The Express.
London, England, 1861-02-14 00:00:00

THE INUNDATIONS IN HOLLAND.

4111011 • CONIZIPOIDEIT.)
AMSTERDAM, Fee. 11.
Thank God the frightful desolation of our inun-
dated districts begins to abate, and the waters are
returning to their natural channels. But what
scenes of distress, agony, and penury do they !cave
behind them ! Some villages are entirely de-
stroyed ; not a vestige of a habitation remains to
show that they were the dwelling-place of man.
Nearly 40,000 acres of cultivated land have been
submerged, and their cultivators been driven from
their dwellings to seek shelter in schools and
churches, and to eat the bread of charity. The
number of cattle drowned or killed it is impossible
to state with accuracy, but it is said to amount to
several thousand. This, however, is a slight calamity
compared with the loss of human life, which, not-
withstanding every effort made by the authorities
to render assistance, hu swollen to a Ugh figure.
Whea the dyke broke at Leeuwen the waters
rushed through with such fearful violence as to
carry all before them ; houses, barns, and trees
tumbled down at their approach ; how, then, could
the labourers on the dyke and their families resist
the crushing strength of the flood and the ice
masses I The descriptions sent me from the scene
of desolation are really shocking. What the poor
creatures, whose homely dwellings but recently
afforded them a comfortable shelter, have bad
to encounter in the form of cold, naked-
ness, and starvation, is almost incredible.
Truth, indeed, in this case is stranger, much
than fiction. One family of eight has
estnTarye disappeared—carried away by the flood,
after enduring all the horrors with which frost and
hunger are always accompanied. Among all the
survivors there is mourning, lamentation, and woo,
not only on account of desolated homes, but on
account of parents, children, and friends whom
this fearful plague of waters ban wrenched from
their embrace. Never, perhaps, has the spirit of
charity and love been so diffused among a people as
it is now among the Dutch, as they listen to the
tales of sorrow of the bereaved and the deso-
late. In unstiuted measure they wive of their
abundance through the length and breadth
of the land. The King, attended by other
members of the royal family, has just returned
from a visit to the inundated districts, where lie
won for himself the affection of his smitten subjects
by his bounty and sympathy. In a letter to the
Minister of the Interior he has decreed that, on
the 19th instant (his birthday), a collection
shall be made through the whole country, from
door to door, for the benefit of the survivors of
this fearful visitation, and, in addition to the
20,000 guilders he has already given, has headed
the national subscription with a contribution of
40,000 guilders. No wonder that on his return
yesterday from his mission of mercy he was bailed,
wherever lie passed, with those acclamations which
burst forth only from a nation's love and admira-
tion.

It is annonnoed that one of the first parliamen-
tary bills to be presented to the Corps Legislatif will be
one for opening to the public the railway round Paris
(Chemin de Fer de Ceirtture). It was approved last Wed-
nesday by the Cousultatise Committee of Roads and
Bridges, and it will be submitted as an extraordinary ex-
pense to the approbation of the Corps LeghUatif.

M. Pierre Leroux and his family, who for some
years hare bees raiding at Jersey,have returned to France.