HISTORY OF

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mer, the Hollanders, in their boats and pleasure-barges, their trekfchuytiand other vessels, are continually journeying and conveying commodities,for consumption or exportation, from the interior part of the country totheir great cities and rivers. An inhabitant of Rotterdam may, by meansof these canals, breakfast at Delft or the Hague, dine at Leyden, and supat Amsterdam, or return home again before night. By them also a pro-digious inland trade is carried on between Holland and every part ofFrance, Flanders, and Germany. When the canals are frozen over, theytravel on them with fkaits, and perform long journeys in a very shorttime; while heavy burdens are conveyed in carts and sledges, which arethen as much used on the canals as in the streets.

The yearly profits produced by these canals are almost beyond belief;but it is certain that they amount to more than two hundred and fiftythousand pounds for about forty miles of inland navigation, which is sixhundred and twenty-sive pounds per mile, the square surface of whichmile does not exceed two acres of ground; a profit so amazing, that it isno wonder other nations should attempt to imitate what has been foundso highly advantageous.

The canals of Ostend, Ghent, Antwerp, Brussels, &c. cannot at presentclaim much praise. This country has had its day of commerce, whenEurope was in its infancy of improvement; but it yet possesses greatwealth, and is extremely populous; it yet carries on considerablemanufactures, although it is no longer the great mart for commerce,as it was two or three hundred years since. Its fortified towns,population, and canals, sufficiently prove what it has heretofore been;and it were to be wished that its inhabitants, who have made a boldattempt to obtain liberty, were less under the influence of bigotry andsuperstition.

The cities of Flanders are no longer in the flourishing state in whichthey were some centuries past. The canals, which were then numerous,

kept