HOLLAND'S THREAT.

Bush Advocate, Volume XXI, Issue 300, 23 June 1909, Page 4

HOLLAND'S THREAT.

"AYe should flood tlie*- country, . as we did when the French invaded lis in 1672. AYe have fought the sea. AYe have \beaten old Father Neptune further and further, .back for 500 ' years. But if our liberties were threatened we should call him in to help us as our friend." These words. uttered with passionate emphasis, were spoken by a public mail of riote •*"• in Holland to a visiting English journalist the other day when the latter suggested that Holland could doJitti,© io oppose an invading German army. Still incredulous, the journalist (who records his experience, in the Daily Mail) went to the Waterstaat Department -to'- enquire how the country could be flooded. The chief engineer received him politely. "Ts it , true that we could flood the country ? Certainly it is true. But I must not tell you how. This is" a matter most intimately connected, with th*e defences of our country." .Half of Holland, the writer points out, lies below the level of the rivers aiicl the sea. The stranger is amazed to "see a river flowing- along what looks like an aqueduct, with a canal . below it, and yet another piece of water be-low that v . One can stand at the' foot of a huge sea-dyke and hear the waves beating it eighteen feet above one's .head. The idea that a universal" in- - undation could be caused by turning a key at the capital is, of course,quite erroneous. As a matter of fact it would lie most diffii.*-uJ*--to. admit ' the sea in most places, and the writer thinks the rivers would provide most •of tlie flood if the Dutch were ever driven to this desperate, measure.' The . embankments enclosing the rivers are so constructed as to make the •operation of flooding the country «.*a ■-..'•-. It would also be a simple matte*- to stop all pumping operations throughout the country, which would result in a rapid accumulation of "water: -'