Dutch Life in Town and Country

by P. M. Hough

When Drusus a few years before the commencement of our era excavated the Yssel canal, and thus gave a new arm to the Rhine, he began a process of canalization in the Frisian and Batavian provinces which has been going on more or less ever since. To the foreigner Holland or the Northern Netherlands must always appear a land of dykes and canals, the one not more important for protection than the other as an artery of communication; spreading commerce and supporting national life. Napoleon, with naïve comprehensiveness, called Holland the alluvion of French rivers. Dutch patriots declare with legitimate pride, 'God gave us the sea, but we made the shore,' and no one who has seen the artificial barrier that guards the mainland from the Hook to the Texel will disparage their achievement or scoff at their pretensions.

A Sea-Going Canal.

The sea-dyke saves Holland from the Northern Ocean, sombre and grey in its most genial mood, menacing and stormy for the long winter of our northern hemisphere; but it is to the inland dykes that protect the low-lying polders that Holland owes her prosperity and the sources of wealth which have made her inhabitants a nation. The original character of the country, a marshland intersected by the numerous channels of the Rhine and the Meuse, rendered it imperative that the System of dykes should be accompanied by a brother system of canals. The over-abundant waters had not merely to be arrested, they had to be confined and led off into prepared channels. In this manner also they were made to serve the purposes of man. High-roads across swamps were either impracticable or too costly; but canals furnished a sure and convenient means of transport and communication.

At the same time they did not imperil the security of the country. Roads on causeways or reared on sunken piles would have opened the door to an invader, but the canals provided an additional weapon of defence, for the opening of the dykes sufficed to turn the country again into its primeval state of marshland. The occasion on which this measure alone saved Holland during the French invasion of 1670 is a well-known passage in history, and the hopes of the Dutch in resisting the attack of any powerful aggressor would centre in the same measure of defence, which is the submerging of the country, practically speaking, under the waters of the canals and rivers. There exists a popular belief that there is at Amsterdam one master key, a turn of which would let loose the waters over the land, but whether it is well founded or not no one except a very few officials can say.

Pending any unfortunate necessity for breaking through the dykes and letting loose the waters, it may be observed in passing that the effectual maintenance of the dykes is a constant anxiety, and entails strenuous exertions. They stand in need of repeated repairing, and it is computed that they are completely reconstructed in the course of every four or five years. A sum of nearly a million sterling is spent annually on the work. A large and specially trained staff of engineers are in unceasing harness, a numerous band of dyke watchers are constantly on the look-out, and when they raise the shout, 'Come out! come out!' not a man, woman, or child must hold back from the summons to strengthen the weak points through which threatens to pass the flood that would overwhelm the land. It is a constant struggle with nature, in which the victory rests with man. As the dyke is the bulwark of Dutch prosperity in peace, it might be converted into the ally of despairing patriotism in war.

There are marked differences among the canals. The two largest and best known canals, the North Canal and the North Sea Canal, are passages to the ocean for the largest ships, and specially intended to benefit the trade of Amsterdam. The North Canal was made in 1819-25, soon after the restoration of the House of Orange, with an outlet at Helder, near the mouth of the Texel. It has a breadth of between 40 and 50 yards, a length of 50 miles, and a depth of 20 feet, which was then thought ample. After forty years' use this canal was found inadequate from every point of view. It was accordingly decided to construct a new canal direct from Amsterdam to Ymuiden across the narrowest strip of Holland. Although the Y was utilized, the labour on this canal was immense, and occupied a period of eleven years, being finally thrown open to navigation in 1877. In length it is under 16 miles, but its average breadth is 100 yards, and the depth varies from 23 to 27 feet. Consequently the largest ships from America or the Indies can reach the wharves of Amsterdam as easily as if it were a port on the sea-coast. Leaving aside the sea-passages that have been canalized among the islands of Zeeland, the remaining canals are inland waterways serving as the principal highways of the country, giving one part of the country access to the other, and especially serving as approaches or lanes to the great rivers Meuse and Rhine.

A Village in Dyke-Land.

The interesting canal population of Holland is, of course, to be found on these canals, which are traversed in unceasing flow from year's end to year's end by the tjalks, or national barges. On these boats, which more resemble a lugger than a barge, they navigate not only the canals of their own country, but the Rhine up to Coblentz, and even above that place. It has been computed that Germany imports half its food-supply through Rotterdam, and much of this is borne to its destined markets on tjalks. The William Canal connects Bois le Duc with Limburg, and saves the great bend of the Meuse. The Yssel connects with the Drenthe the Orange and the Reitdiep canals, which convey to the Rhine the produce of remote Groningen and Friesland. The Rhine represents the destination of the bulk of the permanent canal population of Holland, whose floating habitations furnish one of the most interesting sights to be met with on the waters of the country, but which represent one of the secret phases of the people's life, into which few tourists or visitors have the opportunity of peering.