SECTION SIX
Pages 1 to 8
MAGAZINE
SECTION
PORTLAND, OREGON, MARCH 26, 1916.
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Conflict Preventing the Draining of the
Dread Zuyder Zee Is to Blame for the
Latest Flood in the Stricken Wonderland
of Hans Drinker and the Silver Skates
How the Nations Ancient Enemy
Reaps Its Harvest of DeathK
HOW many more days and nights of terror, death and devastation are ia
store for Holland? How many more grim gales from the northwest will
sweep the waters of the Atlantic Into the North Sea, pile them in raging
mountains upon the fragile -coast and burst the towering dykes In every
direction?
"Turn the ocean loose on them. Lord, and doom them to destruction," was the
curse the Spaniards of the dark ages called down on this "land of the heretics," and
even in the present year of grace and enlightnment, 1916, the results asked for In the
curse are being effected.
Picture"the night of January 13 last, when the terriflc gale that had been raging .
many days came to a climax of fury; first the moaning, blood-curdling song of the
waves, the rumble and crash of thunder and the roar of the onslaught on the dykes;
then the snapping and tearing as the sea wall gave way, and the shrieking of the
term gods as the ocean poured over the stricken land. Rain drove down In torrents.
It was a scene of elemental madness. Illuminated blindingly by flashes of lightning.
The country far and wide was converted into an angry sea. The steeples of
churches, built on high ground, rose like the masts of sunken ships. Whole com
munities, villages, farms and cattle were swept out of existence. Men, women, chil
dren, oxen, dogs and sheep were everywhere struggling in the water. -The swirling
ea tore up graveyards and the living baby in its crib floated side by side with the
corpse in its coffin. On the tops of trees, clinging to the lofty steeples of" churches,
huddled on the upper side of floating houses, human beings were clustered praying,
cursing, crying. . C ,
The ancient floods in which lives were lost by tens of thousands seemed about
to be renewed, despite the work of modern engineers and the better organization for
heip, despite the telegraph and telephone'and" the railway service. It seemed as if
the watery chaos out of which the Netherlands had been created was about to come
back into its own. Big coast vessels were swept over the dykes and floated up into
the country, where they beat to pieces the walls and roofs of houses.
The big dykes, formed of concrete and cement with great ribs of steel and iron,
were snapped like threads. Not even the terrible deluges of the twelfth, thirteenth,
fifteenth, sixteenth and eighteenth centuries had excited so much terror.
The dykes were smashed in seven places close to Rotterdam In North Brabant,
at Amersfoort, Xykerk, along the Elem river, near the fortresses of Mulden and Naar-S
den and in the region of Ann-Paujowna. These places are all in the province of North
Holland. The devastation that befell this section was the worst, except for the num
ber of lives lost, in the history of the Netherlands for the last five centuries. It was
equaled only by the St. Elizabeth flood in 1421, when 10,000 vanished, probably
swept out to sea and 100,000 others were found dead.
As the storm began to subside, boats manned by the government troops were
sent out in every direction, saving those who were still struggling in the water, pick
ing. fugitives from roofs ad tree tops and collecting the bodies of the dead. The
reserve army was mobilized in a Jay and. with the regulars, is still working feverishly
to repair the broken dyke before the next northwestern storms them.
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The war is to blame for what happened on the night of January 13. It stopped
the work on the plan to drain the Zuyder Zee, a project agitated for many years and
just about to be started. This body of water runs far Inland In the shape of a great
bay. It was born in the deluge of the thirteenth century and is always the point where
the ocean pours through. The menacing restlessness of the Zee extends even to times of
calm. It is a matter of constant fighting to keep Its water from Intruding still further.
It is a shallow body,, the average depth being probably not more than twelve feet,
fortunately for the proposed engineering task. Along the line where it joins the sea,
a distance of twenty-five miles, it is planned to erect a great dyke that will be 230
feet wide. This bulwark will cost fourteen million dollars, exclusive of draining the
Zee after it has been shut off from the outer water.- The work would have been
started only for the outbreak of the war.
The execution of the project will not only relieve Holland of one of Its .worst
menaces, but will give the nation a stretch of arable land totaling one-fourteenth of
all the soil now available. It covers a region almost. as large as Rhode Island, and
prior to the fateful year of 1219, when continual gales lashed the North Sea Into it, It
was a section of melancholy marshes interspersed with dry, hard land dotted with
hundreds of towns and villages. When the sea swept in thousands of lives were lost.
The Zuyder Zee, however, was not made a permanent resting place for the salt
waters until 1410, when the sea broke in again, scouring out the region and leaving
it practically as it stands today.
The greatest floods in the subsequent history of Holland, occurring in 1558, 1717,
1856, 1876 and the present one, all had their inception at the Zuyder Zee. The gales
sweep the water into the bay, where it is lashed into fury with no outlet except through
the dykes. The strength of the storm is concentrated here, and the engineer is at a
loss to create a wall strong enough to withstand it. The attack on the dykes along
the coast wall is spread evenly, so that no one point receives all the force, and this
is what will be accomplished for the dykes of the Zuyder Zee when, they are moved
out to the North Sea.
It was at the Zuyder Zee that the Spaniards called down their curse on the
Netherlands..- T-hiawas-Jn the. sixteenth century, when, the dykes, of the -Zee -were-deliberately
blasted open by the "heretics" as a last and successful resort to save
the city of Alkmaar from the armies of Spain led by the dread Duke of Alva.
Spain, then in her heyday, was the most powerful nation in the world. Her
troops had overrun Holland and turned the whole country into a charnel house.
The duke considered it necessary that a blood-torrent should flow constantly ia
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order that "Holland's rivers or gold, a yard deep," as he phrased it. should be
diverted to ff-rirate the thirsty soil of Spain. The death-knell tolled hourly in
every village and surviving fugitives wandered over the country, ghosts of their
former selves.
The tide of human life that was ebbing hourly away seemed to have killed
the spirit of the nation until William, Prince of Orange, known as "The Silent,"
Anally threw down the gauntlet. Daring, swift, secret, tireless, thi3 powerful and
patient leader was ready to go to any extreme, even to making an ally out of
the country's ancient enemy, the sea, in order to sweep the Spaniard forever out
of' the Netherlands. ' ,
It meant that there would be a frightful loss of life and property and that
the harvests would be doomed to destruction; but at any rate the Spaniards would
. have to fly from the North Province or perish to a man. Alktaaar would be saved,
and time would be gained for the country to mobilize its motley but grim and
determined army. '
The result is history. Sufficient has already been accomplished for the glory
of Spanish arms, vaunted Alva. Neither honor nor loyalty, he decided, required
that sixteen thousand of his soldiers should be sacrificed in a struggle, not with
man, but with the ocean, and accordingly the' troops were given the word to flee.
This, however, was the only time in history that Holland was able to turn
its eternal foe into a friend, though it now has what is known as a defensive
intwdation system, which it has not yi t been called upon to use. Another frightful
loss of life and property and destruction of harvests will result if it ever is neces
sary for the country to open its so-called "war dykes" to. destroy an invading
' army, but heroic measures for defense must be taken by the little, rich nation
that would otherwise fall an easy prey to any one of its larger neighbors.
The people of Holland live in constant terror. The menace of their ancient enemy
is over them always. And to a certain extent they seem reconciled. The people run
to 'strapping men and women, and the young girls are beauties and charmers in the
humbuggery of their quaint costumes and wooden shoes, which are donned for the
benefit of tourists who seem to expect to find them in a so-called "native garb." They
hae a beautiful complexion and bonny eyes charming a so many Alices in Won
derland, but the promise of beauty in adolesence is scarcely ever fulfilled in maturity.
Their land really is a wonderland. The magic of white sails floating off in the
distance through the foliage of a processional forest is ever fresh. This is the country
of Hans Brinker and the Silver Skates, a region of lazy landscapes, old world wind
mills and picturesque little cities. The tragic romance of its eternal battle with th
ea is a world sorrow.
(Covrrlsht, 1B1, bj th Clereiaad Conpur)'