The Netherlands
and claimed 80,000 persons. In 1421 the Maas overflowed its banks as the result of a storm, carrying away seventy-two villages and 100,000 lives in a single night. Again, in 1532, the sea broke the embankments of Zeeland, and a hundred villages were of the past. Amsterdam, Zeeland, and the province of Utrecht were inundated in 1570, while 20,000 persons were drowned in Friesland. In 1825 North Holland, Friesland, Over-Yssel, and Gelderland were inundated. In 1855 the overflowing Rhine flooded Gelderland, a portion of Utrecht, and submerged a large portion of Brabant. As late as 1873 the polder of Borselen, 21 English acres in extent, sank into the waters. Undaunted by all these disasters, to mention but a few of the principal ones, the Dutch fought on, draining the Lake of Haarlem, 44 kilometres in circumference, because its waters were a perpetual
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