RHIN, BAS (LowEn RniNE), formerly a frontier department of France, and corre sponding pretty nearly to the present German administrative district of Lms'er Alsace (Nieder-Elsass) in the imperial territory of Alsace-Lorraine. To the e. lies Baden, and to the w. are the French departments of Moselle, Meurthe, and Vosges. The area of Bas Rhin, as a department of France, was 1759 sq.m., and its pop. in 1866 was 609,987; the area of Lower Alsace is 1841 sq.m., and its pop. in 1871, 600,406. This district lies almost wholly within the basin of the Rhine, which flows n, along its eastern border. The eastern portion of the district, lying along the left bank of the Rhine, consists wholly of plains; while in the w. are the rugged and wooded heights which form the eastern slopes of the Vosges mountains. In the hilly regions are many beautiful valleys. The winters are long and cold; the summer variable; the autumns always fine. Cretinism and goiter prevail in some parts, though to a less extent now than formerly. The country is unusually rich in agricultural and manufacturing resources and capabilities. A great va• riety of grains, fruits, and vegetables, including tine crops of hemp and tobacco, are grown extensively; and wines, red and white, the latter held in the highest estimation, are pro duced abundantly. Manufactures, textile and other, are carried on on a grand scale.
Spinning-mills, weaving factories for cotton, calico, woolen, and other fabrics, are exceed ingly numerous, and foundries, arms and machine factories also abound. Some timber, floated down the Rhine in rafts, is exported. The region recently occupied by the French departments of Haut-Rhin and Bas-Rhin constituted, prior to the treaty of Rys wick in 1697, one of the most densely peopled and industrious portions of Germany, called in German, Elsass (Lat. Alsatia). Ceded then to France, it became the French province of Alsace, which was at the revolution subdivided into the two departments. So it remained till, in 1870, during the war between France and Germany, Bas-Rhin and Haut-1111in were, with portions of the departments of Moselle, Meurthe, and Vosges, erected by the king of Prussia into the German general government of Alsace. When peace was concluded at Frankfort, the repossessed German territory was not incorpor ated with any of the German states; but, certain portions having been restored to France, formed a member of the new. German empire, with the title of the imperial territory (Reichsland) of Alsace-Lorraine (Elsass-Lothringen).