THE ZUYDER ZEE.

Auckland Star, Volume LXX, Issue 144, 21 June 1939, Page 20

THE ZUYDER ZEE.

Everyone knows that the Zuyder Zee is Holland's most famous waterway, but did you know that it is the youngest sea in the world? It was formed only about 800 years ago, when the water burst in over the land, sweeping away villages and farms and the poor folk who lived in them. The greater part of Holland is below the level of the North SeaThere is an old Dutch proverb that (iod made the sea, but man makes the shore. For more than a thousand years the making of that shore has been the first dnty and thought of those who, living in Holland, wished to protect it, and enlarge its borders, against the atorma and tides that dash against it.

FLOWERS IN TULIP LAND. ]f we visit Holland in the early summer, tlie land ivclaiuu-d from the sea will l>e brilliant with lovely liulli flowers. Those who have read "The Black Tulip," by Dumas, will understand what a passionate love tin- lhitvh people liave for flowers. Tn the famous t«le the hero devoted his whole time to growing tulips —his life's ambition was» to produce a bulb that would flower black. With the help of the charming heroine, he succeeded in doing this, but only after a series of misfortunes. Haavlem in the seat of a large trade in Dutch bulbs, especially hyacinths, tulips, fritillaries, and japonicas. Common water-lilies, water soldier, reed mace, flag and bur-reed are to be seen in the ditches and pools, and heatJi covers the waste sandy regions in the east of the country.