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"Sire, I have done more; for once, while serving as Ambassador at Venice, I had the honour to be upset in it." With such converse they beguiled the road until they reached Ysselmonde, and found the sea completely hidden by flags and triumphal arches.
It will, therefore, be a correct specimen of the system of dikes and ditches throughout the country, though some of the sections are subject to greater or less difficulty in the drainage, owing to various causes, which will be explained. "When the dike around Ysselmonde is finished, the country is protected from inundation from without.
"No, your Highness, and that is why I contented myself with a purely conventional phrase;" and the Chancellor, who practised finesse in his odd moments, began to talk of the sea, the sight of which awaited them at Ysselmonde. "And what is the sea like?" "Well, your Highness, the sea is somewhat difficult to describe, for in fact there is nothing to compare with it." "You have seen it, I suppose?"
Only the Queen of Ysselmonde sat at the table with her wrists on the arms of her throne and her eyes looking out into the darkness, as though she caught some whisper of the bird's song. But the children knew that he sang for them, not for her; for he told of all the adventures of the day, and he told not as I am telling them, but so beautifully that the heart ached to hear.
"When the height to which the water is to be raised is too great to be accomplished by the agency of one machine, a series of them is introduced. Supposing the land in the middle of Ysselmonde to be twenty feet below the level of the Maas, four series of operations would be required to lift the water. The central portion is enclosed by a dike, with a ringsloot, or canal, outside of it.
For this purpose a dike is built on the border of the land to be enclosed. Take, for example, the Island of Ysselmonde, the land next south of us, and Holland really consists of nothing but islands formed by the rivers and the natural and artificial canals.
"We will suppose that the dike we have built around Ysselmonde protects it from the exterior water; but as the water in the Maas, at high tide, or even at low tide, is above the surface of the polders, they cannot be drained by the ordinary ditches; and it is necessary to remove the water by mechanical means.
The Pope, however, had contrived and blessed the match; so Ferdinand raised no serious objection, but in due course came to Ysselmonde with his bodyguard of the famous Green Carinthian Archers, and two hundred halberdiers and twelve waggons four to carry his wardrobe, and the remaining eight piled with wedding presents. "But you have never seen her," objected Ferdinand.
When the Grand Duke Ferdinand of Carinthia travelled in state to wed the Princess Sophia of Ysselmonde, he did so by land, and for two reasons; the first being that this was the shortest way, and the second that he possessed no ships. These, at any rate, were the reasons alleged by his Chancellor, to whom he left all arrangements.
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