The Ganges overflows its banks annually, and its inundations fertilise the surrounding country. Travelling is at this season performed in boats, in which the Hindoo skims over his rice fields and gardens, which appear to the stranger's eye swallowed up in one vast but monotonous lake. When the waters subside, the appearance is at first so desolate that the crops appear to be entirely destroyed, but they soon recover themselves, and the country becomes excessively fertile. At the distance of about 200 miles from the sea the river separates into two branches, and the western branch, which is the principal one, assumes the name of Hooghly. Both rivers are partially choked up by bars or sandbanks, arising from the violence of the bore.
AFRICAN RIVERS.
The Nile is decidedly the most important river of Africa; and it is called in the Abyssinian tongue the father of the waters. It rises in what are called the Mountains of the Moon in Upper Ethiopia, and flows into the Mediterranean Sea by seven channels, only two of which are at present navigable. The ancients were entirely ignorant of the source of this river, and it was only discovered towards the close of the last century. It enters the lake of Tana in Abyssinia, and crosses one of its extremities with such extreme rapidity, that its waters may be distinguished through a progress of eighteen miles which it makes through the lake. About fifteen miles after it has passed this lake, it forms a magnificent cascade, by rushing precipitately from the summit of a high rock. The greater part of Lower Egypt is included in the Delta of the Nile; the triangle being formed by the Mediterranean Sea on the one side, and on the others by the two great branches of the Nile, which divide five or six miles below Old Cairo, and fall into the sea, the one at Damietta, and the other at Rosetta. The water of the Nile is thick and muddy, and thus, when the river overflows its banks, a fertilising slime is deposited on the fields; and as rain very seldom falls in Egypt, the inundations of the Nile are welcomed in that country as the greatest blessing the inhabitants can enjoy. The Nile has one rather remarkable peculiarity, which is, that in a course of upwards of 1300 miles it does not receive one single tributary stream; a fact which, as Humboldt observes, is quite unprecedented in the history of rivers.
The Niger, or, more properly, the Quorra, is the second great river in Africa, and it is supposed that its extent is upwards of 3000 miles; for several hundred miles of which it forms a broad and magnificent expanse, resembling an inland sea. The history of this river was long involved in the greatest obscurity, some geographers confounding it with the Nile, and others with the Senegal; the latter, indeed, was long believed to be the Niger or Black River of the ancients, from the popular name of the Senegal among the negroes signifying black. After innumerable difficulties the course of the Niger has been at length traced by two young men of the name of Lander; and the Niger has been found to be the same as the Quorra, or Joliba, which is believed to take its rise in the eastern portion of the mountains of the Moon. The Quorra forms a broad and noble stream, varying from one to six or eight miles in breadth, and passing through a large lake called Tchad; though, according to some writers, it is only one of the tributary branches of the Quorra which passes through this lake. The most remarkable part of the river, however, appears to be the enormous extent of its delta. "Along the whole coast, from the river of Formosa, or Benin, to that of Old Calabar, about 300 miles in length, there open into the Atlantic its successive estuaries, which navigators have scarcely been able to number. Taking this coast as the base of the triangle or delta, and its vertex at Kirree, about 170 miles inland, where the Formosa branch separates, we have a space of upwards of 25,000 square miles, equal to the half of England. Had this delta, like that of the Nile, been subject only to temporary inundations, leaving behind a layer of fertilising slime, it would have formed the most fruitful region on the earth, and might have been almost the granary of a continent. But unfortunately the Niger rolls down its waters in such excessive abundance as to convert the whole country into a huge and dreary swamp, covered with dense forests of mangrove and other trees of spreading and luxuriant foliage. The equatorial sun, with its fiercest rays, cannot penetrate these dark recesses; and it only exhales from them pestilential vapours, which render this coast the theatre of more fatal epidemic diseases than any other, even of Western Africa." These broad estuaries of the Quorra communicate with each other by creeks; and these numerous creeks, which frequently overflow their banks, appear to be the true cause of the country becoming a vast alluvial morass, which extends from the coast for more than twenty miles inland.
The Senegal, which was formerly supposed to be the same as the Niger, is now found to be of comparatively little importance; as its navigation is extremely difficult and dangerous, especially in the rainy season, when the prodigious swell of the river, from the south west winds being opposed to its rapid course, raises the waves to such a prodigious height at the mouth, where there is a formidable sand bank or bar, that their crashing at the bar resembles the shock of two mountains thrown violently against each other. Enormous trees and pieces of rock are also frequently brought down by the current, so that it is scarcely possible for any ship to enter the river with safety. About sixty miles from the mouth also, there are dangerous cataracts, so that the river is comparatively of little use for the purposes of navigation, though it is in many places of considerable depth and breadth; and its course, which, however, winds exceedingly, is nearly 800 miles in length.
The Gambia and Rio Grande are two other African rivers, which were formerly supposed to be mouths of the Niger. The sources of these rivers are regarded with great superstition by the natives, who believe that if any one attempts to leap over either stream near its source, they must inevitably fall into the water and be drowned, however narrow the stream may be; and that as the woods which surround the spring are inhabited by spirits, if any one presumes to use an axe in them, he will immediately lose the use of his arm.
EUROPEAN RIVERS.
The Danube is the principal river of Germany. It takes its rise in the Black Forest, and after a rapid course of nearly 2000 miles, it discharges itself into the Black Sea, after receiving in its course thirty navigable rivers, and ninety smaller streams. The Danube was formerly considered unnavigable from its numerous cataracts, but this difficulty having been overcome, partly through the exertions of a patriotic Hungarian nobleman, steam-vessels are now established between Pesth and Constantinople. One of the most remarkable parts of this river is, what was formerly called the Gate of the Danube. Near the little village of Grein, the river contracts suddenly, so as to be only one fourth of its former width, while the mountains on either side becoming higher and higher, the channel of the river presents the appearance of a mountain gorge or defile, and this was almost impassable, as will be seen by the following description of what it was only a few years ago. "The dark and gloomy forests, extending from the mountain-tops down to the water's edge; the castles surmounting the banks on either side; and the violent course of the river,—all conspire to produce a grand and picturesque scene. This gorge or defile terminates at an island which occupies the centre of the river, dividing it into two branches, of which one only is capable of being navigated with safety. Even this one branch is a channel of no inconsiderable danger, for across it stretches a reef of small rocks, known by the name of the Strudel, over which a boat is hurried with fearful velocity. No sooner is this danger past, than the traveller sees before him another small island or rock in the middle of the river; so situated as to cause a boiling and foaming whirlpool, called the Wirbel, in the stream. The current here flows in all directions at once; insomuch that an eddy, twenty or thirty feet over, is formed, concave in appearance, and sunk three or four feet in the middle." The rocks are now partly removed, and the passage rendered safe.
The Rhine is celebrated for the romantic beauty of the scenery. It rises in the Alps, three separate streamlets uniting to form the river. Its course is about 900 miles, through a country remarkable for the beauty of the scenery; but, singularly enough, it does not empty itself naturally into the sea, as it formerly disappeared in some downs near Leyden; and even now it is only conducted by a canal from Leyden to the ocean. Another branch, which divides from the main stream near Utrecht, empties itself into the Zuider-Zee. The Rhine in its course passes through the Lake of Constance, and divides several times, forming large branches which empty themselves into other rivers, particularly the Meuse. When the snow melts in Switzerland, the Rhine rises from twelve to thirteen feet above its common level, and frequently inundates the surrounding country, occasioning, when it does so, dreadful devastation, as it generally covers the adjoining fields with sand. One of the singularities of the Rhine is, that particles of gold are found in the sand which is brought down by the river from the mountains, but these particles are so small, that in the space of four miles scarcely five ounces are collected in the year. The river also contains many crystals and agates, the latter of which are known by the name of Rhine pebbles.
The Rhone also takes its rise in the Alps, and its source is only five miles from one of the sources of the Rhine. It flows in a western direction through the wide valley of the Swiss Canton of the Valais, and after a course of about 500 miles, during which it is joined by several other rivers, it empties itself by three mouths into the Mediterranean Sea, in the part called the Gulf of Lyons; its branches forming the Island of Camargue. The Rhone carries with it great quantities of earth which it deposits at its mouth, and hence the navigation of the river is very hazardous, as the outlets through which the river empties itself are continually changing their shape, sometimes one being passable, which, in a few days, is nearly closed, and another is opened. "To remedy this inconvenience, a canal has been opened from Arles to the small haven of Bouc, near the sea." There is also a navigable river which connects the Rhine and the Rhone. The most remarkable circumstance connected with the Rhone is, however, its disappearance near Bellegarde, where it plunges with great noise into a cavity of the rocks, and does not shew itself again for a distance of about 120 yards. The width of the river, which when it quits the Lake of Geneva is about 115 feet, is contracted, just before it loses itself, to about sixteen feet. This curious phenomenon, which is called La Perte du Rhône, is almost repeated a few miles lower down near Mai Pertuis.
The river Guadiana in Spain loses itself nearly in the same manner as the Rhone, at about twenty five miles from its source, near the village of Castillo de Cervara, it disappears under the earth; and rises again nearly twenty miles from the place of its disappearance, at the spot called by the Spaniards the Eyes of the Guadiana. The whole course of the river is more than 300 miles. Several rivers in Greece have an underground course in a similar manner.