d the untiring industry of man have since converted into the archipelago of Zealand and South Holland. These islands were unknown to the Romans.
Such were the rivers, which, with their numerous tributaries, coursed through the spongy land. Their frequent overflow, when forced back upon their currents by the stormy sea, rendered the country almost uninhabitable. Here, within a half-submerged territory, a race of wretched ichthyophagi dwelt upon terpen, or mounds, which they had raised, like beavers, above the almost fluid soil. Here, at a later day, the same race chained the tyrant Ocean and his mighty streams into subserviency, forcing them to fertilize, to render commodious, to cover with a beneficent network of veins and arteries, and to bind by watery highways with the furthest ends of the world, a country disinherited by nature of its rights. A region, outcast of ocean and earth, wrested at last from both domains their richest treasures. A race, engaged for generations in stubborn conflict with t
This book tells the story of the rise of the Dutch Republic between 1555-1566. It is the first part of the series of many books on Dutch history by American historian John Lothrop Motley.
The famous and well-reputed Dutch historian Robert Fruin critised Motley for making up 'facts'. Motley is also critised for being biased (pro-Dutch) in his works. It's because of the unreliabillity that I give only 2 stars to this book.
