eciate the wondrous tales of worldwide renown which have found birth
on its banks.

Although the most German of rivers, the Rhine does not run its entire
course through German territory, but takes its rise in Switzerland and
finds the sea in Holland. For no less than 233 miles it flows through
Swiss country, rising in the mountains of the canton of Grisons, and
irrigates every canton of the Alpine republic save that of Geneva.
Indeed, it waters over 14,000 square miles of Swiss territory in the
flow of its two main branches, the Nearer Rhine and the Farther Rhine,
which unite at Reichenau, near Coire. The Nearer Rhine issues at the
height of over 7000 feet from the glaciers of the Rheinwaldhorn
group, and flows for some thirty-five miles, first in a north-easterly
direction through the Rheinwald Valley, then northward through the
Schams Valley, by way of the Via Mala gorge, and Tomleschg Valley, and
so to Reichenau, where it is joined by its sister stream, the Farther
Rhine. The latter, rising in the little Alpine lake of Toma near the
Pass of St. Gotthard, flows in a north-easterly direction to Reichenau.
The Nearer Rhine is generally considered to be the more important
branch, though the Farther Rhine is the longer by some seven miles. From
Reichenau the Rhine flows north-eastward to Coire, and thence northward
to the Lake of Constance, receiving on its way two tributaries, the
Landquart and the Ill, both on the right bank. Indeed, from source to
sea the Rhine receives a vast number of tributaries, amounting, with
their branches, to over 12,000. Leaving the Lake of Constance at the
town of that name, the river flows westward to Basel, having as
the principal towns on its banks Constance, Schaffhausen, Waldshut,
Laufenburg, Saeckingen, Rheinfelden, and Basel.

Not far from the town of Schaffhausen the river precipitates itself from
a height of 60 feet, in three leaps, forming the famous Falls of the
Rhine. At Coblentz a strange thing happens, for at this place the river
receives the waters of the Aar, swollen by the Reuss and the Limmat, and
of greater volume than the stream in which it loses itself.

It is at Basel that the Rhine, taking a northward trend, enters
Germany. By this time it has made a descent of nearly 7000 feet, and has
traversed about a third of its course. Between Basel and Mainz it flows
between the mountains of the Black Forest and the Vosges, the distance
between which forms a shallow valley of s