There is much traffic in the Upper Scheldt from Antwerp to Ghent, the water being tidal to the latter town, with a depth of 6 to 8 feet, working the river with the tide. The Terneuzen Canal is 35 kilometres in length, and is used by some twenty steamers from England weekly, taking coals, pig iron, and other articles, and loading manufactured iron and other goods from all parts of Belgium. The inland harbour at Ghent has been much enlarged of late, and the lock has been removed, thus rendering access more easy. It is now a waterway of ample depth and great width, with locks at Terneuzen on the Scheldt, and at Sas van Gent, near the Belgian frontier. There is a pilot station at Terneuzen, the men taking their turns to and from Ghent. English coal may be bought for 15 to 18 francs a ton at Ghent, being carried at a very low freight for want of cargo on the outward voyage. Vessels of the following dimensions can use this canal:—Length, 110 metres; breadth, 11·50 metres; and draught, 5·85 metres. Their speed en route when exceeding 2·75 metres draught, is 145 metres a minute; when under 1·50 metres draught, 250 metres a minute.
The enormous difference that results to the prosperity of a city from the possession of facilities for the navigation of vessels is well illustrated in the case of the old town of Bruges in Belgium, as compared with that of her rival Antwerp. Nay, the point is forcibly brought home by the history of Bruges herself.
This “Venice of the North” lay formerly near the sea, on a gulf of large extent and considerable depth; she was easily accessible, not only to the ordinary run of vessels, but even to the largest of ships. That her port of Damme was large is evident from the fact that in 1213 Philip Augustus, at the head of 1700 sail, closed in it with the allied English and Flemish fleets. This fact alone will give an idea of the importance of Bruges harbour, then one of the largest in Europe. As long as these means of communication with the sea remained open, Bruges maintained her commercial power. The successive accumulations of clay in the Zwyn and in the havens of Damme and Sluys, the outer ports of Bruges, were the causes of the lamentable state of things which followed.
About the beginning of the 13th century, vessels sailed into Damme, the port of Bruges, from all quarters of the world, and poured into her markets the trade and wealth of the South and East. Less than a century later the inhabitants of Bruges were compelled to lengthen their maritime channel to Sluys, a small town situated on the Zwyn, about eight miles beyond Damme. The new canal was so constructed as to give access to vessels of from 400 to 500 tons, the largest then built; it passed by Dudzeele and Westcapelle. Hardly had it been opened when the commercial movement of Bruges took a fresh start; from 1420 to 1470 Bruges was the mart of the world, and her fortune had reached its climax. By the Sluys Harbour, into which entered in 1468 with one tide as many as 250 vessels, Bruges was in communication with the North and South of Europe; she was also the only market city for the Netherlands and the Hanseatic League. But from 1470 onwards, i. e. twenty-two years before the discovery of America, the accumulation of clay in the Zwyn again made its disastrous effects felt. Caracks, galleys, and other large vessels could no longer enter the channel. Charles the Bold, in order to deepen it, had the polder[80] of the Zwartegat opened, but without avail. Twelve years later, in 1482, matters stood in a much worse condition, and vessels of large draught had completely ceased to appear. No work such as cleansing was carried out, no artificial sluices for such a purpose constructed; and the Sluys Canal, that bold work which during one whole century had maintained the marvellous prosperity of Bruges, now wellnigh useless, became entirely choked up, and like the harbour of Sluys itself, disappeared in the depths of the vast gulf, under the clayey mud and deposits of its alluvia-bearing waves. Bruges was thenceforth condemned to a long decline.
In 1622, during the reign of Albert and Isabella, the opening of a canal from Bruges to Ostend, viâ Plasschendacle was for the first time determined upon. Twenty years later was dug the canal from Bruges to Nieuport and from Nieuport to Dunkerque. In 1646 Dunkerque was given up to France, and consequently the Flemings were obliged, in 1664, to direct their attention towards Ostend. The dimensions of this canal were now largely increased, and the sluices of Plasschendacle replaced by those of Slykens, much nearer the sea. In 1717, a powerful society, known as the Compagnie des Indes, was organised at Ostend. The undertaking met with wonderful success at its very beginning, and would probably have given back to Bruges some of its former movement and life, had not the Treaty of Paris of 1727, inspired by the jealousy of Holland and England, suspended for seven years the grant of the company, and later on forbidden all commercial intercourse between the Austrian Netherlands and the Indies. Four years later the Treaty of Vienna of 1731, stipulated expressly—Sec. 4 of the Act, dated from the Hague, 20th February, 1732—“That all commerce and navigation from the Austrian Netherlands to the East Indies, as also that all commerce and navigation from the East Indies to the Austrian Netherlands, shall cease for ever.”
In 1783, Joseph II., wishing to end the state of subjection that his provinces were labouring under, conceived the idea of linking the waters of Flanders with those of the sea, by means of canals to be dug exclusively in Flemish ground. He failed in the attempt, and it was only after the Netherlands had been joined to the French Empire that the work which the inhabitants of Bruges had been in vain seeking for centuries was again attempted. At their urgent request, Napoleon ordered a canal to be dug from Bruges to Sluys viâ Damme; this it was intended to lengthen later on, as far as the Scheldt, somewhere near Breskens. The works unfortunately were carried on with extreme slowness, and the fall of the empire prevented their completion. In 1818 the canal was opened.
In 1829, King William found out the inefficiency of the issues of the Zwyn; he resumed the scheme of Napoleon I., and decided to push the new canal on to Breskens. The works were on the point of being ordered, when, in 1830, the Revolution broke out, and Bruges saw the realisation of her hopes again deferred.
Since 1470, then, three principal efforts have been made to bring Bruges into communication with the sea; first, in 1622, viâ Ostend; second, in 1640, viâ Dunkerque; third, in 1810, viâ Breskens. The two last failed through political events, which took away from Belgium the two principal points: Dunkerque scarcely five years after the canal was completed; Breskens before the works were even begun. One disadvantage to be noticed with regard to these two towns is the considerable distances at which they lie from Bruges—Dunkerque at over forty, Breskens at more than twenty miles. Moreover the works, comparatively speaking, were on a very small scale. As for the Ostend scheme, the canal necessarily encountered the same fate as the harbour itself—one continual struggle against alluvia. The case seemed hopeless, and Bruges in despair had resigned herself to her melancholy fate, when in 1877 M. A. de Maere Limnander started and publicly advocated a scheme which was intended to open for Bruges, once more a seaport town, a fresh era of prosperity. The work which he published on the subject, the result of long inquiry, has met with general approbation.
In the construction of the ship canal from Ostend to Bruges, the spot chosen for the outer port lay in the neighbourhood of Heijst, to the south-west of the mouth of the Sebzate and Schipdonek canals, at about 1250 metres (4114 feet) from the Heijst sluices. The motives for selecting this place are twofold—Firstly, the minimum of clearing to be executed in opening the downs, the depth of which is here of not more than from 50 to 60 metres (164 feet to 197 feet); secondly, the minimum of length to be given to the piers, the depth of seven metres (23 feet) at ebb tide being here very near the shore. This part of the coast, moreover, is also one which has stood in constant danger of irruption on the part of the sea, and has only recently needed strengthening. To maintain the depth at the entrance to the harbour the westerly pier is made the longer of the two, and slightly bent in towards the end; its length is fixed at 1100 metres (3620 feet), viz., 840 metres (2769 feet) from the base to the bend, and 260 metres (855 feet) from the bend to the end; that of the easterly one at 800 metres (2633 feet); the width at the entrance to the port at 300 metres (987 feet), and that at the base of the same at 1000 metres (3291 feet); the surface of the harbour thus amounts to 60 hectares (6000 acres, or 29,040,000 square yards). The masonry consists of artificial blocks of the largest possible dimensions, never weighing less than from 40,000 to 90,000 kilogs.—from about 85,000 lb. to about 180,000 lb. M. de Maere also advocates the construction along the outer side of the westerly pier of a breakwater, made of a single row of stakes. One or two lighthouses are to light the entrance to the harbour. The cost of this section of the works was estimated at 9,000,000f. = 360,000l.
The canal runs in a straight line from the sea to the docks at Bruges. Its length is 12 kilometers.—about 7½ miles; its floor width is 20 metres—65 feet; its width, measuring at the water-line, of 62 metres—204 feet; its depth from the water-line of 7 metres—23 feet. The slopes have a slant of 1 metre—3 feet 3½ inches—for every 3 metres—9 feet, 10½ inches. This lessens the expense of keeping in repair, and, where the necessity is felt, makes the widening of the bottom possible. The canal is exclusively fed with sea-water, and is so constructed as to allow of the Ghent-Heijst Canal being easily joined to it later on below the future sluice. The amount of earth dug out of the canal was about 8,887,000 cubic feet, and the cost of clearing it some 2,500,000f.—100,000l. 2,700,000 cubic metres of earth were employed in the construction of banks or dykes along the canal. This necessitated the expropriation of 170 hectares—17,000 acres, or 82,280,000 square yards—of land, at the rate of 10,000f.—400l.—per hectare, or 1,700,000f.—68,000l.—for the 170 hectares.