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The delta of the Rhone is not less remarkable for its increase. Astruc gives a detailed account of it in his Natural History of Languedoc; and proves, by a careful comparison of the descriptions of Mela, Strabo and Pliny, with the state of the places as they existed at the commencement of the eighteenth century, taking into account the statements of several writers of the middle age, that the arms of the Rhone have increased three leagues in length in the course of eighteen hundred years; that similar additions of land are made to the west of the Rhone; and that a number of places, which were situated, six or eight hundred years ago, at the edge of the sea or of large pools, are now several miles distant from the water.

Any one may observe in Holland and Italy, with what rapidity the Rhine, the Po, and the Arno, since they have been confined within dikes, raise their beds, advance their mouths into the sea, forming long promontories at their sides; and judge, from these facts, how small a number of ages was required by these rivers to deposit the low plains which they now traverse.