Charters, moreover, had been granted to various persons,
under which they drained the adjoining lands, and gradually reclaimed
large portions from the sea. The channel, at no time very deep,
became shallower, narrower, and more difficult of access, until at
last, during the second half of the fifteenth century, the passage
between Sluis and Damme was navigable only by small ships. Soon
the harbour at Damme was nearly choked up with sand. Many schemes
were tried in the hope of preserving the Zwijn, but the sea-trade
of Bruges dwindled away to a mere nothing, and finally disappeared
before the middle of the sixteenth century.
[Footnote *: Gilliodts van Severen, p. 25.]
And so Bruges fell from greatness. There are still some traces of
the ancient bed of the Zwijn amongst the fields near Coolkerke,
a village a short distance to the north of Bruges--a broad ditch
with broken banks, and large pools of slimy water lying desolate
and forlorn in a wilderness of tangled bushes. These are now the
only remains of the highway by which the 'deep-laden argosies'
used to enter in the days of old.
'BRUGES LA MORTE'
CHAPTER VI
'BRUGES LA MORTE'
They call it 'Bruges la Morte,' and at every turn there is something
to remind us of the deadly blight which fell upon the city when
its trade was lost.
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