From the neighborhood of Emmerich, before reaching
the Dutch frontier, it has lost all the beauty of its banks, and flows
in great curves through vast and ugly flats, which seem to mark the
approach to old age. At Millingen it runs entirely in the territory of
Holland; a little farther on it divides. The main branch shamefully
loses its name, and goes to throw itself into the Meuse: the other
branch, insulted by the title of the Dannerden canal, flows nearly to
the city of Arnehm, when it once more divides into two branches. One
empties into the Gulf of Zuyder-Zee; the other still called, out of
compassion, the Lower Rhine, goes as far as the village of Durstede,
where it divides for the third time; a humiliation now of old date.
One of these branches, changing its name like a coward, throws itself
into the Meuse near Rotterdam; the other still called the Rhine,
but with the ridiculous surname of "curved," reaches Utrecht with
difficulty, where for the fourth time it again divides; capricious as
an old man in his dotage. One part, denying its old name, drags itself
as far as Muiden, where it falls into the Zuyder-Zee; the other, with
the name of Old Rhine, or simply the Old, flows slowly to the city
of Leyden, whose streets it crosses almost without giving a sign of
movement, and is finally gathered into one canal by which it goes to
its miserable death in the North Sea.
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