. The earth and its inhabitants .. . I FIE noble river which, on crossing the frontier of Switzerland, is already one of the great water highways of Europe, irrigates regions very different in their aspects. If it were not that the Rhine forms a connecting link between Baden and Hesse, the valleys of the Nahe, the Lahn, the Moselle, the Sieg, and the Ruhr would each have to be studied separately. It is the Rhine which stamps a common character upon regions so diverse in many respects. The Celtic names of numerous towns and rivers, as well as the physical affinities which anthropologists have n
. The earth and its inhabitants .. . I FIE noble river which, on crossing the frontier of Switzerland, is already one of the great water highways of Europe, irrigates regions very different in their aspects. If it were not that the Rhine forms a connecting link between Baden and Hesse, the valleys of the Nahe, the Lahn, the Moselle, the Sieg, and the Ruhr would each have to be studied separately. It is the Rhine which stamps a common character upon regions so diverse in many respects. The Celtic names of numerous towns and rivers, as well as the physical affinities which anthropologists have noticed amongst the inhabitants dwelling along its banks, prove to us that the Rhine, from the most remote ages, formed one of the highways followed by migratory tribes. The great lines of migration, however, crossed the river transversely. To wandering hordes coming from the East, the Neckar, the Main, and other eastern tributaries afforded easy access to the river, but having once overcome the obstacle presented by it, these migrants found themselves in the face of mountain ranges and plateaux which proved more formidable than the river had done. Hence those incessant struggles whose memory survives amongst the dwellers along the banks of the Rhine, and which have rendered the river so famous. Poets speak of the Rhine almost as of a sentient being, capable of comprehending the struggles of which it was a witness. * Area and population of Rhenish Germany, exclusive of Alsace-Lorraine and the upper basins of the Neckar, the Wain, and the Lippe : — Area. Sq. M. Baden -, . 5,824 Hesse-Darmstadt 2,965 Nassau (Prussia) 2,145 Bavarian Palatinate 2,292 Principality of Birkenfeld (Oldenburg) . 195 Rhenish Prussia (Rheinland) .... 10,413 District of Arnsberg (Westphalia) . . 2,972 Total . 26,806 Population. Inhabitants 1S75. to a Sq. M. 1,507,179 259 884,218 298 679,012 316 641,254 280 37,093 190 3,804,.381 366 981,741 330 8,534,878 319
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1800, bookdecade18, booksubjectgeography, bookyear1883
