which lies between Dutch Brabant on the south, and the high land of Utrecht and Gueldres on the north, is covered by a network of streams and streamlets, channels, canals, and dieps, which partly receive and partly transmit the flowing waters of the Rhine and the Maese. Loaded with mud, which they cheerfully deposit in every stiller part of their course, these streams have often filled up their own beds; have in consequence frequently shifted their channels, and, through lapse of time, have not only raised the general level of the valley, but have extended their deposits seaward, forming the numerous islands and the low coast-line of the Netherlands.

Modify this picture by the prolonged exercise of human skill, especially by the energetic perseverance of a free people, and the surface of modern Holland is before our eyes.

The geologist still distinguishes the sites of broad lakes and marshes in the wide polders, as also the ancient beds and changing courses of the rivers in the ribbands of rich alluvial soil which wind through the marshes towards the sea. The actual surface divides itself before his eyes into the sandy downs that border the sea, and here and there, within the land, display their round and flitting forms—the sandy scanty-herbage-yielding moors of North Brabant, Gueldres, Groningen, and East Frieseland-the alluvial, sometimes sandy, but most frequently clay deposits which skirt the actual course of the rivers, or occupy the long lines of their ancient beds—the rich warp or sea-sludge that forms the islands at the extreme mouths of the Maese and the Scheldt, fringes the shores of the Zuyder Zee, and lines the inner coasts of the Texel and of the entire necklace of islands which guard the northern limits of this inland sea the low mosses (laage veenen, or fens) which

Thus the lower provinces of Holland are chiefly a gift of the river-оraμov dogov—the slowly accumulated deposits of sand and mud and slime, which long years have segregated from the min-yield the hard black peat, the favorite fuel of Holgling river and tidal waters, and at length solidified land, and the extensive higher bogs (hooge veenen) into habitable land. from which the light brown peat of Frieseland is obtained.

The physical geography of the country, and the nature of its soils, are indicative of such an origin. Could we cast our eyes back to the time when it lay in a state of nature, undisturbed by those monuments of human labor which have since so remarkably changed its surface, we should see in the existing kingdom of Holland, which, since the partition, is still generally denominated the Netherlands, a succession of elevated sandy heaths or moors, girt along their lower slopes by fringes of fertile mud; and beyond these, towards the north and west, a flat expanse of marsh and bog and lake, with low firm islands interspersed, and here and there a sandy knoll; and at the ebb of tide long stretches of swampy slime, confined on their western border by a high ridge of wind-driven sand-hills, a self-erected barrier against the fiercer inroads of the German Ocean. Through and among these heaths and marshes the rivers wound their way, here dividing their errant waters, there uniting them; here resting awhile stagnant, there pouring over their banks and scooping out new channels, but gradually lifting up their own beds and the surface of the land along their course.

As time went on, the peat-bogs deepened and extended, and what had been shallow lakes became a surface of deceitful moss or quaking heather. The tall reed spread its impenetrable jungle over the accumulated silt, and human abodes here and there appeared above them. The lakes and creeks had become fewer, and the river islands larger.

These distinctions of the geologist serve the purposes of the agriculturist also. The limits of each variety of surface are defined by the former on his map; the same limits indicate to the latter where agricultural skill, and of what kind, is capable of being applied with economy and advantage; how far the capabilities of each tract have hitherto been understood; and to what extent, and by what new means, their productiveness may be yet increased.

Of the natural causes to which the low country owes its existence, the river and the sea are the principal.

Each has in many places acted independently of the other; and yet an interesting fact has lately been established, which shows how the conjoined action of the two has been necessary to the production of the most valuable parts of the existing surface. The rivers traverse long tracts of country. They wear away rocks and soils of various kinds, and hurry the particles along with them. In their stages of more rapid movement, these particles move along with them. But they are deposited, more or less completely, during the periods of comparative rest. These deposits form the alluvial soils of river banks; and in producing them, the streams perform a merely mechanical part.

water level of the adjoining sea or river, surrounded by *A polder is a tract of land generally below the lowa dyke, and only kept dry by artificial pumping.

The quantity of matter which a river thus brings | leaves their bodies behind it, to add to the accudown, and, consequently, the rapidity with which mulating mud. The extensive mutual surfaces of it may form such deposits, varies with the length river and sea water which in this way are made to of its course, the volume of its waters, the nature meet, insure a more rapid destruction of infusorial of the country through which it flows, the velocity life than could in almost any other way be brought of its own upper current, the quantity of rain about. which falls in a given time in the regions from which its waters come, and the violence or rapidity of descent with which they fall from the heavens. Thus, a thousand gallons of the waters of the Oxus, when in flood, are said to hold in suspension two hundred and fifty pounds of mud, (Burnes ;) of the Yellow Sea, fifty pounds, (Staunton;) of the Ganges, twenty-two pounds, (Everest ;) of the river Wear, in flood, sixteen pounds, (Johnston ;) of the Mississippi, six pounds, (Riddell ;) and of the Rhine, at Bonn, two thirds of a pound, according to Mr. Horner.

There is, no doubt, considerable uncertainty as to the correctness of any of these numbers. They show, however, that the transporting power of rivers varies very much, and is sometimes much greater than we should have supposed or could anticipate. Even the small proportion of matter brought down by the Rhine is equal to 146,000 cubic feet of solid matter in twenty-four hours; or in two thousand years it would form a bed of rock three feet thick and thirty-six miles square. It is by this sediment that the low banks of the Rhine, in its upper course, where it is beyond the reach of the tide, have been gradually raised-and the channels filled up, and the islands at its mouth in great part formed.

We say in great part, because in these two latter operations the sea performs an important, and what we can hardly help considering as a truly wonderful, coöperative part. In the waters of the river, but especially in those of the sea, there exist vast numbers of minute microscopic animalcules, called by Ehrenberg infusorial animals, which are fitted to live each class in its own special element only, and which, therefore, die in myriads where the sweet and the salt waters mingle. It is almost incredible to see how densely the water is sometimes peopled by these creatures, how rapidly they multiply, in what countless numbers they die. Their skeletons and envelopes, consisting of calcareous and siliceous matter extracted from the water, are almost imperishable. They commix with the mud of the river, and come, with it, to form the deposits of slime that fill up the channels, raise the growing islands, or add to the belt of most fertile land which increases seaward, where the waters are still. As the tide advances up its channel, the waters of the river spread and flow over the surface; so that far up the stream, where the upper waters are still sweet, the salt or brackish under-current carries the living things which float in it to certain death, and

*This quantity is probably a great deal too large. Much, however, depends upon the nature of the country. We have ourselves found a hill stream in a clay country to contain, in time of flood, upwards of one per cent. of solid matter dried at 300° Fahrenheit, or 108 pounds in the thousand gallons.

Experiment has shown that as far up as the tide reaches, the so-called alluvial deposit in and along the channel of the river abounds with the remains of these marine animalcules, while above the reach of the tide none of them are to be found. In the Elbe they are seen as far as eighty miles above its mouth. About Cuxhaven and Gluckstadt, which are nearly forty miles from the open sea, their siliceous and calcareous skeletons form from one fourth to one third of the mass of the fresh mud, exclusive of the sand; while further up the river they amount to about one half of this quantity. In the Rhine, the Scheldt, the Mersey, the Liffey, the Thames, the Forth, the Humber, and the Wash, the same form of deposit goes on; so that in the mouths of all tidal rivers there are to be superadded to the mechanical debris brought down by the upper waters, the more rich and fertilizing animal spoils which the sea thus wonderfully incorporates into the growing deltas, and the banks of rising mud. And thus it is seen that river islands encroach upon the ocean, not merely in proportion to the quantity of solid matters held in suspension by the descending water, but in proportion also to the richness of the sea in microscopic forms of life, and to the volume of fresh water which the river can bring to mingle with it.

Such is the origin of the alluvial soils of this country-properly so called-and of the rich seabordering clays formed of mixed mineral and animal matter, the almost fabulous fertility of which everywhere tempts men to brave disease and rapid death, and the sickening effects of swampy climates, and to expend unwearied toil in snatching them from the watery dominion, and defending them by huge dykes.

Thus naturally formed, geologically constituted, and physically placed, this country is exposed to numberless physical accidents. The waters of the rivers gather above, and come down in floods, which the loftiest and strongest dykes fail to resist -or the breaking up of the ice, under the influence of a rapid thaw, dams up the stream, and the melted snows collect and burst for themselves a new channel. It is the tendency also of the rivers, as we have seen, to fill up their beds, so as after a time to become unable to convey to the sca with sufficient rapidity an unusual volume of water, which must therefore seek for itself a new and unusual outlet. Then the west, the northwest, and the south-west winds, both drive back the river itself, and urge into its mouth the waters of the German Ocean, by which the banks are overflowed, broken through, or for considerable distances entirely swept away.

Nor are such accidents confined to the neighborhood of the river. Along the coast high downs generally exist; yet the sea occasionally

The

makes large encroachments upon them, or forces | of water, and in Groningen destroyed nine thouitself entirely through them, and spreads terror and sand men and seventy thousand cattle. In 1686 destruction over the inner land. The Zuyder Zee it rose eight feet above the dykes, destroyed six also is raised far above its usual level when the hundred houses, dug the dead out of their graves, waters of the Atlantic pour into it, and, driven by and converted Frieseland into one wide sea. the wind towards its eastern and southern shores, seventh Christmas flood, in 1717, caused still expend their fatal fury upon the costly sea-walls wider damage in these northern provinces-burst of unhappy Frieseland. Thus, from the Dollart through most of the dykes-laid the town of westward, round by the Zuyder Zee, on the inner Groningen several feet under water, and destroyed shore of North Holland, along the main sea-coast, twelve thousand men, six thousand horses, and among the mouths and channels of the river, and eighty thousand sheep and cattle. up its banks even beyond the Biesbosch and the upper Betuwe-the whole Dutch sea and river border is, more or less, at the mercy of the fluviatile or oceanic waters, and has times without number sunk before them.

Nor has the elemental struggle ceased—the storms still rise as high and rage as fierce as ever. Even the more improved and now loftier dykes fail to resist them; and though millions of florins are annually expended in maintaining them, wakeful The work of Beyer, of which the title is pre-ness and fear still prevail, and frequent loss occurs. fixed to the present article, contains a notice of the The danger to these coasts arises not so much from more remarkable recorded floods which have devas-the intensity of a single wind, so to speak, as from. tated the Netherlands from the commencement of the successive attacks of alternate or changing the Christian era to the great flood of 1825. We winds. The waters which rush forward from the have carefully gone over his long introductory Atlantic, or from the Polar Sea, before a northchapter on this subject; and we find mention made west wind, break strongly against the shores of of no less than 190 great floods occurring between Holland; but they are deflected by these coasts, the years 516 and 1825, besides numerous minor and escape towards the south, causing comparfloods, which were attended with disastrous effects atively little damage when the dykes are sound, upon life and property. This gives, on an average unless they happen to accumulate so as entirely to for the last thirteen centuries, one severe inunda- overtop them. But if the wind has been blowing tion every seven years. Of course these floods fiercely from the north or from the south; compellhave often been local; and hence, though much ing the waters into the German Ocean, and, while destruction was caused by each, yet a longer the current is still strong in either of these direcbreathing time than seven years has generally been tions, it chops suddenly round to the west, it then given, before a fearful deluge recurs in the same forces the accumulated wave towards the Dutch locality. In recent times the years 1776, 1808, and Danish shores, occasions a tide of unusual and 1825, are distinguished by the occurrence of height, dams back the rivers-the Scheldt, the great calamities over similarly extended areas. Maese, the Elbe, and the Eyder—and overbears all human resistance. Or if, blowing first from the south, it wheels still further round, gathering up the waters as it were with one of those huge whirling sweeps which storms are now known to make, and then, coming steadily from the northwest, pours in the Atlantic and Polar tides to aid the already lofty swell—then North Holland and Frieseland suffer; the Dollart, the Lauwer, and the Zuyder Seas swell up; and Amsterdam and all the Frisians tremble with dismay.

Of all the United Provinces, Frieseland and Groningen have suffered, and continue to suffer, most from these floods. Exposed to the full rage of the north, north-west, and west winds, the waters of the angry Atlantic and Polar seas rush towards these provinces, pour through the inlets of its barrier reef-the Helder, (Hels-deur-hell's door,) the Vlie, and the more northern gatesheap them up in the inland Zuyder Zee, burst or overtop its dykes, and spread themselves over the country, sometimes to the very borders of Hanover. Thousands of men and cattle perish, the gates of the barriers become widened, and the dominion of the inland sea enlarged.

Thus, in 1230 a hundred thousand men perished, chiefly in Frieseland. In 1277 the tract of land which now forms the Dollart was swallowed up. In 1287 the Zuyder Zee was enlarged, and eighty thousand persons destroyed, with cattle innumerable. In 1395 the passage between Vlieland and the Texel was greatly enlarged; and in 1399 that between the Texel and Wieringen so widened, that large ships could sail to Amsterdam. In 1470 twenty thousand men were swallowed up, nearly all in Frieseland; and in 1570 an equal number in that province alone. In the latter year the water rose six feet above the dykes, covered even higher parts of the country with seven feet

So with the inner country. The west wind, when of long continuance, drives the salt sea into the mouths of the Rhine and Maese, and their many armlets, and arrests at the same time the descending waters. Let the wind come in this direction, when the North Sea is already raised high by a storm from the north or south, and the more swollen tide, then meeting the river streams, will dam them back to a greater altitude, and thus burst or overtop the feebler or more humble dykes.

But if about the same time Switzerland has been visited by a watery hurricane-and the Alps of the Grisons, or the ridges of the Taunus and the Siebengebirge, or the forest of the Ardennes-and the many feeders that join the Rhine and the

either to an inland fresh-water lake, to an arm of the salt *In Dutch, the word zee, like sjo in Swedish, is applied sea, or to the wide ocean.

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