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 43 
 
 H
 
 WINDMILLS 
 
 AND 
 
 WOODEN SHOES 
 
 By 
 Blair Jaekel, F.R.G.S. 
 
 Author of 
 The Lands of the Tamed Turk 
 
 NEW YORK 
 McBRIDE, NAST & COMPANY 
 
 1912
 
 COPYRIGHT, 1912, BY 
 McBRIDE, NAST & COMPANY 
 
 PUBLISHKD FEBRUARY, 1912
 
 SRLE 
 URL 
 
 5138317 
 
 TO 
 
 MY AUNT 
 KATE FISHER BLAIR
 
 FOREWORD 
 
 To put before the prospective visitor the many 
 delights and few disadvantages of a territory with 
 which he may be already more or less familiar; to 
 help him to form a comprehensive idea of the most 
 of Holland within a reasonably short space of travel 
 time; to refocus the lens, to readjust the vernier of 
 his memory, providing he has already been there, 
 so that he may take a truer reading of the country 
 upon a second visit ; to recant the praises of a people 
 whose very existence has been and ever will be one 
 perpetual, indefatigable struggle against the most 
 ubiquitous of all of man's enemies an element of 
 the universe; to give a brief synopsis of what a vast 
 amount there is to see and learn in a country so 
 rich in accomplishments, so poor in area these con- 
 stitute the chief end of this book of travel through 
 the Netherlands. If it fails in its mission it is by 
 no means the fault of the Netherlands nor of whatever 
 of interest is contained therein. 
 
 If the text and illustrations inclosed between these 
 covers cause but a single reader to live again a 
 summer's trip through Holland or prompt him to 
 go there, there will be at least the satisfaction that 
 the work has not been in vain. 
 
 [vii]
 
 FOREWORD 
 
 The author takes this opportunity to express his 
 appreciation to the editors of Travel, New York 
 City, for permission to reprint as a part of the text 
 of this book, together with the photographs per- 
 taining to the different subjects, certain special 
 articles by the author which have appeared in the 
 pages of the magazine mentioned. 
 
 BLAIR JAEKEL, 
 PHILADELPHIA, PA. 
 
 [viii]
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 CHAPTER PAGE 
 
 I. INTRODUCTORY 1 
 
 II. THE ISLAND OF WALCHEREN . . .14 
 
 III. FROM MlDDELBURG TO DORTRECHT . . 29 
 
 IV. ROTTERDAM 45 
 
 V. DELFT AND HER TRAGEDY ... 59 
 
 VI. THE HAGUE AND SCHEVENINGEN . . 75 
 
 VII. LEYDEN AND HAARLEM .... 91 
 
 VIII. THE CITY OF NINETY ISLANDS . . .108 
 
 IX. EXCURSIONS ABOUT AMSTERDAM . .123 
 
 X. ALKMAAR AND THE HELDER . . . 137 
 
 XI. FROM HOORN TO STAVOREN . . . 150 
 
 XII. FRIESLAND AND ITS CAPITAL . . . 165 
 
 XIII. THE HINTERLAND OF HOLLAND . .176 
 
 XIV. GELDERLAND 189 
 
 XV. UTRECHT AND 'S HERTOGENBOSCH . . 202 
 
 INDEX . 215
 
 THE ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 VETERANS OF THE FISHING FLEET OP VOLENDAM 
 
 Frontispiece 
 
 FACING PAGE 
 
 WOODEN SHOES OF HOLLAND .... 1 
 THE DUTCH BUILD GOOD ROADS . . . .12 
 LOOKING DOWN OVER THE ROOFS OF MIDDELBURG 20 
 THE OLD CHURCH TOWER AND LIGHTHOUSE OF 
 
 WESTKAPELLE 24 
 
 BEHIND THE DIKE AT GOES . . go 
 
 A PICTURESQUE CORNER OF DORTRECHT . . 40 
 THE ROMANCE OF ROTTERDAM SHIPPING . . 44 
 A CANAL STREET IN ROTTERDAM .... 50 
 
 THE EAST GATE OF DELFT 60 
 
 THE PRINSENHOF IN DELFT 68 
 
 DUTCH MAIDS AND WASHERWOMEN ... 76 
 THE KURHAUS AT SCHEVENINGEN ... 88 
 
 A STEAM TRAM ENGINE 92 
 
 INSIDE THE GROOTE KERK IN HAARLEM . .104 
 THE ROYAL PALACE, AMSTERDAM . . .112 
 DIAMOND WORKERS IN AMSTERDAM . . .116 
 A WATERFRONT STREET IN VOLENDAM . .124 
 
 [xi]
 
 THE ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 FACING PAGE 
 
 A CANAL BACKYARD 132 
 
 CHEESE DAY IN ALKMAAR ..... 140 
 
 THE DIKE AT THE HELDEE 144 
 
 AN OLD STREET IN HOORN 152 
 
 HOORN'S RACETRACK ON THE MAIN STREET . .156 
 THE METAL SKULL CAP OF FRISIAN WOMEN . 164 
 LEEU WARDEN'S LEANING TOWER . . . .168 
 THE TOWN HALL AND MARKET SQUARE IN GBO- 
 
 NINGEN 180 
 
 THE BEST OF KAMPEN'S GATEWAYS . . .184 
 QUEEN WILHELMINA'S SUMMER PALACE AT HET 
 
 Loo 188 
 
 THE MARKET AT ARNHEM . . . . .196 
 THE EUSIBIUSBINNENSINGEL OF ARNHEM . . 200 
 UTRECHT'S CATHEDRAL . . . . . 204 
 THE OUDE GRACHT IN UTEECHT . . .210
 
 WINDMILLS 
 
 AND 
 
 WOODEN SHOES
 
 o.S 8
 
 Windmills and Wooden Shoes 
 
 i 
 
 INTRODU CTOBY 
 
 TAKE, if you will, the state of Delaware, some- 
 thing less than half of Maryland and the lower 
 end of New Jersey; turn them upside down; 
 drive Delaware and Jersey and the most of Mary- 
 land below the level of the sea; let the waters of the 
 Atlantic and the Chesapeake Bay seep in over the 
 low-level territory; dike up the edges at the weak 
 and exposed parts along the coast; pump the coun- 
 try dry, and keep it pumped dry, as far as possible 
 then, with a little less regularity of contour, you 
 will have almost a geographical counterpart of Hol- 
 land, both as to acreage and topography, although 
 of but one fifth its total population. The Chesa- 
 peake Bay would equal the Zuyder Zee; Baltimore, 
 if shifted to the other side of the Bay, might be 
 substituted for Amsterdam; Wilmington on the 
 Delaware would displace Rotterdam on the Maas; 
 Hagerstown would fit the position of Arnhem ; and, 
 with the aid of a little elasticity of the imagination,
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 Cape May might be mistaken for the Hook of 
 Holland. 
 
 Such, in brief, are the physical dimensions of, per- 
 haps, the most unique, the most remunerative travel 
 territory, acre for acre, in Europe. 
 
 Holland, like ancient Gaul, is divided; but into 
 two parts instead of three. If we draw an imaginary 
 line north and south bisecting the Zuyder Zee, the 
 country on the west side of this line may be desig- 
 nated as the more be-traveled, therefore the more 
 familiar part. Hundreds of thousands of tourists, 
 singly, in groups, in " personally conducted " parties, 
 annually make use of it as a playground. Its un- 
 usual below-sea-level scenery, its historical buildings, 
 its marvelous waterways, its sandy bathing beaches, 
 the life in its cities, the poetic costuming of its rural 
 inhabitants, its treasures and masterpieces of art 
 all combine to fulfill every condition required by the 
 average sight-seer. In no other section of Europe 
 are the distances between places of interest so short ; 
 in no other section are the modes and conveniences 
 of reaching these places so varied. If the traveler 
 relies solely upon the railways to carry him from one 
 point to another, he may be compelled to wait two 
 hours in order to ride ten minutes. A happy com- 
 bination of the steam tram lines, the railways, and 
 the canal packets, will enable him not only to get 
 about without loss of time, but to penetrate curious, 
 out-of-the-way parts of the country which one or
 
 INTRODUCTORY 
 
 NORTH 
 
 SEA 
 
 The shaded portions of this map of Holland and its immediate 
 surroundings represent land that would be under water if by 
 some inconceivable catastrophe all the dikes should break. 
 The map gives, therefore, some idea of the never-ending strug- 
 gle that the Hollander has faced and continues to face.
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 the other of the different methods of transportation 
 may overlook. 
 
 The surface of the territory to the eastward of the 
 imaginary longitude is barely scratched by the 
 searcher of the picturesque and historical. Many 
 of its towns are as interesting as any of those in 
 the west, but, as a general rule, their peoples have 
 been more easily influenced by German and Belgian 
 methods, and, therefore, their characteristics differ 
 greatly from those of the natives of North and 
 South Holland and Zeeland, for example. What 
 evidences of their history and art these towns still 
 possess they have in a great measure failed to appre- 
 ciate themselves, and it is this lack of self-confidence, 
 translated into a complete failure so far to advertise 
 their own scenic and historical virtues, that has bred 
 the comparative aloofness with respect to them in 
 the manner of the tourist through Holland. Prob- 
 ably the majority of travelers go to the Netherlands, 
 not for art, nor for scenery, nor even for history, 
 but for windmills and wooden shoes (to epitomize the 
 characteristics of the country and its peoples), and 
 for that reason their wanderings are bound to be 
 confined, for the most part, to the exiguous terri- 
 tory bordered by the North Sea on the west and the 
 Zuyder Zee on the east. 
 
 The omnipresent story of Holland is the story of 
 its fight against the waters. Its other conquests pale 
 before it. Its eighty years' revolution against the
 
 INTRODUCTORY 
 
 Spaniards cannot compare with it. Water is Hol- 
 land's perpetual and merciless enemy ; so much so 
 that if all the dikes that protect her from the waters 
 of the ocean burst to-night, to-morrow there would 
 be but a third of the country left. How she has 
 conquered would fill a book in itself. Since the 
 Frisian monks first commenced to dike in the country, 
 successive inundations have blotted out the lives of 
 more of her people than all her conquests at arms 
 put together. But still the Dutch fought on, reso- 
 lutely, unflinchingly, persistently, until they dredged 
 what land they needed from the bottom of the sea 
 and grew grass and flowers and vegetables where 
 kelp and cockle-shells thrived before. After hun- 
 dreds of years of dredging and diking, by 1833 Hol- 
 land had attained an acreage of 8,768 square miles. 
 By 1877 she had added another four thousand. 
 
 Characteristic of the Dutch perseverance to con- 
 quer the menacing waters is a part of the report of 
 the commission appointed to superintend the recla- 
 mation of the Haarlemermeer, an inland sea that 
 once lapped the very gates of Amsterdam herself 
 and upon which a fleet of seventy vessels once gave 
 battle. " We have driven forever from the bosom 
 of our country a most dangerous enemy," said the 
 commission, after its task had been completed ; " we 
 have at the same time augmented the means for de- 
 fending our capital in time of war. We have con- 
 quered a province in combat without tears and with- 
 
 [5]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 out blood, where science and genius took the place 
 of generals, and where workmen were the worthy 
 soldiers." 
 
 Previous to 1836 the Dutch had tolerated the 
 Haarlemermeer. In November of that year a vio- 
 lent west wind lashed its waters into a fury and 
 poured them into the streets of Amsterdam. On 
 Christmas day there came an east wind that drove 
 the waters from Amsterdam over into the streets of 
 Leyden. This was too much. This was the straw 
 that broke the camel's back. This was what ex- 
 hausted even the patience of the Dutch, and they 
 picked up the gauntlet. They contrived a plan of 
 methodical, systematic attack. They diked in the 
 Lake with a high earthen cofferdam, installed a 
 series of powerful pumps that sucked a thousand 
 cubic feet of water at a single stroke of the piston, 
 and they drew 800,000,000 tons of lake water up 
 into the surrounding canals to be carried off to the 
 sea with much the same complacency that you would 
 imbibe a glass of soda through a straw. It took 
 more than four years to complete the process. When 
 it was finally finished the Dutch struck a medal in 
 commemoration which bore in Latin the following 
 matter-of-fact inscription : " Haarlem Lake, after 
 having for centuries assailed the surrounding fields 
 to enlarge itself by their destruction, conquered at 
 last by the force of machinery, has returned to Hol- 
 land its 44,280 acres of invaded land." The sig- 
 
 [6]
 
 INTRODUCTORY 
 
 nificance of the Dutch bon mot, " God made the sea ; 
 we made the shore," will never be more apparent 
 than when you look out from the car window across 
 the Zuidplaspolder near Rotterdam, with a minus 
 altitude of more than thirty feet below the level 
 of the ocean at mean tide. 
 
 Holland being, as a whole, the lowest country in 
 the world, is protected at the danger zones by the 
 great dikes upon which almost the entire kingdom 
 depends for its safety from disastrous inundation, 
 and which require the annual cost of maintenance 
 of approximately $12,000,000 and the undivided 
 attention of a whole department of engineers. The 
 mileage of the canals which intersect the country in 
 every direction is greater than the mileage of the 
 railroads. First and all the time, these canals, ex- 
 cept those constructed for special purposes, serve 
 for conducting the superfluous water from the cul- 
 tivated areas. Second, they are highways for traffic. 
 Travel on them is cheaper than on the steam tram 
 lines, which is cheaper, in turn, than on the railways, 
 for many of the latter are owned and operated by 
 private companies, as in England. Even some of 
 the lines built by the State are leased to a private 
 concern. But unlike those of England, there can 
 be little doubt that an investment in their stocks 
 is a paying one, because railway building and rail- 
 way up-keep in Holland are comparative sinecures. 
 Grades are unknown, curves are scarce as the pro- 
 
 [7]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 verbial hen's teeth, except in the approaches to a 
 city, and I failed to find a tunnel in the whole 
 country. 
 
 But touring in Holland is not so cheap as it is 
 either in Germany or France. The unit basis of 
 Dutch coinage is the gulden, of value equal to 
 slightly more than two francs and just less than two 
 marks. There is even an oft repeated but exag- 
 gerated saying that a gulden in Holland will only 
 go as far as a mark in Germany. One of the reasons 
 for the expensiveness of travel through the Nether- 
 lands is that to stop at any but the so-called first- 
 class hostelries is a rather precarious business. In 
 spite of all the Dutchman's reputation for cleanliness, 
 the less expensive hotels, unlike their ilk in Germany 
 or Switzerland, are often anything but scrupulous 
 in this matter and sometimes shockingly unsanitary. 
 
 The system of Dutch municipal government is 
 almost identical with that of Germany, the Burgo- 
 master, or Mayor, being appointed by the crown 
 instead of being elected by the community, so that 
 a man may follow the profession of burgomastering 
 as he would that of engineering. It is, withal, a 
 system that might well supplant that in vogue in 
 American cities, and if the experimental stages of 
 municipal government by commission lately tenta- 
 tively adopted in some few cases as an expedient 
 to do away with political bartering for executive 
 positions if this form of government proves its 
 
 [8]
 
 INTRODUCTORY 
 
 worth, the professional mayor may yet become with 
 us a reality. 
 
 School attendance for children is compulsory in 
 the Netherlands, but not free. The equivalent of 
 eight American cents is the charge imposed by the 
 State for one week's tuition for one child in the 
 primary grades, with stipulated increments added 
 to the fee as the pupil advances. All schools are 
 under the supervision of the State, and if a family 
 is found too poor to pay the school taxes on its 
 children, the fees are remitted. The trade school, 
 however, of late inauguration, has revolutionized the 
 old-time classical education to a great degree. 
 
 Until the child attains the age of thirty years he 
 or she is subservient to parental authority and must 
 even obtain, up until that age, parental permission 
 to marry and the matter of marriage in Holland 
 is by no means the least interesting of the customs 
 of the country. Courtship is a protracted affair 
 and follows the engagement indefinitely. Two weeks 
 prior to the date of the wedding the legal declara- 
 tion of the betrothal takes place, consisting of the 
 " signing on " of both parties involved. The bride, 
 with apt acknowledgment that an ounce of preven- 
 tion is worth a pound of cure, at once proceeds to 
 render herself immune from the usual deluge of cut 
 glass and pie knives by compiling a list of acceptable 
 wedding presents for the consultation of her rela- 
 tives and friends, so that they may select such gifts
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 as are suited both to her needs and their pocket- 
 books. 
 
 Of the civil marriage ceremonies there are three 
 classes, not at all determined by the social positions 
 of the contracting parties, but by the time required 
 to tie the knot and the corresponding fee imposed. 
 A first-class marriage may be performed on any day 
 of the week, but the second and third-class marriages 
 are conducted upon certain days, the different mem- 
 bers of the City Council officiating by turns. Each 
 of the second-class ceremonies is performed sepa- 
 rately and the ritual repeated for each couple. A 
 number of third-class marriages, however, may be 
 conducted at one and the same time, and practically 
 at club rates. The ceremony in this case is not alto- 
 gether an impressive one but it serves its purpose 
 at a cheaper price and is more quickly over with. 
 The methods of procedure are somewhat as follows: 
 
 Brides and bridegrooms to be, friends, relatives, 
 and witnesses are ushered into a large room in the 
 city hall. The member of Council in charge takes 
 his position upon the dais, and the clerk calls the 
 names of the contracting parties. They arise to 
 acknowledge their identities, which are duly vouched 
 for by the various witnesses in each case. The 
 officer then proceeds to expatiate upon the duties 
 of man and wife and upon the holy bonds of matri- 
 mony, directing his awesome remarks to the stand- 
 ing couples. In closing, he puts forth the question 
 
 [10]
 
 INTRODUCTORY 
 
 as to whether each, in spite of all he has said, will 
 take the other for better or for worse, abide by 
 the laws, and love and cherish each other until death 
 doth part, so help them. A loud and enthusiastic 
 chorus in the affirmative is followed by a banging 
 of the table right soundly with the official gavel, 
 and the whole company is forthwith pronounced man 
 and wife. Of course it is assumed by the conspira- 
 tors which maiden the functionary has pronounced 
 the wife of which young man; at all events, there is 
 nothing on record about the wrong husband de- 
 camping with the wrong wife. Order comes out of 
 apparent chaos and, as the story books read, they 
 all live happily ever after. 
 
 The civil ceremony is all that is required by law, 
 but, possibly to moisten the already well executed 
 knot in the tie that binds, many couples later undergo 
 the religious ceremony in the church. The familiar 
 wedding ring figures in neither the religious nor the 
 civil ceremony. Each member of an engaged couple 
 presents the other with a plain gold ring at the 
 time of " plighting their troth," as we observe in 
 the novels, which is worn upon the third finger of 
 the left hand until after the marriage, when it be- 
 comes a wedding ring and is transferred to the right 
 hand. 
 
 Until the advent of the little Princess Juliana 
 Holland realized her danger of being ultimately ab- 
 sorbed by Germany. A German Prince had married
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 the sovereign of the Dutch nation, and German 
 journals were not reticent in suggesting that, in 
 the event of Queen Wilhelmina leaving no direct 
 issue, the succession should revert to the family of 
 the Prince Consort. Moreover, Germany had ever 
 been jealous of Holland's possession of the mouth 
 of the greatest of German rivers the Rhine, of 
 which she sought the control from its source to the 
 sea. Germany also had an eye upon Holland's pos- 
 sessions for her own colonization possessions that 
 give this little country second place among the colo- 
 nial powers of the world and which, in the Far East 
 alone, aggregate in acreage fourteen times her own 
 area. But the birth of Juliana precluded all im- 
 mediate possibility of German usurpation, and the 
 Hollanders didn't convalesce from the effects of the 
 joyous news for a whole week. 
 
 The Dutch are an intensely patriotic people and 
 have made heroic sacrifices to maintain the inde- 
 pendence now assured them by the powers of the 
 world and the birth of Juliana. They are phleg- 
 matic rather than impetuous; stoical rather than 
 demonstrative; impassive rather than excitable. By 
 virtue of their country's unique maritime position it 
 has bred the naval heroes, navigators, discoverers, 
 and engineers whose names will remain synonymous 
 for indomitable pluck so long as there exists a his- 
 tory of unequal fighting. By reason of the wealth 
 derived from the foreign trade that these men made 
 
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 INTRODUCTORY 
 
 possible it has fostered conspicuous groups of artists 
 and scholars and scientists who in their times were 
 the leaders of their guilds. 
 
 It is with keen appreciation of the characteristics 
 of the Hollander which enable him to offer to the 
 traveling world so delightful a handmade territory, 
 that I turn to the pages of " The Traveler " by 
 Oliver Goldsmith and quote a short summary of Hol- 
 land from the pen of one who traveled and observed, 
 and who, by his enviable powers of description, 
 analysis, and condensation, could epitomize a volume 
 of significance in a single word of syncope. 
 
 " To men of other minds my fancy flies, 
 Embosom'd in the deep where Holland lies. 
 Methinks her patient sons before me stand, 
 Where the broad ocean leans against the land, 
 And, sedulous to stop the coming tide, 
 Lift the tall rampire's artificial pride. 
 Onward, methinks, and diligently slow, 
 The firm connected bulwark seems to grow ; 
 Spreading its long arms amidst the watery roar, 
 Scoops out an empire and usurps the shore. 
 While the pent ocean, rising o'er the pile, 
 Sees an amphibious world beneath her smile ; 
 The slow canal, the yellow blossom'd vale, 
 The willow-tufted bank, the gliding sail, 
 The crowded mart, the cultivated plain, 
 A new creation rescued from his reign."
 
 II 
 
 THE ISLAND OF WAL.CHEREN 
 
 IT must be because the province of Zeeland seems 
 too fearfully close to be interesting that the 
 average traveler through Holland, if he enter 
 by Flushing one of the little country's two princi- 
 pal sea gates hurries from deck to dock like a 
 somnambulist, and fights for his compartment in 
 the four-something A.M. train, bound for Amsterdam 
 or The Hague. Perhaps, after being wakened most 
 unsympathetically, if not rudely, at three-thirty in 
 the morning, he feels disagreeable enough to take the 
 first train out, no matter whence it cometh nor 
 whither it goeth. But in so doing the aforemen- 
 tioned average sight-seer will make his first mistake 
 and a grave one with regard to Holland. Part 
 of the best of the country, scenically and historically, 
 is just at the other end of the gangplank. 
 
 This business of the arrival at Flushing of the 
 night boat from Folkestone at the unheavenly hour 
 of four in the morning, ought in itself be sufficient 
 excuse to go first thing to the bedroom steward the 
 evening of embarkation and whisper unto him casu- 
 ally but firmly that the odds might run as high as 
 
 [14]
 
 THE ISLAND OF WALCHEREN 
 
 ten chances to one his name would be Dutch for 
 Dennis if he dared to rap you out of your bunk 
 earlier than six. The steamship company reserves 
 the privilege of putting you off the boat at seven, 
 at any rate; so, to arise at six will just give you time 
 to array yourself in the proper regalia, indulge in 
 a hurried breakfast of ham and eggs on board (at 
 a shilling an egg), and climb into the seven-seven 
 train for that capital of quaintness, not to mention 
 the province of Zeeland Middelburg. The four- 
 something train ignores Middelburg with a passing 
 snort. 
 
 And a word here to the wise is sufficient: don't 
 settle yourself for an all day train ride. Don't even 
 exert yourself to the extent of hoisting your grip 
 to the baggage rack. If the compartment be 
 crowded which it never is, going to Middelburg 
 you might hold your suit case on your lap the entire 
 journey without fatigue or even ennui. Middelburg 
 is four miles from Flushing. If the engineer doesn't 
 slow down to blow the whistle it will take just eleven 
 minutes to cover the distance. 
 
 I have anticipated the fact that the sum total 
 of your baggage will consist of a suit case, because 
 personally conducting a trunk through Holland 
 would be just as incongruous as saddling a Shetland 
 pony with an elephant howdah. 
 
 There are two methods of seeing the Island of 
 Walcheren, equally fascinating, and the visitor can
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 avail himself of both in one and the same day. The 
 first is by climbing the two hundred and seventy-odd 
 steps to the top of " Long John " in Middelburg, and 
 the second by a drive around the Island, covering, 
 perhaps, thirty miles, and touching the three prin- 
 cipal places of interest: Veere, Domburg, and West- 
 kapelle. To state here that the Island of Walcheren 
 is not an island might seem a bit ambiguous, but it 
 is true, nevertheless, and may be explained away as 
 follows : 
 
 Long before our time, perhaps in the distant 
 Paleozoic age, Walcheren was nothing more than 
 shallow water. Along came the Dutch who have a 
 happy faculty of making their own geography as 
 they need it and, seeing prospects in its develop- 
 ment, built a sort of cofferdam around it, pumped 
 the place dry, and made it into an island. It made 
 a fairly good island, and in later years they grafted 
 it on to the parent land by a long embankment across 
 an arm of the Scheldt, and made it into a peninsula. 
 A peninsula it still remains, but its future is all a 
 matter of conjecture. 
 
 " Long John," or Lang Jan, if the sobriquet be 
 translated into Dutch, is practically the Washington 
 Monument of Walcheren. It is the two-hundred- 
 and-eighty-foot tower of the Nieuwe Kerk in Middel- 
 burg, capped with a climax of forty-one bells that 
 chime a quaint fragment of some familiar popular 
 melody every seven and a half minutes. On the 
 
 16]
 
 THE ISLAND OF WALCHEREN 
 
 hour Long John literally vibrates from foundation 
 to weather vane in a frenzied endeavor to pour forth 
 in toto the accumulation of more or less music ad- 
 ministered in small doses during the previous sixty 
 minutes. 
 
 It is up the middle of Long John you must climb 
 in a spiral to obtain a first impression of Walcheren. 
 It is a tedious task, and by the time you are halfway 
 up you are blessing the memory of the man who 
 twined the now much worn hand rope along the steep 
 staircase. You may even be about to give up in dis- 
 gust, when, of a sudden, you stumble in upon the 
 lofty hermitage of old Hendrick Landman, the keeper 
 of the bells. 
 
 Hendrick sits serenely in his armchair in an ex- 
 tremely well ventilated room at the top of the spiral 
 and lets people pay a small fee for the privilege of 
 climbing up to have him point out the view and 
 exhibit his mechanical masterpiece a few ladder 
 lengths higher up. Hendrick's view alone is doubly 
 worth the climb, and, after reimbursing him to the 
 equivalent extent of about eight cents in American 
 coinage, you will also have to admit that he can 
 certainly keep bells. I know nothing of whatever 
 else Hendrick can or cannot do, but he can certainly 
 keep bells ; and after all, a man can hope for nothing 
 more than to achieve success in his chosen calling. 
 Hendrick also takes just pride in the condition of 
 the Gargantuan Swiss music box that is responsible 
 
 [17]
 
 for the two or three bars every seven-and-a-half 
 minutes. He oils it and he winds it assiduously 
 twice every day in the year. 
 
 Taken by and large, Hendrick is an unimpeachable 
 bell keeper. 
 
 After having been duly and visibly impressed with 
 the manner in which Hendrick keeps his bells and his 
 garrulous music box, it might be well to tarry with 
 him for a few moments at the foot of the ladder 
 and attempt a squint or two through the old gen- 
 tleman's telescope, which, from the appearance of it, 
 might be a lineal descendant of the first ones ever 
 put together by Zacharias Jansen, all of three hun- 
 dred years ago and not more than a few feet from 
 the base of the tower you stand upon. 
 
 Jansen, the inventor of the telescope and the 
 microscope, and Father Jacob Cats, the humorist- 
 poet-philosopher, were contemporaries in Middelburg 
 for a time, and the town claims them as its two most 
 illustrious sons. The children of Jansen's genius 
 may still be viewed in the little Museum of the 
 Zeeuwsch Genootschap der Watenschappen (don't 
 ask me to pronounce the name of that society; it is 
 task enough to spell it correctly) in the Wagenaar- 
 straat of Zeeland's capital; Father Cats will live in 
 Holland in book form until the end of all things. 
 
 If the atmosphere be clear, you would think that 
 a strong wind from the north could topple Long 
 John, including bells, music box, Hendrick Landman 
 
 [18]
 
 THE ISLAND OF WALCHEREN 
 
 and his telescope, and all, upon the bathing beach 
 of Flushing itself the place seems so close below 
 you. Flushing of to-day is nothing more than a 
 pseudo bathing resort, much patronized by easily 
 pleased Germans, and a handy terminus for 'cross- 
 channel passenger boats. But the name of Flushing 
 also means much in the history of Holland. 
 
 Here was born in 1607 that popular idol of the 
 Dutch, Admiral de Ruyter, the son of a rope maker, 
 although his mother, whose name he assumed, hap- 
 pened to be of noble birth. De Ruyter flourished 
 at a particularly favorable time in the middle of 
 the seventeenth century, when the navigation acts 
 passed by Cromwell placed unbearable restrictions 
 on trade with Holland. The ensuing war with Eng- 
 land called into play de Ruyter's talents, and a large 
 majority of the thirteen great naval battles fought 
 within a period of sixteen months were won by the 
 Dutch. It was not, however, until a later war with 
 England that de Ruyter performed his principal and 
 culminating achievement. In 1667, at the age of 
 sixty, he mustered his fleet and forced a fairway up 
 the Thames to the very gates of London herself, 
 demolishing fortifications and shipping as he went, 
 and plunging London into a panic. 
 
 Flushing, too, was the scene of embarkation of the 
 unhappy Charles V in 1556, and of Philip II three 
 years later, neither of whom ever returned. As you 
 look out upon the Scheldt from your coign of van- 
 
 [19]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 tage at the top of Long John you can almost picture 
 the scene on the deck of the vessel when Philip de- 
 nounced the Prince of Orange as having thwarted 
 his plans, declaring the innocent William an ingrate, 
 and doubtless a host of other names unfit for pub- 
 lication. 
 
 It was Flushing that first hoisted the ensign of 
 liberty against the Spaniard, Alva, and it was Flush- 
 ing, during the Napoleonic wars of 1809, that the 
 English fleet, with the ultimate capture of Antwerp 
 at heart, bombarded so vigorously that the mag- 
 nificent Town Hall, a couple of churches, and no less 
 than two hundred private houses were razed to the 
 ground. 
 
 From Long John one can see plainly the towns 
 on the north and west coasts of Walcheren, and often 
 even the spires of Antwerp are visible, while directly 
 below a mass of red roofs punctured here and there 
 with patches of trees stretches Middelburg. To the 
 left is the market place, bounded on the north by 
 the handsome Town Hall begun in the sixteenth cen- 
 tury, the embellishment of whose faade by twenty- 
 five ancient statues of the counts and countesses of 
 Holland helps it to hold its place as one of the 
 finest and most interesting late-Gothic edifices in 
 the Netherlands. The tower of the Town Hall has 
 a chime, too, and each time after Long John so 
 insistently proclaims the hour of the day or night 
 for Long John takes the credit of giving standard 
 
 [20]
 
 2 
 u. 
 
 o a 
 
 c 1/5
 
 THE ISLAND OF WALCHEREN 
 
 time to Middelburg it must get a bit on his nerves 
 to have "Foolish Betsy " (Gekke Betje), up in the 
 Town Hall tower, rattle off her cacophonous con- 
 tradiction a minute or two earlier, or later, as the 
 case may be. 
 
 To the right is the peaceful square inclosed by 
 the famous old Abbey of St. Nicholas, founded as 
 early as 1106, and later, in the sixteenth century, 
 the scene of a memorable meeting of the Knights 
 of the Golden Fleece. 
 
 Then, after a last good-by to Hendrick and his 
 companionable telescope, you clatter down the tower 
 steps, ignoring with consummate contempt the twin- 
 ing hand rope which, in the ascent, so forcibly ap- 
 pealed to your avoirdupois. 
 
 The road from Middelburg to Veere, a distance 
 of three or four miles, is brick-paved and lined with 
 trees, as is the habit of most highways in Holland ; 
 and if it is your first experience thoughts pertaining 
 to the thoroughness of the Dutch will doubtless be 
 in order. It may have taken more time and it may 
 have cost more money to lay brick roads, but then 
 the expense and labor of repair are minimum. The 
 building of roads is but one of the many tasks that 
 the Hollander does not believe in doing over again 
 in a year or two ; so he lays them in brick and the 
 comfort of passengers in vehicles is of no considera- 
 tion. There is a road from Monnikendam to Edam 
 which might give a horse spavin to look upon. The
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 blame for the wearing out of the road, in this case, 
 is placed upon the poor beast, and down the middle 
 of it they have laid a brick paved path, the sides 
 being merely macadamized. 
 
 The landscape of Walcheren seems set as if for 
 a theatrical performance. There is a place for every- 
 thing, and everything is in its place. Left, a tree- 
 encircled, thatch roofed farmhouse, built as an ad- 
 dition to the barn in the back, so as to save a wall; 
 right, a line of willows, all twins, that fringe a road 
 along the top of a dike ; up stage, a windmill of 
 methodical movements, and, perhaps, a sailboat pass- 
 ing slowly along a narrow canal too narrow and 
 too high above the eye for the audience to obtain a 
 glimpse of any water at all giving the effect of a 
 mirage; down stage, a black and white cow. Of 
 course it will be a black and white cow, because, 
 figuratively, you might count the red cows in Hol- 
 land on your fingers. And such a scene is not typ- 
 ical of the Island of Walcheren alone, but of the 
 Netherlands in general. Any other type of scenery 
 might become wearisome, but possibly the brevity of 
 the train ride or the substitution of a boat or 
 steam tram trip between one point of interest and 
 another has a lot to do with relieving the monotony. 
 
 Of all Zeeland, the particular costume of that 
 province can be observed to the best advantage on 
 the island of Walcheren. A milkmaid of Middelburg, 
 for example, is a joy to look upon. Her spotless 
 
 [22]
 
 THE ISLAND OF WALCHEREN 
 
 white cap bristles at the temples with kurkenkrullen 
 like the antennas of a prehistoric beetle. Her skirts 
 are ankle-high and padded generously at the hips. 
 If she be naturally rotund and the skirts need no 
 padding, circumstantial evidence of the fact is suffi- 
 cient to stamp her the belle of the community. The 
 sleeves of her bodice are very short and very tight, 
 pinching the arms above the elbows so that they 
 might be mistaken for a pair of aggravated cases 
 of inflammatory rheumatism. Of course the sun in 
 all its glory strikes the backs of these arms, for she 
 always walks with them akimbo, the better to balance 
 the pails which dangle one from each end of a 
 wooden yoke, enameled a vivid robbin's egg blue. 
 But the redder the arms from the rays of the sun 
 and the tighter the pinch of the sleeves, the flatter 
 the chest and the broader the hips, the sooner will she 
 cease to be a mere milkmaid through the medium of 
 a simple marriage ceremony in the village kerk. 
 
 The only discordant note in the otherwise har- 
 monious landscape on the road to Veere may be said 
 to be a flitting one. It assumes the distended shape 
 of a buxom village maiden in the full provincial cos- 
 tume padded skirts and all astride a bicycle, 
 spinning townward or homeward over the bricks. 
 For the bicycle, be it known, is the natural and 
 it has therefore become the national means of loco- 
 motion in Holland. Everybody rides bicycles ; and 
 since the only hills are the approaches to the dikes 
 
 [23]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 or across the humpbacked span of a canal draw- 
 bridge, their invention has been no less a boon to 
 the populace at large than it has been a bane to 
 the sight-seer. In The Hague, for example, they 
 have become a veritable pest, and to be constantly 
 dodging them in the streets keeps a person very 
 much on the jump. 
 
 By and by you will rattle into Veere. You can 
 tell it is Veere by its church, for Veere's church is 
 something to remember. It is by far the biggest 
 thing on the island of Walcheren. It is the first 
 building of historical or architectural importance 
 that you will pass on entering the town from Middel- 
 burg, and its immensity, so foreign to the Veere of 
 to-day, may be able to convey to you some remote 
 idea of what Veere used to be before the sea leaked 
 in over the cofferdam and blotted out most of the 
 place between suns. 
 
 Built in 1348, this church weathered even the 
 terrible encroachment of the sea; but along came 
 Napoleon in 1812. Napoleon, being accustomed to 
 move, lock, stock and barrel, into the most sumptu- 
 ous quarters of every town he visited, took a par- 
 ticular liking to Veere's church and promptly made 
 a barracks of it. There is no more complete method 
 of demolishing the interior of a building than to turn 
 it into a barracks, especially a Napoleonic barracks, 
 and since the Little Corsican's unwelcome visit to 
 Veere the old church has remained ravaged, mildewed, 
 
 [24]
 
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 M 
 
 bfl w 
 
 15 
 
 "3 CO 
 
 p, M 
 
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 3 J3
 
 THE ISLAND OF WALCHEREN 
 
 and decayed. In a corner of the east end, however, 
 the people of Veere still gather for spiritual wor- 
 ship. Twelve years ago they started to restore the 
 church, but if the receipt of funds is not a little 
 more prompt in the future they may some day have 
 to restore the restorations. 
 
 Several quaint old houses of the sixteenth century ; 
 an impressive tower at the mouth of the harbor, 
 whose mate lies buried under the sea ; and the Town 
 Hall, containing an unimportant museum save for a 
 few royal documents and a richly enameled goblet, 
 presented to the town in 1551 by Maximilian of 
 Burgundy, the first marquis of Veere these and the 
 church are the sole relics of Veere's previous pros- 
 perity not claimed by the ocean. 
 
 A rapid succession of long, shady, hedge-fringed 
 avenues lead from Veere to Domburg, the curious 
 little bathing resort on the northwest coast of the 
 island. Approximately halfway, at West Hove, 
 there stands a famous old castle, once the residence 
 of the Abbots of Middelburg, which remains in such 
 a perfect state of preservation although modern- 
 ized, of course, to a certain degree that in the 
 summer it is used as a sanatorium for the poor 
 children of the Flushing and Middelburg districts. 
 Just across the road an attractive modern building, 
 more like a country home in design, does duty as a 
 full-fledged hospital. 
 
 The town of Domburg gives not the least evidence 
 [25]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 of being situated on the seaside, as do the most of 
 our Atlantic Coast resorts by their bleakness, but 
 seems rather an inland village, thickly sprinkled with 
 and all but completely surrounded by trees. At its 
 back and just a few steps behind the sand dunes, 
 lies the sea, while a stretch of well formed, sandy 
 beach, which entices to Domburg each summer a 
 goodly number of Dutch people and the few for- 
 eigners who know of its charms, slopes away beyond 
 the dunes. 
 
 For five miles farther, to Westkapelle, the road 
 lies first behind the dunes and then behind the giant 
 dike for which this, one of the most exposed and 
 at the same time one of the lowest sections of Hol- 
 land, is famous. Presently you find yourself bowling 
 along on top of the dike, with the sea lapping rest- 
 lessly at its thick, bevel ed-stone hide on the right, 
 and the village of Westkapelle, nestling some feet 
 below the water level even at low tide, yet secure 
 behind the backbone of its protector, on the left. 
 This dike, being of necessity one of the largest and 
 strongest along the Dutch coast, receives the tender- 
 est of care in the hands of the Government, for, in 
 case of a break in it, the Island of Walcheren would 
 be reduced to its former state of shallow sea water 
 in less time than it would take to set the type of the 
 " scare-head " in the newspapers to tell of the catas- 
 trophe. The laborers who are constantly employed 
 at work upon it are supposed to be the direct de- 
 
 [26]
 
 THE ISLAND OF WALCHEREN 
 
 scendants of the Danish fishermen who dragged these 
 waters with their nets far back in Norman times. 
 
 Aside from its dike the most conspicuous object 
 in the vicinity of Westkapelle is the lofty, square, 
 Gothic tower, belonging originally to a fifteenth cen- 
 tury church burned down in 1831. This tower the 
 Dutch have aptly turned into practical service by 
 making a lighthouse of it. The powerful reflectors 
 at its top have a radius of twenty-five miles or more 
 and, even in the daytime, the tower is as much of a 
 landmark along the west coast of the island as the 
 church at Veere is along the north. 
 
 Driving from Westkapelle back to Middelburg you 
 scarcely pass out from the throes of one tollgate 
 until you are enmeshed in those of another. You 
 are assumed to be honest in Zeeland and expected 
 to march right up to the door of the tollhouse, pass 
 a cordial time of day with the character who keeps 
 it, and pay your little five or six Dutch cents without 
 even so much as giving vent to the time-honored con- 
 jecture that the farmers thereabouts must be too 
 well off to work out their taxes on the roadway. 
 
 Nor is it only the tollhouse keeper who has a 
 pleasant word of greeting for you, but every native 
 you pass, man, woman, or child, will have a nod and 
 a smile and a cheery " Good evening " although you 
 may not recognize the verbiage. The sturdy truck 
 farmer, with gold earrings and cropped hair, trudg- 
 ing homeward in the wake of his push-cart; the 
 
 [27]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 thickly padded maiden with her dangling milk pails ; 
 the tiny boys and girls, diminutive counterparts of 
 their parents as regards a costume which wavers not 
 with the change of fashion all seem to think it their 
 especial assignment to treat the tourist on Walcheren 
 as a visitor and not an invader. 
 
 [28]
 
 Ill 
 
 FROM MlDDELBURG TO DoRTRECHT 
 
 IF the American traveler expects to stop off along 
 the line from Middelburg at a little place called 
 Goes, he will undergo his first operation with the 
 Dutch language. Should he fail to catch sight of 
 the signboard that proclaims in print the name of 
 the station, or to compare his watch with his time- 
 table in order to ascertain in this manner the exact 
 bearings of the point of stoppage, he will probably 
 be carried on through, for it will not occur to him 
 that he had planned to detrain when the tin-horn- 
 girdled conductor rattles up and down the platform 
 shouting, " Whose." But " Whose " is the way Goes 
 is pronounced and this is simply introductory. 
 
 Some there be who try to insist that we have noth- 
 ing to brag about in the way of euphonic orthogra- 
 phy, which is more or less of a cold fact. But then, 
 we are used to it. The same may be said of the 
 Dutch language, and it is to be hoped that the Dutch 
 are used to it. They seem to get along with it 
 passably well, at all events. But their ability to 
 master the impossible does not alleviate our troubles 
 in the least. Any nation that can spell "ice" y-s 
 
 [29]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 and i-j-s with equal complacency, and gather the 
 same meaning from both methods, deserves to be 
 misunderstood. 
 
 The Dutch letter g, to come back to Goes, strikes 
 terror to the vocal organs of the most versatile 
 linguist. It is treated with somewhat the same dis- 
 respect that the Spanish treat their j, only more so. 
 The Dutch pronunciation of a word beginning with 
 g is started somewhere in the anatomical vicinity of 
 the diaphram and allowed to percolate up through 
 the aesophagus, gathering harshness and strength 
 until it comes in violent contact with the larynx, 
 whence it is finally ejaculated with about the same 
 sound as a bad attack of hay fever. I quote a pas- 
 sage from a certain work on Holland, the author of 
 which infers that if any person not of Dutch descent 
 can repeat the sentence correctly as to sound and 
 emphasis, to him the mastery of the remainder of 
 the language will seem like child's play. The sen- 
 tence follows : " Grietje, gooi geen goeje groente in 
 de gracht." The interlinear cribbing of it would be 
 in English, " Gretchen, do not throw any good vege- 
 tables into the canal." 
 
 But since the Dutch have made so many brave 
 attempts to discover a goodly portion of the east 
 coast of the United States, there may be found in 
 any geography of America a number of proper 
 names, originally of Dutch origin, but now Angli- 
 cized to meet our requirements. They thought so 
 
 [30]
 
 a 
 
 e 
 rt 
 
 w --3 
 
 8s 
 XJ 
 
 J3 ^3 
 O cj 
 
 -u C 
 
 rt 
 
 CQ
 
 much of the beauties of the lower end of New York 
 Bay that they promptly applied to it the term, 
 "Beautiful Outlet," or, in Dutch, Helle Gat. 
 "Hell Gate" must obviously be a deal less difficult, 
 although scarcely more poetic. For the same reason 
 does the Americanized Cape Henlopen supplant the 
 correct name of the Friesland town of Hindeloopen 
 from which its discoverer hailed. The name of a cer- 
 tain street in lower Manhattan must also be of Dutch 
 derivation, for our word " Bowery " may be found 
 as bouwerij, which means a "peasant's dwelling" in 
 the vocabulary of the Netherlands. And these are 
 but a few of the numerous words and syllables heard 
 in America that may be attributed to Dutch influence. 
 
 Hard by the town of Goes the tourist will obtain 
 a comprehensive idea of what a real polder looks 
 like, although it is scarcely distinguishable from the 
 fact that all of the scenery along the route from 
 Flushing east is typical, below-sea-level Dutch, lav- 
 ishly cut by canals into triangles, trapezoids, and 
 parallelograms. 
 
 A polder, by way of explanation, is the reclaimed 
 bed of a sheet of water; and since the greater part 
 of Holland lies below the level of the sea, the most 
 of it is polder. Land thus reclaimed is of extraor- 
 dinary fertility by reason of the fact that the water 
 under which it was once submerged, having been 
 pumped into surrounding canals, is readily available 
 for irrigation purposes in event of a dry season. 
 
 [31]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 The initial move in this really marvelous process 
 of making land while you wait consists of building 
 a dike around the prospective polder to fortify it 
 against future inundations. Next, they literally kick 
 the water out of the inclosed area by means of a 
 peculiarly constructed water wheel, formerly driven 
 by a windmill, but latterly the Dutch having be- 
 come inoculated with twentieth century impatience 
 by the adaptation of steam or gasoline power to the 
 task. Often, however, the bed of the marsh or lake 
 to be reclaimed lies too deep to admit of its water 
 being at once kicked into the main canals to be 
 carried off to the ocean. Such a condition of affairs 
 will necessitate the lake being surrounded with a 
 veritable series of dikes, each higher than the one 
 before, like the amphitheater of a clinic (a slightly 
 exaggerated simile), and each with a canal on its 
 farther side from the polder. The water is then 
 pumped from a lower level to a higher one until, 
 finally, it is forced to admit the utter uselessness of 
 trying to compete with the Dutch. The polder near 
 Goes, known as the Wilhelminapolder, is something 
 like 4,000 acres in extent and was reclaimed from 
 the sea the same year that Napoleon was undoing 
 the history of ecclesiastical architecture in Veere. 
 
 Polder making is a specialty with the Dutch en- 
 gineers, and the end of their ingenuity is not yet 
 in sight. Even now they are making gigantic prepa- 
 rations to spend upwards of $80,000,000 in the recla- 
 
 [32]
 
 MIDDELBURG TO DORTRECHT 
 
 mation of the whole lower half of the Zuyder Zee, 
 two thirds of which is to be constructed into a polder 
 having an area of 1,400 square miles. The dike will 
 
 Harlingen 
 
 Lemmer 
 
 AMSTERDAM 
 
 Elburg 
 
 IIP"'' 
 
 o Harderwijk 
 
 Weesp 
 
 Dutch engineers are planning a stupendous project to reclaim 
 the shaded portions that are now part of the Zuyder Zee. 
 
 stretch across the Zee from the village of Ewyksluis 
 in North Holland to Piaam in Friesland, the cost of 
 which alone is estimated at about $18,000,000. 
 
 [33]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 On any other day but Tuesday there can be no 
 excuse for the traveler to take the least heed of the 
 train conductor's garglings and stop off at Goes ; but 
 the costumes of Zeeland, as seen at a Tuesday's 
 market, are well worth a break in the journey. 
 
 A few miles beyond Goes the train crosses the Zuid- 
 Beveland Canal, which intersects the long, straggling 
 island of that name and of which Goes is the capital. 
 The canal was cut through by the Dutch engineers 
 in 1863-66 as a sort of apology to nature for their 
 having deliberately closed up an arm of the Scheldt 
 called the Kreekerak a body of water that the 
 Dutch never trusted since its contribution to the 
 inundation of the east coast of Flemish Zeeland. 
 Previous to 1532 that east coast was fertile farm 
 land and populated by peace-loving peasants. But 
 in that year the dike burst. Three thousand inhab- 
 itants are alleged to have perished, and the locality 
 is still under water, it being known to-day as Ver- 
 dronken Land, or " Drowned Land." 
 
 A little later your train will cross the Kreekerak 
 on the embankment they built, and Bergen-op-Zoom 
 is the next stop. 
 
 They say Bergen-op-Zoom used to be one of the 
 most flourishing towns in the Netherlands. Doubt- 
 less that is true. The only flourishing parts to be 
 found about it now are its thousand and one rags 
 flourished by its thousand and one housemaids scrub- 
 bing its thousand and one doorsteps. The latter are 
 
 [34]
 
 MIDDELBURGTO, DORTRECHT 
 
 incessantly being cleaned and recleaned by the 
 former in the hands of the intermediate ; so much so, 
 indeed, that it appears as if each maid were trying 
 for a record. Bending double or down on their 
 knees in every conceivable attitude they attack their 
 front doorsteps as many times a day as they think 
 necessary, which is rather more than often. I 
 have never read a consular report that speaks of 
 Holland as a territory open for trade in mops. They 
 may be on sale, but I have yet to see one in action. 
 For one cause or another the Dutch seem to cling 
 to the hand method of wringing the cloth over the 
 bucket, then bending double and sloshing it from 
 side to side across the pavement with a movement 
 akin to that of a nervous captive elephant; but per- 
 haps for the reason that this Dutch method is 
 not and never can be thorough, do they deem it 
 exigent to repeat the operation with such frequence. 
 
 The lesson gleaned from all this is how the Dutch 
 have beaten their lifelong enemy, water, at its own 
 game, ousted it, and then turned round and made of 
 it an humble and subjected medium for keeping the 
 country clean. 
 
 Most towns west of the Zuyder Zee are so notori- 
 ously clean that even walking over the pavements is 
 not encouraged. For reasons of his own a house- 
 holder will continue his property line out across his 
 two or three feet of pavement with the help of a 
 chain or iron railing, more or less decorative, so 
 
 [35]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 that the pedestrian, when he comes to the barrier, 
 must side-step into the street in order to pass it. 
 
 There are four or five other features of Bergen- 
 op-Zoom that I remember no less distinctly. One 
 was the imposing old Gevangenpoort with its mas- 
 sive brick archway. It dates from the fifteenth cen- 
 tury and constitutes one of the few remaining relics 
 of the ancient town fortifications. Another was the 
 accomplished female at the railway station, who 
 served liquid refreshments to warm and weary trav- 
 elers and, by way of diversion for the sake of 
 accumulating a few extra absurd little ten cent pieces, 
 handled the baggage of arriving and departing visi- 
 tors to the town with the ease and strength of a full- 
 blown dientsmann. If there happened to be too 
 many pieces of luggage to carry at once, she invari- 
 ably remembered where someone had hidden a wheel- 
 barrow conveniently near the station. This she 
 would fetch, often without the knowledge or consent 
 of its owner, load the luggage upon it, and march 
 off with a dignified, " what-do-you-think-of-me " 
 sort of an air. 
 
 Another feature was the glaring heat of the place 
 the day of my visit being a rather humid one in 
 July ; and still another the most important of all 
 was a quiet, shady nook on the low portico of a little 
 cafe just back of the Groote Kerk, from which shel- 
 tered position I looked up more than once over the 
 tops of the trees and admired the lofty steeple of 
 
 [36]
 
 MIDDELBURG TO DORTRECHT 
 
 the old house of worship through the bottom of a 
 tall, slender glass. 
 
 But a short ride from Bergen-op-Zoom brings you 
 to Rosendaal, which, from the apparent activity 
 about the station, might be by long odds the most 
 important town in all Holland. It is the seat of 
 the Dutch customhouse and therefore the junction 
 of many railway lines, north, south, east, and west ; 
 or vice versa. All roads lead in the Netherlands, 
 not to Rome, but to Rosendaal. To explore the town 
 is scarcely worth the trouble, but the railway station 
 itself deserves especial notice. If you enter Holland 
 from the Belgian frontier it will be impossible not to 
 notice it, for the train will stop long enough at 
 Rosendaal for the customs officials to question each 
 and every passenger personally about cigars, per- 
 fumery, and other dutiable articles. If you come 
 from the east or the west it is eleven chances to one 
 you will have to change cars at Rosendaal, in which 
 latter predicament you will at least enjoy a stroll 
 up and down the long station platform. 
 
 This Rosendaal station struck me as being about 
 the cleanest, shiniest place, for a railway station, 
 at which I had ever changed cars. Not a speck of 
 soot or dust was visible to the naked eye, and it is 
 possible that one of old Zacharias Jansen's micro- 
 scopes wouldn't be able to find any either, although a 
 certain few, larger and more grotesque than their 
 fellows, might be brought to notice under the lens 
 
 [37]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 of an instrument of later model. Every doorway 
 was guarded by a pair of little boxwood or bay tree 
 sentries, and flowers filled the boxes under the win- 
 dows. The leather tables and chairs in the waiting- 
 rooms and restaurant all but suggested a Spanish 
 Renaissance influence, and their great brass-topped 
 tacks glittered as if they had never known what it 
 was to be tainted with stain or smirch and this in 
 a railway station. 
 
 But then, a Dutch locomotive is not nearly so 
 offensive, I might say, as one of the American breed ; 
 and if the proper legislation is forthcoming we shall 
 be sending experts to Holland soon to take notes 
 on how they do it. All .railway locomotives in Hol- 
 land are under the supervision of an arm of the 
 government service, and although the most of them 
 bear the shop-plate of Glasgow or Manchester, they 
 must be equipped with an apparatus, not only for 
 consuming the smoke but for the prevention of the 
 emission of sparks and other combustible matter. 
 Descriptions and drawings showing the details and 
 workings of these contrivances must be submitted to 
 the Supervising Board of Railways before each new 
 type of locomotive is purchased. Upon its delivery 
 every newly purchased locomotive must undergo a 
 thorough test and be approved by the inspector of 
 the Board before it may be placed in service. 
 
 The same regulations apply to stationary engines 
 burning bituminous coal, which would otherwise emit 
 
 [38]
 
 MIDDELBURGTO. DORTRECHT 
 
 great clouds of black smoke, gases, and soot. Re- 
 strictions, in some localities, are even placed upon 
 the particular kind of fuel locomotives may burn. 
 The province of Zuid-Holland, for example, has 
 issued the eikon that only coke may be used upon the 
 locomotives that traverse its railway lines. 
 
 A few miles before you come to Dortrecht the 
 railway crosses a long bridge that spans an arm of 
 the North Sea known as the Hollandsch Diep. The 
 actual breadth of the Diep is a mile and five-eighths, 
 but its projecting stone piers cut the length of the 
 bridge down to slightly less than a mile. This, the 
 longest bridge in Holland, was completed in Novem- 
 ber, 1871, after being more than three years in the 
 building, and its fourteen arches, with a span of 110 
 yards each, rest upon stone buttresses, the founda- 
 tions of some of which are sunk fifty or sixty feet 
 below low water mark. From the center of the struc- 
 ture you may look out over the Hollandsch Diep 
 on the left and, on the right, the eastern end of the 
 Biesbosch, or " reed forest " a great, watery dis- 
 trict more than forty square miles in area and lately 
 reclaimed. It was formed in 1421, at the same time 
 and under the same conditions as the Hollandsch 
 Diep, by a terrific overflow of the sea that blotted 
 out seventy-two towns and villages and the lives of 
 100,000 people. 
 
 Dortrecht, called Dordt by the Dutch, is prac- 
 tically a survivor of that calamity. The town was 
 
 [39]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 founded away back in 1008 and, four hundred years 
 later, made an island by the obstreperous Merwede 
 the name given to a short part of the river formed 
 by the confluence of the Maas and the Waal, which, 
 beyond Dortrecht, is called De Noord and, by the 
 time it approaches Rotterdam, known as the Maas 
 again. 
 
 By reason of a special privilege called The Staple 
 pure and simple "graft," plainly speaking 
 Dortrecht in the Middle Ages was the most prosper- 
 ous town in Holland, for the workings of The Staple 
 were far-reaching and marvelous. The Staple al- 
 lowed Dortrecht, by royal warrant, be it remembered, 
 to act in the capacity of a kind of clearing house 
 for all goods, whether wines, grains, metals, or fab- 
 rics, that entered the domains of Holland by way 
 of the Rhine. Now the territory punctured by these 
 hundred and one apparently different and distinct 
 rivers that so muddle the geography of the southern 
 part of Holland for the tourist, is nothing more 
 nor less than the wide-spreading estuary of the one 
 river, Rhine. As every cargo that came down the 
 river had necessarily to be unloaded at Dortrecht, 
 municipal and private money chests burst their stout 
 iron hoops in their efforts to contain the duties and 
 taxes imposed. And in this kind of business bucca- 
 neering the place reveled for centuries, until Rotter- 
 dam, overcome with jealousy in 1618, stopped the 
 procedure at the point of the bayonet. 
 
 [40]
 
 *
 
 MIDDELBURG TO, DORTRECHT 
 
 If Wilmington, Delaware, although just twice as 
 large in point of population, could boast of a wind- 
 mill or two and a few odoriferous canals, bordered 
 with numerous sixteenth century faades that slanted 
 out over them as if in imminent danger of toppling 
 into them ; and if she had a narrow street of rather 
 serpentine proclivities, like the Wynstraat, down 
 which the rolling stock of the local traction com- 
 pany, in the shape and vintage of an ancient horse 
 car, clanged its weary way, she might be taken, dot 
 and tittle, for Dortrecht. Since the forced abolition 
 of The Staple, the most of Dortrecht's 40,000 in- 
 habitants have gone into the more legitimate business 
 of shipbuilding. But Wilmington, to achieve this, 
 would also have to level off her hills to a certain 
 depth below the sea, which might then necessitate the 
 diking of the Delaware. It would be a mighty task 
 and, after all is said and done, she would gain little 
 but history. 
 
 Here in Dortrecht were born the brothers De Witt, 
 Cornelius and John, whose equal as councilors and 
 statesmen Holland has not been able to reproduce. 
 The dome of the ancient Groothoofdpoort, one of 
 the town gates of the sixteenth century that stands 
 at the harbor end of the Wynstraat, contains, among 
 other relics, a collection of medals, many of which 
 were struck in commemoration of the tragedy of the 
 Binnenhof at The Hague. Nicolas Maes, Albert 
 Cuyp, and Ary Scheffer are the three most famous 
 
 [41]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 Dutch painters that Dortrecht takes pride in claiming 
 as her own. 
 
 Like Leyden, Dortrecht experienced her period of 
 siege in the hands of the Spaniards, although of not 
 nearly so long duration, and relief was effected in 
 much the same manner. Her coat of arms, consist- 
 ing of a milkmaid couchant under her docile bovine 
 on a field of garlic, we'll say, strikes forever the 
 keynote of the town's relief. 
 
 It seems that a milkmaid in the employ of a cer- 
 tain wealthy farmer living near the city, having gone 
 into the fields in pursuit of her daily duties, discov- 
 ered the Spaniards hidden behind the hedges. Prob- 
 ably out of pure reticence, bashfulness, timidity, 
 downright scared-to-death-ness what you will she 
 took no notice of the ambushed members of the oppo- 
 site sex, but went as gleefully as possible at her 
 task, and, having completed it, shouldered her yoke 
 and started homeward. It cannot be held against 
 her if she did hasten a bit, for a consultation of the 
 records will prove that a thunderstorm was gather- 
 ing on the horizon. 
 
 Arriving at the farmhouse, she told her employer 
 of what she had seen, and he told the Burgomaster. 
 The Burgomaster dispatched a spy, who, in turn, 
 discovered that the milkmaid related no myth but a 
 cold and brittle fact. Soldiers were mustered forth- 
 with, and the dikes were cut, allowing the merciless 
 river to rush in and catch the cruel Castilians un- 
 
 [42]
 
 MIDDELBURG TO DORTRECHT 
 
 awares at their bloody job. It is alleged that Span- 
 iards galore were drowned in the raging torrent, and 
 many were " utterly disappointed in their design." 
 At all events, the town was saved and the States 
 issued orders to the effect that the farmer be re- 
 imbursed for the loss of his cattle, real estate, and 
 personal property, and that the milkmaid's likeness, 
 together with that of her faithful and nonplussible 
 cow, be impressed upon the new coinage of the city. 
 " And she had, during her life, and hers forever," 
 according to a medieval historian, " an allowance of 
 fifty pounds per annum a noble requital for a vir- 
 tuous service." 
 
 The first glimpse of Dortrecht that you get as 
 you emerge from its railway station will put you 
 at once in sympathy with it. Prefaced by an open, 
 sunny, brick paved space, a long avenue of great 
 trees stretches away directly in front, while back in 
 their shade stands the peripatetic horse car, as if 
 loath to attempt the transfer of passengers in the 
 heat of the day. On either side of the avenue are 
 beautiful residences, their lawns encircled, not by the 
 inappropriate and unsightly fence, but with a narrow 
 canal, like a miniature moat, which is bridged only 
 at the front and the rear entrances to the grounds. 
 Everything seems so peaceful, so conducive to com- 
 fort and leisure, that you will wish you had the time 
 to stay in Dortrecht indefinitely and take up your 
 abode near the station a wish that even in your 
 
 [43]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 wildest flights of fancy would never apply to Wil- 
 mington, Delaware. 
 
 Import a treacherous-looking Italian in a vivid 
 pink shirt and let him stir up the aroma by poling 
 his mournful gondola up and down a certain canal 
 in Dortrecht, and you will have a scene in Venice 
 itself. This canal, spanned at intervals by narrow 
 bridges and bordered with three-story houses that 
 hang over it menacingly, is obviously the reason why 
 so much good stout canvas and so many tubes of 
 excellent paint have been used up by Dutch artists 
 in picturing Dortrecht ; for a little of Venice, they 
 must have thought, is better than none at all. In 
 view, therefore, of the length, tediousness, and ex- 
 pense of a trip to Venice in those days, many of the 
 best of the Dutch painters stayed home and exercised 
 their talents on that canal in Dortrecht. All of 
 which we may consider a boon to the art of the 
 Netherlands as well as to the picture-loving public. 
 
 [44l
 
 
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 fl 
 
 3* 
 
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 rt O
 
 IV 
 
 ROTTERDAM 
 
 HE who says the romance of the West is dead 
 has never mingled much with the " eight-section 
 man " down in the southwestern corner of 
 Texas. He who avers that the romance of steel is 
 played out and defunct has never straddled an I- 
 beam of a New York skyscraper in the building high 
 above the vortexes of street traffic, above the flirt of 
 a housemaid hanging out clothes on a lower roof. 
 He who claims that the romance of shipping has 
 succumbed under the pressure of modern methods 
 has never been to Rotterdam. 
 
 They have a pretty park in that San Francisco 
 of Holland that fringes the bank of the Maas. On 
 its river side, near the entrance, there is a cafe, where, 
 in the evening, the less romantic Rotterdamer basks 
 and imbibes in the throes of a virulent orchestra. 
 Farther along under the trees, past the cafe and over- 
 looking the river, numerous benches invite the lover of 
 the sea and its ships to sit him down and gaze upon 
 the great steel hulls and wooden ones, too that 
 have just returned from, or are about to depart for, 
 
 [45]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 a lengthy and uncertain argument with Father Nep- 
 tune. 
 
 The view from here is several times more magnetic 
 than it is from the neighborhood of the cafe, and so 
 here, about dusk, come those wizened warriors upon 
 whom the sea has cast her spell once and for all time, 
 to sit and smoke their pipes upside down and dream, 
 perhaps, of other days, of other ships, of other seas. 
 Three or four may occupy a single bench, but it 
 will be an hour before a word is passed between them. 
 It is their only method of rejuvenation, and they are 
 loath to be reminded that their day is almost done. 
 A certain sort of reverence pervades the place; it 
 would seem a blasphemy even to speak aloud. 
 
 On one of these wooden benches I sat one evening 
 at sunset, looking out across to the docks on the 
 opposite side of the river. Busy little motor boats 
 were sputtering hither and thither between the ship- 
 ping, bent upon the fulfillment of their last missions 
 of the day. A few hundred yards farther up, a 
 couple of gloomy-looking steam ferries, built like 
 Rhine river tugs, transferred their deck loads of 
 workmen from the different docks and machine shops 
 on the Feijenoord to the Westplein landing in Rotter- 
 dam. From out in the stream came the rattle of 
 chain through hawse pipe, as a Portuguese tramp, 
 having entered the harbor too late for a stranger 
 to dock, was preparing an anchorage for the night. 
 Close by lay a Norwegian " wind jammer " so close 
 
 [46]
 
 ROTTERDAM 
 
 that the two of them might easily have rubbed figure- 
 heads. A big cargo boat, bound out, preceded by a 
 tiny tug to herald her approach and followed by its 
 twin to help keep her straight while passing, an ex- 
 act fit, through the draw to one of the many 
 "havens," bayed sonorously for the less conspicuous 
 craft to get out of her way; while alongside the 
 Wilhelminakade the upper decks of a great pas- 
 senger-carrying leviathan, already electric lighted, 
 showed through the rigging of the intermediate ves- 
 sels. Out of respect for the tide, she was to sail 
 at three the next morning, and her passengers, when 
 they awakened, would find themselves well down the 
 English Channel on their way back to New York 
 after a summer in Europe. 
 
 Presently, two young women, pushing a baby- 
 coach between them, came strolling along, and took 
 up positions at the railing just in front of me. 
 Plainly they were English, and, although I strained 
 every nerve to overhear their conversation (which 
 was mean of me), but could not, I divined the reason 
 for their coming. The same thing occurs a dozen 
 times a day in Liverpool, in 'Frisco, in Sydney, in 
 Valparaiso, in every port of any consequence in 
 the world. One was the wife, and the other perhaps 
 the sister, or her sister, or maybe a close friend. 
 And there was also the kiddy. 
 
 Their vigil was not long in being rewarded, for 
 during the three weeks' absence three months', more 
 
 [47]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 likely, if the voyage had been a long one they had 
 perused the Lloyd reports daily and diligently, and 
 with the additional aid of a letter or two, had cal- 
 culated the time of arrival to a nicety. 
 
 Soon a great black hull appeared far down the 
 river. Darkness was gathering fast, but they knew 
 the lines of that ship as they knew their little gardens 
 at home. They un-reticuled their handkerchiefs and 
 waved and giggled and giggled and waved. For full 
 twenty minutes they waved and giggled, and then 
 they held the kiddy up. The ship turned off to enter 
 a dock on the opposite side of the stream and, as 
 she turned her port beam to us, someone it would 
 not have been difficult to guess whom on her bridge 
 held up a navigator's three-foot telescope, it having 
 been doubtless already very much in hand, and waved 
 a brief but significant, "All's well; see you in two 
 hours" or waves to that effect. 
 
 Yes, there is still romance in shipping, and Rotter- 
 dam, being first, last, and all the time a shipping 
 town, there is romance in Rotterdam. 
 
 The most satisfactory way of approaching Rotter- 
 dam is by water, and the most satisfactory water 
 way is from Dortrecht. By this route you obtain 
 not only the most characteristic views of Rotterdam 
 and the bustle and business about her water front, 
 but you get also the glimpse of Dortrecht that Albert 
 Cuyp availed himself of so often, for the water front 
 of Dortrecht doesn't seem to have changed much, 
 
 [48]
 
 ROTTERDAM 
 
 according to Cuyp, except in the item of steam for 
 sail. 
 
 It is a pleasant trip of an hour and a half 
 duration down the Maas, past numerous shipyards 
 that are capable of building anything from a canal 
 boat to an ocean-going cargo carrier; past great 
 suction dredges assigned to the perennial duty of 
 keeping the river conquered; past fishers for salmon, 
 who, by treaty, may lower their nets only upon 
 certain days in order to give the German fishers, 
 higher up the stream, an equal opportunity to make 
 a living; past little hamlets whose river docks and 
 picturesque dock tenders serve in lieu of railway sta- 
 tions and the more prosaic red-capped and frock- 
 coated station masters. 
 
 But Rotterdam, by reason of her trade, does not 
 coincide with the general idea of Holland. She is 
 more or less cosmopolitan, to be sure, but this phase 
 strikes the traveler less forcibly than her ardent 
 activity. What with her electric cranes and machine- 
 shops and sugar refineries and tobacco factories and 
 shipbuilding yards and distilleries, she gives one the 
 impression of a thriving German seaport. The home 
 port claimed by the greater number of the seven 
 hundred or more steam and sailing vessels that make 
 up the merchant marine of Holland, is Rotterdam, 
 and through this port passes at least one-half the 
 country's total imports by sea and almost as much 
 of her exports, together with four-fifths of Holland's 
 
 [49]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 trade with the Rhine. But Baltimore, in the matter 
 of population, would make two of this, the most 
 active, the most important seaport of the Nether- 
 lands. 
 
 Still, Rotterdam is essentially Dutch, in fact if 
 not in first appearances. She has her Groote Kerk, 
 the Church of St. Lawrence, begun in 1412; she has 
 her Town Hall, without which, it seems, no town in 
 Holland could survive; she has her picture gallery, 
 although a mediocre one, in the Boymans Museum ; 
 she has her old market and her new church ; and she 
 has her fish market, where women of the most un- 
 certain antiquity sit and gossip and knit and sell 
 sole between stitches. Here and there, too, she has 
 her old windmill, thatch covered, browbeaten by the 
 weather, massive and ponderous-looking, that, in the 
 very midst of twentieth century hurry and scurry, 
 waves its stiff arms as if depicting in pantomime a 
 scene of other days. And then, in striking contrast, 
 right at the very edge of the old harbor, stands the 
 tallest building in the Netherlands. It must be as 
 sky-scraping as eight or ten stories, and high up 
 under its eaves it displays the advertisement of an 
 American breakfast food. Its builders probably 
 thought that a photographer would be the only mor- 
 tal who could be induced to rent the top story, so 
 they made the building's sloping roof into one glori- 
 ous skylight, under which rural Holland might sit 
 and have its picture taken for the family album.. 
 
 [50]
 
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 CIS 
 
 s-s 
 
 a, 
 
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 a
 
 ROTTERDAM 
 
 It was while waiting for a car at the beginning of 
 The Oosterkade and just across the old harbor from 
 this Metropolitan Tower of Rotterdam that the more 
 nearly general of all Dutch customs was brought 
 home to me. 
 
 The car had approached its terminus and I was 
 about to mount, when the conductor, more forcibly 
 than politely, requested that I discontinue the attempt 
 and take up my position where I belonged, with the 
 rest of the crowd, in the vicinity of a certain lamp- 
 post a few steps beyond the Dutch being most pre- 
 cise and systematic. I ambled thither and was 
 standing in the more or less protecting umbrage of 
 the lamp-post, with sarcastic but not envious mien, 
 watching the traction company partake of a large 
 slab of black bread and cheese (until the disappear- 
 ance of which the car refused to continue) when I 
 was accosted by a small street urchin of about the 
 tender age of seven, who was armed with an immense 
 cigar. I happened to be smoking at the time, and 
 this was what brought the boy in my direction. He 
 wanted a light and wasted no words in asking for 
 it. Being somewhat shocked that a youth of such 
 tender years should be so faithful a slave to the 
 vile, pernicious weed, I submitted to his plea under 
 mental protest. But he seemed not in the least em- 
 barrassed, for he saluted and marched off, appar- 
 ently enjoying the thing as if it had been his fifth 
 since breakfast.
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 Before I was through with Holland, however, I 
 came to know that every able-bodied male in the 
 kingdom acquires the cigar habit as early in life 
 as his physical condition permits, and I have yet 
 to see the adult Dutchman who doesn't use tobacco 
 in some form. Holland, by virtue of her colonial 
 holdings in Sumatra and the Straits Settlements, 
 is the paradise of smokers, and tobacco stores in 
 every town, be it large or small, are as thick as 
 saloons in McKeesport, Pennsylvania. If you pay 
 more than the equal value of two American cents 
 for a cigar in Holland you are branded as a for- 
 eigner or an extravagant roue. Of course foreigners 
 who unfurl their native colors full in the face of the 
 tobacconist are expected to and do pay more, but 
 a cigar equal in flavor and composition to the best 
 of our ten cent brands can be bought in Holland 
 for five Dutch cents, and often less, if you go about 
 it in the proper manner. The age at which boys 
 learn to smoke in Holland has never been correctly 
 computed, but in the country I have seen lads of 
 five or six serenely eliminating all possible chance 
 of being rewarded the oft-referred-to gold watch at 
 the age of twenty-one, and handling their cigars with 
 as much real enjoyment as their paternal grand- 
 parent. 
 
 Perhaps at this point it might be opportune to 
 tell the story of old Herr van Klaes of this same 
 town of Rotterdam, who consumed a five-ounce pack- 
 
 [52]
 
 ROTTERDAM 
 
 age of tobacco daily and died in action at the age 
 of ninety-eight with his pipe actually in his mouth. 
 In his will he expressed the wish that every smoker 
 in the kingdom be invited to his funeral "by letter, 
 circular, and advertisement," and all who took ad- 
 vantage of the invitation should be presented with 
 ten pounds of tobacco and two pipes, the name of 
 van Klaes, his crest, and the date of his demise to 
 be engraved upon the latter. Every poor man in 
 the neighborhood who accompanied the bier was to 
 receive a large package of smoking mixture on each 
 anniversary of the death of his champion. The will 
 stipulated further that all who wished to partake 
 of its benefits must smoke "without interruption 
 during the entire ceremony." The body was to be 
 placed in a coffin lined with the wood of his old 
 cigar boxes, and at the foot should be placed a 
 package of French tobacco and one of the Dutch 
 blend. At his side in the coffin was to be laid his 
 favorite pipe and a box of matches, " For," he said, 
 " one never knows what may happen." And all per- 
 sons in the funeral procession were requested to 
 sprinkle the ashes of their pipes upon the bier as 
 they passed it while taking their departure from 
 the grounds. 
 
 It is said the funeral of Herr van Klaes at least 
 enjoyed the distinction of being the largest seen in 
 Rotterdam in many a day. It must have been a 
 busy time for the aanspreker. Indeed, it must have 
 
 [53]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 taken the concentrated efforts of all the aansprekers 
 in Holland to help advertise the funeral. But here a 
 few lines as to the solution of the word " aanspreker." 
 
 The Dutch aanspreker is he of the mourning robes 
 whose duty it is to go about from house to house, 
 wherever even the flimsiest ties, whether social or* 
 business, exist, and announce the saddening news of 
 a death; or it is he of the more gaudy apparel who 
 gives the gladsome tidings of a birth in the family 
 and the degree of his mournfulness or jocundity in 
 appearance bespeaks the mournfulness or jocundity 
 of his employers. 
 
 In earlier times the services of the aanspreker were 
 augmented by those of the huilebalk, a kind of a 
 professional mourner, who, in the case of a death, 
 accompanied the aanspreker on his rounds and wept 
 more or less fluently after the completion of each 
 doleful message. His coat was long-tailed and his 
 hat wide-brimmed and the extent of his sorrow in 
 each case depended wholly upon the receipts for his 
 services; the more money, the more tears. Both 
 must have been depressing professions at best, but 
 this manner of announcing the news constituted an 
 essential factor of every funeral. The aanspreker 
 is often seen to-day, but the huilebalk has wept him- 
 self out of existence, probably on account of a 
 simple dearth of apprentices. 
 
 The patron saint, almost, of Rotterdam is 
 Gherardt Gherardts, better known by_ the more poetic 
 
 [54]
 
 ROTTERDAM 
 
 name of Erasmus Desiderius meaning " beloved and 
 long desired" scholar, critic, philosopher, intellec- 
 tual fly-by-night, born in Rotterdam in 1466. A 
 bronze statue of him by Hendrik de Keyser decorates 
 the Groote Markt of his birthplace. Known best by 
 his immortal satire, "The Praise of Folly," and for 
 his being, in 1516, the first to be so bold .as to amend 
 the text of the Greek New Testament, Erasmus was 
 undoubtedly the " intellectual dictator of his age." 
 He entered the order of the Brethren of the Common 
 Life, first at 'S Hertogenbosch and later at Delft, 
 and the year America was discovered saw him acting 
 as secretary to the Bishop of Cambrai. He studied 
 in Paris, in Orleans, in Oxford, in Rome, and then 
 returned to England to accept a professorship at the 
 University of Cambridge. He died in Basle in 1536. 
 Rotterdam cannot be said to be noted for its 
 cleanliness ; in fact, it crowds Amsterdam for first 
 place as the dirtiest city in Holland. But still Rot- 
 terdam as well as Amsterdam has its beauty spots. 
 Some of the residence streets in the newer part of 
 the city are veritable gardens in themselves. The 
 Parklaan, with the Park at one end and the Groote- 
 veerhaven, the latter crowded with private motor 
 boats and yachts that gleam in their innocence of 
 dirt, at the other, is lined with beautiful homes. It 
 and the Mauritsweg and the Eendragtsweg are 
 tree studded and kept swept and sprinkled quite as 
 thoroughly and as frequently as any of the streets 
 
 [55]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 in The Hague. The canal that borders these two 
 latter streets is banked with lawns and crossed here 
 and there by artistic rustic bridges, for in Rotter- 
 dam, as in the German municipalities, they pay more 
 attention to the details of city beautification than 
 do we in America. The community at large seems to 
 take a personal interest in such affairs. Can you 
 imagine the linemen for a telegraph company or 
 an electric light corporation coming along the streets 
 of a German city, exercising the right of eminent 
 domain by ripping up the pavements of the property 
 holders and digging holes big enough to bury a horse, 
 in which to plant the unsightly wooden poles that 
 seem to them, on account of their comparative cheap- 
 ness, the only known method of carrying wires? The 
 Germans wouldn't stand it for a minute. They use 
 steel wire carriers over there a more businesslike 
 looking trestle work in the shape of an elongated 
 truncated pyramid, set slightly above the ground on 
 a concrete foundation. And I noticed that these 
 " trestle " telegraph poles in Rotterdam, when the 
 conditions permitted, were planted in the center of 
 a little bed of geraniums, while some even had vines 
 climbing upon them. 
 
 The Dutch, too, are sticklers for coziness and 
 they try to make their living quarters as habitable 
 as possible. In the congested harbors of Rotterdam, 
 where, sometimes, you can step from one side of 
 the stream to the other upon the flat decks of the 
 
 [56]
 
 ROTTERDAM 
 
 swarms of canal boats, it is doubtful if you will see 
 an uncurtained cabin window, and pots of flowers 
 will be displayed in most of them. The train shed 
 of the Beurs railway station in the heart of the 
 city has an outside cornice of flower boxes filled with 
 pink geraniums. But then, you will remember about 
 the Dutch locomotives which accounts for much. 
 
 As you enter Rotterdam or Amsterdam on the 
 railway you pass row after row of what we please 
 to call tenement houses. Even these are not devoid 
 of a cozy, homelike aspect that our tenements and 
 even reasonably inexpensive apartment houses know 
 not. Each apartment can boast of a balcony in 
 the rear that is partitioned off from its neighbors. 
 In many cases these balconies are shaded with awn- 
 nings from the glare of the sun and decorated with 
 flowerpots in profusion. This serves the city 
 dweller in lieu of a garden, and here he eats his 
 meals and spends his evenings after work. In the 
 daytime the family use the balcony as an impro- 
 vised sewing room. Many of the back yards of the 
 smaller houses consist of a tree lined canal over 
 which the family looks from the seclusion of a flower 
 girdled, awning covered veranda. 
 
 The Dutch not only keep themselves cozy but 
 they take a tender sort of interest in the well-being 
 of their birds and dumb animals. True, they train 
 their dogs to help their masters pull the milk carts 
 or vegetable wagons, but the dogs look husky and 
 
 [57]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 well fed and seem to take pride in their accomplish- 
 ment. A spare-ribbed stray canine prowling around 
 the neighborhood is an unknown quantity in Holland. 
 
 In the center of some of Rotterdam's canals which 
 are barred to traffic and made, instead, to assist 
 in the beautification of the city, you will see little 
 wicker duck nests, like empty market baskets turned 
 on their sides. They rest on piles driven into 
 the bottom of the canal, and the entrance to each 
 is approached from the water by means of a wooden 
 incline about the size of a shingle. This is not only 
 a convenience for the ducks but features as an artistic 
 break in the monotony, I might say, of the canal. 
 
 And these are but a few of the reasons why a visit 
 to Rotterdam, although barren of the types and 
 characteristics that Holland is noted for, is well 
 worth the trouble; if only to study the city and its 
 inhabitants from a psychological point of view it is 
 well worth while. 
 
 [58]
 
 V 
 
 DELFT AND HER TRAGEDY 
 
 'Tt TINETEEN minutes in the train from Rotter- 
 \ dam, and you are in Delft such are the dis- 
 tances between towns in South Holland. 
 
 The population of Delft amounts, numerically, to 
 some 32,000, but this is an item that is farthest from 
 your thoughts. It is one of the quietest, quaintest 
 cities in the Netherlands. Up and down its narrow, 
 lime shaded canals the boatmen of Delft pole their 
 barges laboriously, yet noiselessly, walking along the 
 decks from stem to stern against their padded means 
 of propulsion and literally pushing their craft out 
 from under them. In the spring these watery high- 
 ways are covered with a fragrant layer of fallen 
 blossoms ; in the fall, with leaves of variegated colors. 
 The houses that stand behind the trees have been 
 well built and are well preserved, adding to the place 
 an impression of comfortable solidity. 
 
 My first visit to Holland brought me to Delft from 
 " The Hook " at a very early hour in the morning, 
 when the housemaids were about to commence the 
 first concentrated assault of the day upon their 
 pavements, doorsteps, front doors, and the brass- 
 
 [59]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 work pertaining thereto in the shape of knobs and 
 knockers. " Scrub " seemed to be the housemaids' 
 slogan, and they were certainly living up to it. 
 Pail after pail of water was hoisted from the canals 
 and splashed over everything in reach, until it flowed 
 across the streets and pavements, and fell back 
 whence it came originally. If I had appeared upon 
 the scene a little later I might have concluded that 
 a cloud-burst had struck the town. And all this 
 brackish water, that, in the canals, comes within 
 an ace of being absolutely stagnant, being poured 
 so recklessly over the town, gave to it a kind of 
 antique odor, anything but pleasant to inhale. It 
 gave every evidence that that same water had been 
 hoisted, put to its task, and allowed to drip back 
 into the canals again since medieval times. 
 
 This was on a week day. A subsequent visit to 
 Delft took me there on Sunday. 
 
 Now, for some reason, psychological or otherwise, 
 the housemaids of Delft don't seem to take the same 
 interest in the scrupulousness of their doorsteps on 
 a Sunday that they do on a week day. Sunday is 
 the day that everybody in Delft dons his or her 
 best bib and tucker and goes to church, or leans 
 over the railings of the canal bridges and chats with 
 a friend, or walks about the town under the shade 
 of its trees, contemplating, perhaps, upon the ex- 
 igencies of life. And a housemaid is but human. 
 
 To come upon Delft, therefore, during this weekly 
 [60]
 
 o 
 
 <u 
 
 13 
 
 O
 
 DELFT AND HER TRAGEDY 
 
 interruption in the perennial polishing of the town, 
 whatever the reason for it, offers the traveler a 
 different and vastly more agreeable impression. He 
 will see Delft and her people at their best, the latter 
 more congenially courteous, the former more serenely 
 stolid. Instead of the boatmen being continually 
 in the act of disturbing the bottoms of the canals 
 with their poles, so that the housemaids can skim 
 off the most graveolent of it with which to scour 
 and rinse their pavements, they assume for the day 
 the role of flower sellers. Boats bearing fragrant 
 burdens of potted plants of every variety, and cut 
 flowers as well, as if to try to make amends for the 
 mal-odor of the previous week, will be drawn as close 
 to the sidewalks as the banks of the canals permit, 
 in order to tempt the frailty of the Delft housewife 
 if an inherent love of flowers may be termed as such 
 on her way home from church. 
 
 Delft is old and she shows symptoms of the fact 
 in spots. Down at the southern end of the city, near 
 the Rotterdam gate, stands a venerable building, 
 once one of the numerous warehouses scattered over 
 the country belonging to the Dutch East India Com- 
 pany that most famous and wealthiest of all Dutch 
 trading concerns, founded in 1602, when the power 
 and wealth of the Republic had attained their high- 
 water marks under the stadtholdership of Maurice, 
 one of the sons of the ill-fated Prince William of 
 Orange. The place has long since been put to use 
 
 [61]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 as a military storehouse. Directly opposite is the 
 ominous-looking city arsenal, bearing above its 
 arched entrance a massive copy of the arms of the 
 old Dutch Republic, carved in stone. Another of 
 the old buildings is the Gemeelandshuis van Delftland, 
 showing in sandstone a rich Gothic fa9ade of the be- 
 ginning of the sixteenth century. 
 
 With us, Delft's principal claim to notoriety lies 
 in the manufacture of its faience, commonly called 
 " Delft ware," in the seventeenth and eighteenth cen- 
 turies. Its composition and design at first copied 
 from the Chinese and Japanese porcelain, this faience 
 became celebrated throughout the world. Dutch de- 
 signs were soon substituted for the Oriental, and the 
 industry prospered proportionately. Later it lapsed 
 into decay and the true process has been revived in 
 Delft only within comparatively recent years. A 
 large plant for its manufacture now operates on the 
 Oosteinde, not far from the New Church. 
 
 But in the heart of the Hollander, Delft will ever 
 be revered as the scene of the tragedy that cut short 
 the life and terminated the praiseworthy deeds of 
 that eminent founder of Dutch liberty, " William the 
 Silent," Prince of Orange, the George Washington 
 of the Netherlands. 
 
 Born of noble German parentage at Dillenburg in 
 the Duchy of Nassau in 1533, William, curiously 
 enough, became the favorite of Philip II of Spain, 
 who appointed him, in 1559, when but twenty-six 
 
 [62]
 
 DELFT AND HER TRAGEDY 
 
 years of age, stadtholder or governor of the provinces 
 of Zeeland, Holland, Friesland, and Utrecht. Two 
 years later William found himself in bad odor with 
 Granvella, the Bishop of Arras, whom Philip had 
 appointed as counselor to his half-sister, Margaret 
 of Parma, the then regent of the Netherlands. Wil- 
 liam finally effected the enforced relinquishment of 
 this post by the Bishop in 1564. 
 
 The subsequent unrest in the Netherlands, pro- 
 voked mainly by the atrocities of Spanish soldiery, 
 led to the sanguinary assignment of Ferdinando Al- 
 varez de Toledo, Duke of Alva, to command an 
 army of 10,000 picked men, mustered from Lom- 
 bardy, Sardinia, Sicily, and Naples, to quell the 
 possible insurrection. This move was bitterly re- 
 sented, not only by her subjects, but was opposed, 
 although without success, by Margaret of Parma 
 herself; for the name of Alva was as odious to her 
 as it was to them. 
 
 A man of brilliant military attainments and the 
 most experienced general in Europe at the time, but 
 bubbling over with avarice and revengefulness, cruel 
 and overbearing, Alva accepted the assignment with 
 alacrity. " I have tamed people of iron in my day," 
 he was reported to have said contemptuously ; " shall 
 I not easily crush these men of butter?" 
 
 When Alva, with his army, entered the Nether- 
 lands and took it upon himself, after much intrigue 
 anl conniving, to supersede the half-sister of his 
 
 [63]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 sovereign as governor of the province, the Prince of 
 Orange retired to Dillenburg. Continued oppressions 
 by the Spaniards later called him to arms with the 
 French Huguenots as allies, and he set out betimes 
 upon an unsuccessful campaign to liberate the south- 
 ern provinces from their yoke of Spanish tyranny. 
 Since that time he was ever an active revolution- 
 ist. In 1571 he championed the "Water Beggars,'* 
 by which name those insurgents who assisted their 
 compatriots by sea were known, and one year later, 
 having been invited by the provinces of Zeeland and 
 Holland to command their troops against the Span- 
 iards ? he captured Middelburg, and later came to the 
 successful rescue of the besieged town of Leyden. 
 Soon after the formation of the famous defensive 
 league known as the " Utrecht Union," William was 
 condemned to exile by Philip. The fact that the 
 States-General defied the sovereign's authority in this 
 matter was the percussion cap that exploded the 
 general uprising and the throwing off of Dutch alle- 
 giance to Spain in 1581. 
 
 "Uneasy lies the head that wears" the helmet 
 of revolt, and from the time of his first attempt to 
 achieve the success of his ambitious project, the 
 life of no medieval ruler was ever more in jeopardy 
 than was that of William of Orange. Within a 
 period of two years five separate and distinct at- 
 tempts to take his life had been perpetrated, and a 
 sixth, albeit an abhorrently successful one, was about 
 
 [64]
 
 DELFT AND HER TRAGEDY 
 
 to follow all of which were undoubtedly at the ini- 
 tial instigation of the Duke of Alva. 
 
 Just across the canal from the Old Church at 
 Delft still stands the house of William the Silent, 
 now known as the Prinsenhof, where the tragedy took 
 place. It is a low, two- story building with a red- 
 tiled roof, formerly a cloister, but fitted up in 1575 
 as the residence of the Princes of Orange. Here 
 came William, in the summer of 1584, to join his 
 fourth wife, Louisa de Coligny, at the christening of 
 their son, born in Delft the previous winter, who 
 later became the celebrated governor, Frederic Wil- 
 liam. The door marked Gymnasium Publicum, 
 opposite the tower of the church, leads through a 
 courtyard to the staircase where the murder was 
 committed; and in a dark corner of the wall at the 
 foot of the steps the custodian will show you a hole 
 made by one of the bullets that killed the Prince. 
 The dining-room beyond, from which William had 
 come to his death, is now a museum containing 
 reminiscences of him. 
 
 The Czolgosz of the occasion, the perpetrator of 
 the dastardly act, was Bathazar Gerard, alias Francis 
 Guion, the self-alleged son of a martyred Calvinist, 
 a religious fanatic who had long cherished an insane 
 desire to murder Orange. 
 
 " The organization of Bathazar Gerard," says 
 Motley, "would furnish a subject for profound 
 study, both for the physiologist and the metaphysi- 
 
 [65]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 clan. Neither wholly a fanatic nor entirely a ruffian, 
 he combined the most dangerous elements of both 
 characters. In his puny body and mean exterior 
 were inclosed considerable mental powers and accom- 
 plishments, a daring ambition, and a courage almost 
 superhuman. Yet those qualities led him only to 
 form upon the threshold of life a deliberate determina- 
 tion to achieve greatness by the assassin's trade." 
 
 After long and exasperating delays, Gerard had 
 finally succeeded, on account of his ambitions, in 
 nursing himself into the good graces of Alexander 
 of Parma, the Spanish governor of the Netherlands 
 at that time. On the other hand, " Parma had long 
 been looking for a good man to murder Orange, 
 feeling as Philip, Granvelle, and all former gov- 
 ernors of the Netherlands had felt that this was 
 the only means of saving the royal authority in any 
 part of the provinces. Many unsatisfactory assas- 
 sins had presented themselves from time to time, and 
 Alexander had paid money in hand to various indi- 
 viduals Italians, Spaniards, Lorrainers, Scotchmen, 
 Englishmen, who had generally spent the sums re- 
 ceived without attempting the job. Others were sup- 
 posed to be still engaged in the enterprise, and at 
 that moment there were four persons each unknown 
 to the others, and of different nations in the city 
 of Delft, seeking to compass the death of William 
 the Silent." 
 
 Upon the death, at this time, of the French Duke 
 [66]
 
 DELFT AND HER TRAGEDY 
 
 of Anjou, Gerard was recommended to Parma by 
 various parties as a capable messenger "to carry 
 this important intelligence to the Prince of Orange." 
 Concerning the outcome of this mission, I can do 
 no better than to quote John Lothrop Motley from 
 his "The Rise of the Dutch Republic," as I have 
 done elsewhere in this chapter: 
 
 " The dispatches having been intrusted to him " 
 (Gerard), "he traveled post-haste to Delft, and to 
 his astonishment the letters had hardly been de- 
 livered before he was summoned in person to the 
 chamber of the Prince. Here was an opportunity 
 such as he had never dared to hope for. The arch- 
 enemy to the Church and to the human race" (that 
 is, the Prince, so called), "whose death would con- 
 fer upon his destroyer wealth and nobility in this 
 world, besides a crown of glory in the next, lay 
 unarmed, alone, in bed, before the man who had 
 thirsted seven long years for his blood. 
 
 " Bathazar could scarcely control his emotions 
 sufficiently to answer the questions which the Prince 
 addressed to him concerning the death of Anjou; 
 but Orange, deeply engaged with the dispatches, and 
 with the reflections which their deeply important con- 
 tents suggested, did not observe the countenance of 
 the humble Calvinist exile, who had been recently 
 recommended to his patronage by Villers. Gerard 
 had, moreover, made no preparation for an interview 
 so entirely unexpected, had come unarmed, and had 
 
 [67]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 formed no plan for escape. He was obliged to 
 forego his prey when most within his reach, and 
 after communicating all the information which the 
 Prince required, he was dismissed from the chamber. 
 
 " It was Sunday morning, and the bells were tolling 
 for church. Upon leaving the house he loitered about 
 the courtyard, furtively examining the premises, so 
 that a sergeant of halberdiers asked him why he 
 was waiting there. Bathazar meekly replied that he 
 was desirous of attending divine worship in the church 
 opposite, but added, pointing to his shabby and 
 travel-stained attire ? that, without at least a pair 
 of new shoes and stockings, he was unfit to join 
 the congregation. Insignificant as ever, the small, 
 pious, dusty stranger excited no suspicion in the mind 
 of the good-natured sergeant. He forthwith spoke 
 of the wants of Gerard to an officer, by whom they 
 were communicated to Orange himself, and the Prince 
 instantly ordered a sum of money to be given him. 
 Thus Bathazar obtained from William's charity what 
 Parma's thrift had denied a fund for carrying out 
 his purpose! 
 
 " Next morning, with the money thus procured, he 
 purchased a pair of pistols or small carabines from 
 a soldier, chaffering long about the price because 
 the vender could not supply a particular kind of 
 chopped bullets or slugs which he desired. Before 
 the sunset of the following day that soldier had 
 stabbed himself to the heart, and died despairing, 
 
 [68]
 
 DELFT AND HER TRAGEDY 
 
 on hearing for what purpose the pistols had been 
 bought. 
 
 "On Tuesday, the 10th of July, 1584, at about 
 half-past twelve, the Prince, with his wife on his 
 arm, and followed by the ladies and gentlemen of 
 his family, was going to the dining-room. William 
 the Silent was dressed upon that day, according to 
 his usual custom, in very plain fashion. He wore 
 a wide-leaved, loosely-shaped hat of dark felt, with 
 a silken cord round the crown such as had been 
 worn by the Beggars in the early days of the revolt. 
 A high ruff encircled his neck, from which also de- 
 pended one of the Beggars' medals, with the motto, 
 ' Fideles au roy jusqu' a la besace,' while a loose 
 surcoat of gray frieze cloth, over a tawny leather 
 doublet, with wide, slashed underclothes, completed his 
 costume. Gerard presented himself at the doorway, 
 and demanded a passport. The Princess, struck with 
 the pale and agitated countenance of the man, 
 anxiously questioned her husband concerning the 
 stranger. The Prince carelessly observed that 'it 
 was merely a person who came for a passport,' 
 ordering, at the same time, a secretary forthwith to 
 prepare one. The Princess, still not relieved, ob- 
 served in an undertone that ' she had never seen so 
 villainous a countenance.' Orange, however, not at 
 all impressed with the appearance of Gerard, con- 
 ducted himself at table with his usual cheerfulness, 
 conversing much with the burgomaster of Leeuwarden, 
 
 [69]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 the only guest present at the family dinner, concern- 
 ing the political and religious aspects of Friesland. 
 At two o'clock the company rose from table. The 
 Prince led the way, intending to pass to his private 
 apartments above. The dining-room, which was on 
 the ground floor, opened into a little square vestibule, 
 which communicated, through an arched passageway, 
 with the main entrance into the courtyard. This 
 vestibule was also directly at the foot of the wooden 
 staircase leading to the next floor, and was scarcely 
 six feet in width. Upon its left side, as one ap- 
 proached the stairway, was an obscure arch, sunk 
 deep in the wall, and completely in the shadow of 
 the door. Behind this arch a portal opened to the 
 narrow lane at the side of the house. The stairs 
 themselves were completely lighted by a large window 
 half-way up the flight. The Prince came from the 
 dining-room, and began leisurely to ascend. He had 
 only reached the second stair, when a man emerged 
 from the sunken arch, and, standing within a foot 
 or two of him, discharged a pistol full at his heart. 
 Three balls entered his body, one of which, passing 
 quite through him, struck with violence against the 
 wall beyond. The Prince is said to have exclaimed in 
 French, as he felt the wound, ' O my God, have mercy 
 upon my soul ! O my God, have mercy upon this poor 
 people ! ' 
 
 " These were the last words he ever spoke, save 
 that when his sister, Catherine of Schwartzburg, im- 
 
 [70]
 
 DELFT AND HER TRAGEDY 
 
 mediately afterwards asked him if he commended his 
 soul to Jesus Christ, he faintly answered, ' Yes.' 
 His master of the horse, Jacob van Maldere, had 
 caught him in his arms as the fatal shot was fired. 
 The Prince was then placed on the stairs for an 
 instant, when he immediately began to swoon. He 
 was afterwards laid upon a couch in the dining-room, 
 where in a few minutes he breathed his last in the 
 arms of his wife and sister. 
 
 " The murderer succeeded in making his escape 
 through the side door, and sped swiftly up the 
 narrow lane. He had almost reached the ramparts, 
 from which he intended to spring into the moat, when 
 he stumbled over a heap of rubbish. As he rose he 
 was seized by several pages and halberdiers, who had 
 pursued him from the house. He had dropped his 
 pistols upon the spot where he had committed the 
 crime, and upon his person were found a couple of 
 bladders, provided with a piece of pipe, with which 
 he had intended to assist himself across the moat, 
 beyond which a horse was waiting for him. He 
 made no effort to deny his identity, but boldly 
 avowed himself and his deed. He was brought back 
 to the house, where he immediately underwent a pre- 
 liminary examination before the city magistrates. 
 He was afterwards subjected to excruciating tor- 
 tures ; for the fury against the wretch who had 
 destroyed the father of the country was uncontrolla- 
 ble, and William the Silent was no longer alive to
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 intercede as he had often done before in behalf 
 of those who assailed his life." 
 
 The tortures that the man endured prior to his 
 speedy execution are unmentionable. 
 
 " William of Orange," continues Motley, " at the 
 period of his death, was aged fifty-one years and six- 
 teen days. He left twelve children. By his first 
 wife, Anne of Egmont, he had one son, Philip, and 
 one daughter, Mary, afterwards married to Count 
 Hohenlo. By his second wife, Anna of Saxony, he 
 had one son, the celebrated Maurice of Nassau, and 
 two daughters, Anna, married afterwards to her 
 cousin, Count William Louis, and Emilie, who es- 
 poused the pretender of Portugal, Prince Emanuel. 
 By Charlotte of Bourbon, his third wife, he had six 
 daughters ; and by his fourth, Louisa de Coligny, 
 one son, Frederic William, afterwards stadtholder 
 of the Republic in her most palmy days. The 
 Prince was entombed on the 3rd of August at Delft, 
 amid the tears of a whole nation. Never was a more 
 extensive, unaffected, and legitimate sorrow felt at 
 the death of any human being." 
 
 So passed the greatest man that little Holland 
 ever did or ever will produce. His ashes lie in a 
 vault in the Nieuwe Kerk of Delft, together with 
 those of thirty-five other princes and princesses of 
 the House of Orange, the last being King William III, 
 father of the present Queen, who died on November 
 23rd, 1890. Above the vault stands the handsome 
 
 [72]
 
 DELFT AND HER TRAGEDY 
 
 and imposing marble monument to William the Silent, 
 worked by the de Keysers, begun by the father in 
 1616 and finished by the son. A translation of the 
 Latin epitaph of the Prince reads as follows : 
 
 In honor of God Almighty and for an eternal memorial 
 of William of Nassau, Prince of Orange, father of his 
 fatherland, who valued the welfare of the Netherlands more 
 than his own interests or those of his family; who twice, 
 and principally at his own expense, collected powerful armies 
 and led them into the field under the command of the States; 
 who averted the tyranny of Spain; called back and restored 
 the true religion and the ancient laws; who at last left the 
 nearly regained liberty to be confirmed by his son, Prince 
 Maurice, heir to the virtues of his father; the truly pious, 
 prudent and invincible hero, whom Philip II, King of Spain, 
 that terror of Europe, feared, but could neither subdue nor 
 intimidate, but killed with gross perfidiousness by the hand 
 of a hired murderer, the United Provinces have ordered this 
 to be erected as an eternal memorial of his merits. 
 
 Motley's phraseology with regard to the Prince's 
 attributes and ambitions cannot be improved upon. 
 
 " His firmness was allied to his piety. His con- 
 stancy in bearing the whole weight of a struggle, 
 as unequal as men have ever undertaken, was the 
 theme of admiration, even to his enemies. The rock 
 in the ocean, * tranquil amid raging billows,' was the 
 favorite emblem by which his friends expressed their 
 sense of his firmness. From the time when, as a 
 hostage in France, he first discovered the plan of 
 Philip to plant the Inquisition in the Netherlands, 
 up to the last moment of his life, he never faltered 
 in his determination to resist the iniquitous scheme. 
 
 [73]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 This resistance was the labor of his life. To exclude 
 the Inquisition, to maintain the ancient liberties of 
 his country, was the task which he appointed to him- 
 self when a youth of three-and-twenty. Never speak- 
 ing a word concerning a heavenly mission, never de- 
 luding himself or others with the usual phraseology 
 of enthusiasts, he accomplished the task through 
 danger, amicl toils, and with sacrifices such as few 
 men have ever been able to make on their country's 
 altar." 
 
 Truly, Wilhelmina has an illustrious ancestor. 
 
 [74]
 
 VI 
 
 THE HAGUE AND SCHEVENINGEN 
 
 A DUTCH saw has it that you " make your for- 
 tune in Rotterdam, consolidate it in Amster- 
 dam, and spend it at The Hague." I am not 
 so sure about the veracity of the first two clauses, 
 but you can certainly spend it at The Hague. 
 
 The Hague is at once the most beautiful and the 
 most expensive city in Holland. It is the Paris, the 
 Washington, the Berlin of the Netherlands all in 
 one. Like Paris, it is so overflowing with history 
 and art that it would take a small book to tell of 
 it all in detail ; like Washington, it is beautiful, and 
 the official residence of the chief executive of the 
 nation and the diplomatic corps, but not half so 
 expensive; like Berlin, again it is just as beautiful 
 and twice as expensive. It is the magnetic pole of 
 the American tourist in Holland, and it takes pains 
 to cater in many ways to his whims and fancies, not 
 to mention his pocketbook, and thus hold his patron- 
 age. Half the town speaks English and most of the 
 remaining half understands it. Its people are oblig- 
 ing and courteous and seem to take a personal in- 
 terest in making your stay one of pleasure and in- 
 
 [75]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 struction as they do in no other city in Europe. 
 In The Hague I have tried to explain to an obtuse 
 conductor, in smatterings of German, Dutch, and 
 English, where I wished to get off the car, and half 
 a dozen fellow-passengers, finding a stranger in diffi- 
 culty, have chimed in without the least solicitation 
 and untangled my knots of pantomime with real 
 Dutch verbiage. 
 
 But, being the tourist center that it is, it has 
 naturally developed the old familiar nuisance to be 
 found in all cities of its ilk in Europe: the piratical 
 parasite who stands in ambush behind the hotel porter 
 as you start out in the morning and tags along 
 halfway to your destination, shouting an incessant 
 "Do you vont a guite, sir? Do you vont a guite?" 
 You will find him in almost every part of the town, 
 but his particular lair is in the lee of the picture 
 galleries. Either by instinct or by abnormal powers 
 of observation he knows that the average tourist 
 whose time is limited will make a bee line for the 
 nearest picture gallery before he has even had an 
 opportunity to unpack his grip. So here near the 
 galleries the guide awaits the coming of his prey. 
 If you succumb to his prattle, all is lost, save the 
 hope that he may soon run out of things to show 
 you. But an excellent entertainment for a party 
 of, say, four or five is to club together and hire a 
 guide, let him take you whither he will, and, during 
 the process, keep him under a rapid fire of questions 
 
 [76]
 
 THE HAGUE AND SCHEVENINGEN 
 
 so foolish and insipid that it will tax his ingenuity 
 even to answer them incorrectly as, you may re- 
 member, Mark Twain and his friend overwhelmed 
 their guide in Genoa. This is the only way to ob- 
 tain value received with more often, without re- 
 spect to the guide, for his sense of humor is pro- 
 verbially null and void and affords a vulnerable 
 target. 
 
 And a wonder it is to me that some of these " old 
 master" centers do not consider us Americans the 
 most appreciative of art of any people in the world. 
 They must think that we are picture and cathedral 
 crazy and I have no doubt they do, and snicker up 
 their sleeves in lieu of a less ill-mannered outburst. 
 Granted that in itself it is an education to see the 
 famous pictures I admit that there are other things 
 in the world just as wonderful as old paintings, many 
 of which are of notoriously poor draughtsmanship 
 but have become famous merely from the fact that 
 the paint still retains its luster after three hundred 
 and some years. We pay too little attention to the 
 life of the cities and the traits of their peoples as 
 they are found to-day. 
 
 But I digress. This is not a lecture on the marvels 
 or fallacies of art. 
 
 The site of The Hague was originally a hunting- 
 park owned and operated by the Counts of Holland 
 who used to come over frequently from Haarlem to 
 hunt their deer. From this fact it derived its Dutch 
 
 [77]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 nomenclature, 'S Graven Hage, meaning " the Count's 
 inclosure." The allurements of the place must have 
 been to the detriment of official business in Haarlem, 
 for they felled most of the trees with which it was 
 overgrown and transferred thither the seat of gov- 
 ernment about the middle of the thirteenth century. 
 Beginning with Maurice of Nassau in 1593, it be- 
 came the official residence of the stadtholder of the 
 Republic. 
 
 Having been thus honored as the capital of Dutch 
 statesmanship in the early days, the main historical 
 curiosity in The Hague is the Binnenhof, a group 
 of ancient buildings where the stadtholders lived and 
 worked and had their being and tried to dissolve 
 frequent plots for their own extermination. Here 
 William II, Count of Holland and afterward elected 
 Emperor of Germany, built a castle in ,1250, which, 
 forty years later, was enlarged and fitted up for a 
 permanent residence by his son, Floris V. At the 
 east of the Binnenhof stands the old gabled and 
 turreted Hall of the Knights, erected at the time of 
 Floris and recently restored and put into use for 
 legislative purposes. 
 
 But those days, however glorious from the point of 
 view of national advancement, were also the days of 
 plot and intrigue, and there is scarce an historical 
 building in Holland but might tell its tale of a trag- 
 edy. On the 13th of May, 1619, the seventy-two 
 year old prime minister of the nation at the time, 
 
 [78]
 
 THE HAGUE AND SCHEVENINGEN 
 
 Jan van Oldenbarnevelt, was put to death on a 
 scaffold erected in the Binnenhof " for having con- 
 spired to dismember the States of the Netherlands, 
 and greatly 4 troubled God's church," according to 
 Maurice of Orange, whose displeasure he had in- 
 curred. The learned Grotius, scholar and statesman 
 and the then senator from Rotterdam, who was 
 arrested at the same time as Oldenbarnevelt for 
 alleged conspiracy with him, was sentenced to prison 
 for life in the castle of Loevenstein, near Gorinchem. 
 Happily, however, with the help of his wife, he 
 effected means of escape ere he had been confined a 
 full year. 
 
 Hard by the Binnenhof stands the old Gevangen- 
 poort, now containing a morbidly interesting collec- 
 tion of guillotine blocks that have seen their grew- 
 some service, neck twisters, back breakers, and other 
 such unhappy instruments of torture, which recall, 
 all too vividly, perhaps, the days when they were 
 wont to be put into actual and frequent use in that 
 same tower. In the tower, too, they will show you 
 some of the dark, musty old dungeons, used for the 
 former incarceration of political prisoners. Their 
 names, written in blood by many of the victims, 
 can still be traced upon the walls. Here also is 
 where, in 1672, Cornelius De Witt, falsely accused 
 of plotting against the life of William III, and his 
 brother John, who had unwisely hastened to the 
 tower to intercede in his behalf, were put to their 
 
 [79]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 horrible deaths by the gullible mob of citizens, who, 
 believing in the guilt of Cornelius, had assembled in 
 the neighborhood to make a demonstration against 
 him. The remains of the brothers De Witt rest in 
 the Nieuwe Kerk. 
 
 The Willem'splein, a large square a hundred yards 
 or less to the east of the Binnenhof, is the center of 
 gravity of The Hague's traffic and street railway 
 service. From here you may take an electric car 
 to almost any part of the city, and to the suburbs 
 as well. In the center of the plein stands the bronze 
 statue of William the Silent, done by Royer and 
 erected in 1848, with the Prince's motto, "Tranquil 
 Amid Raging Billows," inscribed in Latin on the 
 pedestal. 
 
 Facing the square on the west side stand the 
 Colonial Offices and the Ministry of Justice, while 
 just off the northwest corner is the Mauritshuis 
 the Louvre, the Corcoran Gallery, the Kaiser Friede- 
 rich's Museum of The Hague. Built in the early half 
 of the seventeenth century as a residence for the 
 Dutch West India Company's Governor of Brazil, 
 it now shelters what is probably the most notable 
 collection of paintings gathered under one roof in 
 Holland, the gifts to the nation of the different 
 stadtholders. 
 
 The reputed gems of this collection are Rem- 
 brandt's rather morbid of subject, but admirably 
 executed, " School of Anatomy," and a large animal 
 
 [80]
 
 THE HAGUE AND SCHEVENINGEN 
 
 painting by Paul Potter, known as "The Bull," in 
 which Potter presents a collection of farm animals. 
 Their owner, standing nearby, appears to be nearly 
 as large as the bull, which is the central figure, and 
 the bull, in turn, is just a shade smaller than the 
 tree under which the owner stands. Taken individu- 
 ally, the animals are painted in a most marvelous 
 manner, but with regard to composition I should 
 think the accomplished Potter would rather have 
 been known by his smaller animal pictures and his 
 landscapes ; eight of the best of the latter now 
 hang in the Hermitage in St. Petersburg. ' ' The Bull ' ' 
 was carried off to the Louvre by the French at the 
 time of the flight of the Dutch stadtholder in 1795, 
 where it was awarded fourth place in point of value. 
 Originally purchased in 1749 for something like 
 $300, Napoleon restored it to the Dutch nation at 
 a handsome profit for about $25,000. 
 
 The Mauritshuis also contains masterpieces by 
 Holbein, Jan Steen, Rubens, Van Dyke, Terburg, 
 Vermeer, and other famous Dutch artists, together 
 with a Madonna by Murillo and some interesting 
 royal portraits by Velasquez. 
 
 Backing upon the Mauritshuis is the picturesque 
 Vyver, a broad sheet of water punctured here and 
 there by the divings of ducks and swans. Near the 
 center of its south side it reflects the walls and towers 
 of the ancient Binnenhof, while on its north it is 
 lined with many rows of trees. 
 
 [81]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 Not far from where the lofty spire of iron open- 
 work of the Groote Kerk the scene of the wedding 
 ceremony of Wilhelmina and Duke Henry of Mecklen- 
 burg-Schwerin on February 7, 1901 serves as a 
 conspicuous landmark for strangers in the city, and 
 facing a continuation of the busy Hoogstraat, rises 
 the unimposing royal palace, from the front windows 
 of which the Queen may look out upon an equestrian 
 statue of the father of her country, William the 
 Silent. It is a palace that gives the impression of 
 having been built for comfort rather than ostenta- 
 tion, and when the Queen is not in residence you 
 may obtain tickets of permission to be taken through 
 by a servant, from a little tobacco store near by. 
 
 None of the rooms of the palace is particularly 
 striking as to decorations and furniture, save one, 
 and that is about the most remarkable apartment of 
 any palace on the continent. Floor, walls, and ceil- 
 ing, it is one solid mass of the most exquisitely 
 carved teakwood, given by the colony of Java as 
 a wedding present to the Queen. You will wonder 
 little that it took upwards of thirty-five men seven 
 years to complete the job. There are gold and in- 
 laid pieces of wonderful workmanship in the cabinets 
 that border the walls presents from the Javanese 
 to the little Juliana which add to the whole impres- 
 sion of unalloyed richness welded together in perfect 
 taste, without so much as giving the hint of a "gin- 
 gerbread" effect. In beautiful gardens at the rear 
 
 [82]
 
 THE HAGUE AND SCHEVENINGEN 
 
 of the palace the Queen walks every morning with 
 Juliana after dejeuner at eleven. 
 
 Farther along to the northwest is the fashionable 
 residence section of The Hague, with the Willem's 
 Park as its principal focus. In the center of this 
 park, in an open space called the " Plein 1813," 
 rises a handsome national monument, unveiled in 
 1869 to commemorate the restoration of Dutch in- 
 dependence by the expulsion of the French in 1813 
 and the return of the pristine exile, Prince William 
 Frederic of Orange, who landed at Scheveningen and 
 ascended the throne of Holland as king. Not far 
 from here and still to the northwest, is the finest 
 modern picture gallery in Holland, the Mesdag Mu- 
 seum, presented to the State by the modern Dutch 
 artist, H. W. Mesdag, and his wife, in 1903. 
 
 The shopping district of The Hague comprises the 
 Hoogstraat and its immediate vicinity, the Spuistraat 
 and the Wegenstraat. The narrow Spuistraat is al- 
 ways the most congested. Like the Hoogstraat in 
 Rotterdam and the Kalverstraat in Amsterdam, it is 
 so thickly patronized from four-thirty, say, until 
 dark that vehicular traffic through it is self-suspended 
 for the sake of saving time ; even the pitiless Hague 
 bicyclist is compelled to dismount and push his wheel 
 through it. At this late hour of the day the cafes 
 are given over to the cordially inclined and the coffee 
 drinkers, who fill their favorite rendezvous to the 
 bursting point. As in Berlin, the Zoological Gar- 
 
 [83]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 den at The Hague, with its cafe-concerts, is also a 
 much frequented spot for recreation, but, unlike the 
 Berlin garden, the less said about its zoology the 
 better. 
 
 The beautiful old forest called the Bosch, lying 
 just to the east of The Hague, intersected with dis- 
 used and, therefore, rather stagnant canals, is the 
 Versailles of Holland, and the " House in the Wood " 
 is its Trianon. But the Bosch is much more acces- 
 sible to The Hague than Versailles is to Paris, for 
 an electric car will take you there from the plein 
 in fifteen or twenty minutes. 
 
 Erected in 1645 by Prince Frederic Henry of 
 Orange for his consort, the Princess Amalia of 
 Solms, " The House in the Wood " latterly became 
 famous as the seat of the international peace con- 
 ference which the representatives of twenty-six differ- 
 ent world powers held here in 1899. The conference 
 convened in the so styled " Orange Room," an oc- 
 tagonal hall lighted with a cupola, its walls and ceil- 
 ing embellished with allegorical scenes from the life 
 of Prince Frederic, done in oils by Dutch and Flemish 
 artists. It is by far the most important apartment 
 in the palace. The other rooms contain some won- 
 derful Japanese embroideries, cabinets of elaborately 
 and minutely carved ivories, rice paper tapestries, 
 porcelains, and other exquisite objects of Oriental 
 handcraft. It was here that the American historian, 
 John Lothrop Motley, wrote a greater part of his 
 
 [84]
 
 THE HAGUE AND SCHEVENINGEN 
 
 " The Rise of the Dutch Republic " and a portrait 
 of him hangs upon the wall of one of the rooms. 
 
 A short distance to the north of the forest will 
 be erected the much talked of Peace Palace for the 
 International Court of Arbitration, toward the cost 
 of which Mr. Carnegie has promised to contribute 
 a million and a half. 
 
 But two miles from The Hague lies Scheveningen 
 Holland's most fashionable, most expensive, most 
 diverting seaside resort the Atlantic City of the 
 Netherlands. It may be approached by divers 
 means : by railway train, by electric car, by omnibus, 
 or on foot. The two principal and most popular 
 routes served by the electric cars from The Hague 
 are the Old Way and the New. Both are tree 
 shaded and attractive, but the more tree shaded and 
 attractive is the Old Way. The clinkers with which 
 the most of it is paved were put down as early as 
 1666. Lined on the left with handsome summer resi- 
 dences and on the right with a pretty park, the Old 
 Way to Scheveningen, with its geometric rows of 
 stately trees, is undoubtedly the finest avenue in Hol- 
 land. 
 
 Scheveningen, beside being a watering place of 
 many merits and numerous shortcomings, is a town 
 of no mean importance as a fishing port. Its fleet 
 numbers two hundred or more pinken, or small fishing 
 boats, and their catch is sold at auction at the fishing 
 harbor upon arrival, as at Ostend. 
 
 [85]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 The name of the place is a hard one for the 
 English-speaking tourist to pronounce, but he will 
 not be far wrong if, in his apparent eagerness to get 
 there, he inquires of the genial head porter at the 
 hotel in The Hague the number of the car line that 
 will take him to " Shave agin." He may slur over 
 a syllable or two in the abbreviation, but the head 
 porter will make due allowance for at least a brave 
 attempt to master the word which is something 
 and will direct him accordingly. 
 
 Instead of the old familiar seaside board walk, 
 Scheveningen has its stone paved Boulevard, a mile 
 and a quarter long and eighty feet wide. This is 
 the promenade of the international hodgepodge of 
 holiday makers, augmented on a Sunday and in the 
 evenings by gigglings girls and sober countenanced 
 fishermen from the village. Invariably dressed in 
 their best Sunday-go-to-meetings, the most conspicu- 
 ous feature of the feminine attire is a wide shawl, 
 often suggesting the Persian in design, worn tight 
 about the shoulders and reaching down to the waist 
 in the back. Of course the skirts are padded volumi- 
 nously about the hips, and the girls display at the 
 temples many varieties of gilded antennae to hold 
 their white caps securely. 
 
 About midway of the Boulevard and back of it, 
 stands the ever present Kurhaus, although what they 
 profess to cure in that house may simply be a re- 
 luctance on the part of the holder to diminish his 
 
 [86]
 
 THE HAGUE AND SCHEVENINGEN 
 
 letter of credit. It is three hundred feet or more in 
 length, this Kurhaus, and its commodious hall, in 
 which are held some very excellent symphony orches- 
 tra concerts, can seat as many as 3,000 people. On 
 the side of the Kurhaus overlooking the sea there is 
 a large stone terrace where the band plays in the 
 afternoons, and, underneath this, a very expensive 
 cafe. 
 
 Just opposite the Kurhaus is the pier a real old- 
 fashioned ocean going steel pier, terminating in a 
 concert pavilion and built right out into the water 
 for almost a quarter of a mile, having a plate glass 
 partition down the middle, so that there is a lee and 
 a weather side to it. At intervals along its sides 
 are fish nets, which may be raised from or lowered 
 into the water by means of a crank and spindle 
 attached to the pier railing. These are rented to 
 the public on the time basis, and there is ever a 
 group of persistent people vibrating between one net 
 and another in the hope that its operator may bring 
 to the rail a real denizen of the watery depths. I 
 contracted the fever one day myself and fell in with 
 this flitting crowd for an hour, more or less, only 
 to be unrewarded in the end, but I am told that if 
 anything piscatorially larger than an adult white- 
 bait inadvertently becomes enmeshed in any of the 
 nets and is brought to the surface the successful 
 fisher receives round after round of enthusiastic 
 applause. 
 
 [87]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 And Scheveningen is in no sense of the word a 
 philanthropic institution. Everything in the place 
 has its price mark tagged securely on. You have to 
 pay to walk on the pier, concert or no concert; you 
 have to pay to listen to the band from the Kurhaus 
 terrace ; you have to pay to sit in one of the yellow 
 mushroom chairs that make the beach resemble a 
 fungus growth ; you have to pay even to take a bath 
 in the ocean, and are then restricted to the hours 
 of from seven in the morning until sunset. On Sun- 
 days they close up the ocean for bathing purposes at 
 2 P.M. 
 
 But sea bathing is a different proposition in Eu- 
 rope from what it is in America. At Scheveningen it 
 is a matter of the most serious import, and the necessi- 
 ties for its success I almost said "enjoyment" 
 are many. To go about it in the proper manner, 
 you first approach the ticket window on the Boule- 
 vard in front of the Kurhaus and apply to the 
 cashier for a permit, varying in price according to 
 the class of bath selected. Providing you have 
 brought your own bathing suit, this will be the only 
 payment necessary, for the permit graciously entitles 
 you to the use of two towels, obviously for drying 
 purposes. In case you have come unprepared with 
 regard to bathing apparel, you will have to pay for 
 a suit, although, judging from those I have seen 
 personally, the wearer should be the one to be re- 
 warded. To avail yourself of the use of a "bath- 
 CBS]
 
 1 
 
 * 
 
 8 
 
 11 
 M S) 
 
 1.1 
 
 I!
 
 THE HAGUE AND SCHEVENINGEN 
 
 sheet" whatever that may be necessitates addi- 
 tional expenditure, and there are various other alleged 
 indispensable articles that the cashier may try to 
 inflict upon the unwary at face value. 
 
 The next step is to repair to the beach and await 
 the calling out of the number shown on your ticket, 
 whereupon you are assigned to a striped kind of house 
 on wheels, of the same kith and kin as an English 
 " caravan " wagon. In this you must wait until 
 the attendant sees fit to hitch his horse to it and 
 haul you, wagon and all, into the surf. During the 
 voyage you will have finished changing your costume 
 and the minute your wagon is backed into the water 
 you are ready to commence your amphibious per- 
 formance. A high sign to the attendant will be the 
 signal that you have survived the operation of bath- 
 ing, and, presto! his horse will haul you out upon 
 dry land again. 
 
 Doubtless on account of the expenses incurred in 
 taking the proper precautions for bathing there are 
 more waders at Scheveningen, especially among the 
 thrifty Dutch, than there are bathers. Human snipe, 
 ducks, and storks, according to their respective 
 builds, with trousers rolled to their knees or petti- 
 coats pinned up to a similar altitude, daily patrol 
 the edge of the ocean for a mile or more. 
 
 Surf riding is another favorite method of spending 
 a half hour's time at Scheveningen, the game being 
 to suffer oneself to be bobbed up and down at the 
 
 [89]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 mercy of the breakers in a tethered fishing boat, only 
 to be ultimately carried ashore again on the backs 
 of the crew. 
 
 An obelisk at the southern end of the Boulevard 
 commemorates the landing of Prince William Frederic 
 of Orange, but the victorious naval achievement of 
 Admiral de Ruyter in defeating the combined French 
 and English fleets off the coast of Scheveningen in 
 1673, remains unhonored. 
 
 [90]
 
 VII 
 
 LEYDEN AND HAARLEM 
 
 IF you happen to have penetrated Holland as far 
 as The Hague without having availed yourself 
 of the steam tram method of conveyance between 
 one town and another the trip by this means from 
 The Hague to Leyden might be suggested as an 
 excellent one with which to commence to develop 
 the habit. 
 
 The tram that operates on regular schedule be- 
 tween the Schenkweg in The Hague and the Groote 
 Ryndyk in Leyden pierces a delightful country check- 
 ered by a labyrinth of canals, long and short, wide 
 and narrow. Even every patch of humble cabbages 
 appears to be surrounded with one, along which the 
 truck gardeners pole their boats that bear the vege- 
 tables direct from soil to market. Tree crested dikes, 
 straight as the shortest distance between two points, 
 stretch away into the perspective in every direction. 
 Villas and cozy country cottages come quickly into 
 view and fade away again behind their groves of 
 trees, giving the traveler just a flitting suggestion 
 of the comfort their owners must find in them. In 
 passing through the neat little brick paved villages
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 of Voorburg and Voorschoten the tram engine careens 
 around through the streets as if it had developed a 
 first-class state of intoxication. It aims directly for 
 a kitchen door here and the walls of a church there, 
 only to miss them by a few feet while making a dex- 
 terous turn to the other side of the road, twisting its 
 diminutive train of two or three cars in its wake. 
 Then out beside the dikes again it puffs and sputters 
 on its seemingly remonstrative way to Leyden. 
 
 Leyden is a quiet,- curious old town, rich in history 
 and effervescent with learning. With due respect to 
 art, it was the birthplace of a dozen or more of the 
 most illustrious Dutch painters of the sixteenth and 
 seventeenth centuries, including Jan Steen, Gerard 
 Dou, and last, but by no means least, the celebrated 
 Rembrandt; but, strange to tell, it cannot boast of 
 a single masterpiece of any of them. At its univer- 
 sity, then renowned throughout the world, the future 
 savants of the age came to pore over their books. 
 Hugo Grotius was one of its earlier sons, and later, 
 in 1755, at the age of twenty-seven, Oliver Gold- 
 smith aspired in vain to the degree of Doctor of 
 Medicine, afterwards conferred at Louwain, giving 
 Leyden the first opportunity of being its donor. 
 The town's many museums of ethnography, of natu- 
 ral history, of comparative anatomy, of physiology, 
 of archeology bespeak its hobby: the insatiable 
 thirst for knowledge. Even many of the signs one 
 reads in the town are in Latin. 
 
 [92]
 
 \\ 
 
 O S 
 
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 J3 
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 4> .1 
 
 H-a 
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 O <"
 
 LEYDEN AND HAARLEM 
 
 Four hundred years ago Leyden could brag about 
 its 100,000 population without treading on the toes 
 of any city in Holland. To-day it contains little 
 more than half as many souls as it did then. Since 
 its " revision downward " from its pinnacle at the top 
 of the Dutch textile industry, it has seemed a sacri- 
 lege to conduct business in the place. Its university 
 sustained for a time the reputation that its weaving 
 enterprises relinquished, but now we go to Vienna, 
 instead of to Leyden, to glean the fine points in the 
 science of medicine. Using Discovery for a fulcrum, 
 Time undermines methods with the infallibility of the 
 sun's attraction, and brands them as obsolete forever. 
 
 The historical bench mark of Leyden is the siege 
 it survived at the point of the Spanish bayonet in 
 the sixteenth century. Lasting, in the aggregate, 
 from October 31, 1573, until October 3, 1574, 
 this siege may be considered as one of the longest 
 and most persistent in the annals of history, and its 
 ultimate relief was as characteristic, picturesque, and 
 ingenious as if it had been the plot of a tale by 
 Dumas. 
 
 At the expense of the lives of 4,000 patriots, him- 
 self included, Count Louis of Nassau effected a par- 
 tial relief of Leyden five months after the siege 
 commenced ; but, encouraged by the butchery of this 
 Dutch commander and his comparative handful of 
 soldiers, the Spaniards continued to hold on so tena- 
 ciously that William the Silent concocted the daring 
 
 [93]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 scheme to flood the intervening country with water 
 from the sea so that his fleet might sail in to the 
 rescue. 
 
 Having already reduced Leyden to the point of 
 starvation, Valdez, the Spanish general, in glowing 
 phrases offered pardon to the citizens if they would 
 but open the gates of the beleaguered city and sur- 
 render. But the people would have none of it, plac- 
 ing renewed confidences in their leader, William of 
 Orange, and consoling themselves / as best they could 
 with the firm belief that he was listening to their 
 prayers and would ultimately devise some means of 
 raising the blockade. 
 
 As time dragged wearily on, the sorties of the 
 Dutch became less frequent and, finally, it was an- 
 nounced by the din of clanging church bells that the 
 gates should henceforth be kept closed and no man 
 should venture outside the city. 
 
 Even at this time, William, unbeknown to the 
 people of Leyden, was appealing to the States to 
 allow him to open the flood gates of Rotterdam and 
 Schiedam and to pierce the dikes along the Meuse 
 and the Yssel in order to inundate the country and 
 give his fleet a fairway to the very watchtowers of 
 Leyden. After much debate, his proposition for 
 effecting the relief, although a most destructive one 
 to the surrounding country, was accepted; bonds 
 were issued by the States to help defray the expenses 
 of the task, and patriotic Dutch housewives disposed 
 
 [94]
 
 of silver plate and jewelry as their contributions to 
 the financial furtherance of the scheme. 
 
 It was not until some days after the Prince had 
 supervised in person the unlocking of the gates at 
 Schiedam and Rotterdam on August 3rd and the 
 rupture of the dikes at sixteen different places along 
 the Yssel, that the starving prisoners of Leyden com- 
 menced to grow impatient and appealed by letter to 
 Orange, telling him that their bread was gone and 
 that the supply of its only substitute, malt cakes, 
 would last but four days longer. To their letters the 
 Prince, having unfortunately and most untimely con- 
 tracted the fever, answered reassuringly from his 
 sick bed in Rotterdam to the effect that the dikes 
 had been cut, that water was already pouring in 
 over the land, and that as soon as its depth was 
 sufficient to float the fleet an attempt at rescue would 
 be made. The message was read by the Burgomas- 
 ter, Van der Werf, to the people assembled in the 
 marketplace, and the welcome news was received with 
 great rejoicings. 
 
 Although the water about Leyden had by this time 
 reached a depth of ten inches, the Spaniards, at first 
 confused, later became confident that the thing could 
 not be accomplished. When, from the lack of a 
 breeze, the water failed to rise higher; and because 
 of the inability of the prostrate Prince, which neither 
 the besiegers nor besieged had heard of nor even 
 imagined, curtailed additional attempts to flood the 
 
 [95]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 country; the Spaniards began to taunt the valiant 
 citizens. " Go up to the tower, ye Beggars," they 
 cried, "go up to the tower and tell us if ye can see 
 the ocean coming over the dry land to your relief." 
 
 But the citizens did go up to the tower, and, after 
 bravely having withstood the siege until early in 
 September, by which time a gale of wind had risen 
 and the Prince had recovered in a measure from his 
 illness, they did see the ocean coming over the dry 
 land to their relief, and with a vengeance. Not only 
 that, but they also saw a welcome fleet of two hun- 
 dred vessels coming in on the crest of the ocean; 
 they saw this fleet come up from the south, steadily 
 and undisputed, to within five miles of Leyden; they 
 saw it demolish the Spanish forts a navy of sur- 
 geons cauterizing the festering sores on the face of 
 fair Holland. Then, to their consternation, they 
 saw the gale die out and the waters recede, leaving 
 the entire fleet stranded at North Aa, just beyond 
 cannon's shot of its goal. 
 
 Despair took the place of hope in the hearts of the 
 besieged. They implored, and then threatened the 
 life of Burgomaster Van der Werf if he refused to 
 surrender to the Spaniards. He came out into the 
 little square just opposite the old church of St. 
 Pancras, waved his felt hat as a signal for silence, 
 and delivered himself of a short but pithy address 
 that turned despair into faith, animosity into pride, 
 and fired the hearts of his countrymen with renewed 
 
 [96]
 
 LEYDEN AND HAARLEM 
 
 patriotism. What he said on that occasion has gone 
 down in history as one of the most superb proclama- 
 tions ever uttered by a brave man for a national 
 cause. 
 
 " What would ye, my friends ? " he said. " Why 
 do ye murmur that we do not break our vows and 
 surrender the city to the Spaniards? a fate more 
 horrible than the agony which she now endures. I 
 tell you that I have made an oath to hold the city, 
 and may God give me strength to keep my oath! 
 I can die but once; whether by your hands, the 
 enemy's, or by the hand of God. My own fate is 
 indifferent to me. Not so that of the city intrusted 
 to my care. I know that we shall starve if not soon 
 relieved ; but starvation is preferable to the dis- 
 honored fate which is the only alternative. Your 
 menaces move me not. My life is at your disposal. 
 Here is my sword; plunge it into my breast and 
 divide my flesh among you. Take my body to ap- 
 pease your hunger, but expect no surrender so long 
 as I remain alive." 
 
 How the populace of Leyden, after listening to 
 this, rushed to the ramparts with renewed courage 
 engendered within them and hurled defiance in the 
 teeth of the bloodthirsty Spaniards; how as many 
 as 8,000 died in the streets from the plague alone, 
 germinated by the foulness of the beleaguered city; 
 how the frantic people stripped even the leaves from 
 the trees to relieve their hunger and fought over the 
 
 [97]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 garbage pits for every possible morsel of food; how 
 at last a violent equinoctial gale on the first two 
 days of October filled the lowland with water and 
 floated the stranded fleet ; how this fleet sailed in 
 between the trees and the chimney pots of submerged 
 farmhouses, putting the Spaniards to flight as it 
 advanced; and how, on the morning of the 3rd of 
 October, the Dutch ships, under Admiral Boisot, 
 paddled up the canals of Leyden while the stricken 
 citizens gathered on the banks and tried to shout 
 with wild delight, but could not on account of their 
 emaciated condition are all matters of historical 
 fact that may be perused in detail in the pages of 
 any authoritative work on the rise of the Dutch 
 Republic. 
 
 It is also an historical fact that on the very next 
 day after the relief of Leyden the gale shifted and 
 blew with all its fury from the northeast, driving out 
 the waters before it, so that within a few days the 
 country was as it had been before and the labor of 
 repairing the dikes commenced forthwith. 
 
 As a reward for the sufferings of the people of 
 Leyden the city was granted an annual fair of ten 
 days with exemption from taxes and the States caused 
 the university to be established. 
 
 The University of Leyden doesn't look much like 
 our idea of a university, for the professors, except 
 those in the department of medicine, teach their 
 classes at home, the nine hundred students live in the 
 
 [98]
 
 LEYDEN AND HAARLEM 
 
 town, and, as a result, dormitories and classrooms 
 are things that may be dispensed with. The old 
 " university building," however, originally a nunnery, 
 maintains in its connection one of the finest libraries 
 in Holland. 
 
 Not far from where the lofty perpendicular Gothic 
 windows of the church of St. Pancras overlook the 
 square in which the Burgomaster extemporized with 
 such eloquence at the time of the siege, a shipload of 
 gunpowder exploded in 1807. After removing the 
 debris of the buildings which it razed, the Leydeners 
 planted the site as a public park and erected a statue 
 of the valiant Van der Werf in the center of it. 
 Backed by two or three handsome new buildings be- 
 longing to the university and facing a wide, clear 
 canal, this Van der Werf Park vies with the Botanical 
 Gardens behind the old university building, as 
 peaceful a spot in which to spend a moonlit evening 
 pondering over the history of the old place as may 
 be found in Leyden; while from the Morsch Gate, 
 a well preserved remnant of earlier fortifications, 
 many temptingly shaded walks twist and twine 
 through the immediate neighborhood. 
 
 In Leyden, and not in Amsterdam or Rotterdam, 
 as one might suppose, I came across a beggar for 
 the first time in Holland, although technically, he 
 came across me. The atmosphere of book learning 
 was probably what launched him on his career, for 
 he certainly seemed able-bodied enough to make a 
 
 [99]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 more honest living by the sweat of his brow ; but 
 the people of Leyden are not given much to fluent 
 perspiration. And it might be here mentioned that 
 one of the reliefs of travel in Holland, compared with 
 Italy, for example, is its dearth of mendicants and 
 beggars. Cripples and the poverty stricken are to 
 be found in Holland as in any other country, but, as 
 a rule, they do not submit their complaints to the 
 sympathies of the tourist. Wherever possible, one 
 of Holland's world famed charitable institutions gets 
 hold of them and sends them from the congested city 
 to the pauper colony in the country. Three such 
 colonies, founded in 1817, are situated near the rail- 
 way line from Meppel to Leeuwarden, while in the 
 one city of Amsterdam there are more than a hundred 
 benevolent institutions. The Society for the Public 
 Welfare, or, in Dutch, Maatschappij tot Nut van't 
 Algemeen, with headquarters in Amsterdam, was 
 founded in 1784 and has made its influence felt 
 throughout the entire kingdom. 
 
 Katwyk and Noordwyk, three miles apart, the par- 
 ticular seashore resorts that cater especially to the 
 people of Leyden and Haarlem, are both connected 
 by steam tram with Leyden. Both are insignificant 
 and expensive, and neither is so attractive as Dom- 
 burg nor so gay as Scheveningen. Their wide beaches 
 of fine sand would seem to us their only assets. 
 
 But if you would have further evidence of the 
 Dutch mastery of the element of water, take the tram 
 
 [100]
 
 LEYDEN AND HAARLEM 
 
 to Katwyk aan Zee and walk up the beach a half 
 mile or more to where they have harnessed the mouth 
 of the old Rhine and curbed its outlet to suit their 
 convenience. 
 
 A hurricane having thrown up the sand before the 
 mouth of the river in the year 839, thus causing its 
 flow into the ocean to be blocked, its backed-up waters 
 created a swamp which all but covered the entire 
 territory known as Rynland, and which, in the sub- 
 sequent diversion of the river's course, was largely 
 responsible for the formation of the vast delta in the 
 south. In 1807 the Dutch conceived the project of 
 draining this swamp and making polders of it by 
 pumping its water into especially constructed canals. 
 Later they relieved the congestion of sand at the 
 old Rhine's mouth and built a series of flood gates 
 across it. By closing these gates at high tide they 
 were enabled to exclude the inrush of water from the 
 ocean, and by opening them again at low tide, they 
 permitted the accumulated waters of the river to 
 flow out into the ocean at the rate of 50,000 cubic 
 feet per minute. Thus was the Haarlemerpolder, 
 seventy-two square miles in extent, reclaimed from 
 what used to be the Haarlemermeer. 
 
 The tram line from Leyden to Katwyk passes first 
 through the village of Endegeest, the home and work- 
 shop of Descartes for a number of years, and then 
 through Rynsburg, the former residence of that 
 grandfather of modern philosophy, Spinoza, born of 
 
 [101]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 Jewish parents in Amsterdam in 1632. The little 
 places are so shady, so peaceful, so still, that anyone 
 having been brought up within their solitudes might 
 very naturally develop the pastime of philosophizing 
 without half trying. 
 
 The latter part of April or the first part of May 
 is the proper time of year to visit Haarlem and its 
 vicinity. Then the tulips, crocuses, lilies, and hya- 
 cinths are in the halcyon days of their bloom, sway- 
 ing languidly to and fro in the gentle breeze and 
 diffusing a delicious perfume that is wafted over the 
 country for miles. Fields and fields of them there 
 are a sweetly scented " crazy quilt " of superlative 
 sheen and luster; for Haarlem, the greatest flower 
 garden in the world, exports bulbs of all varieties to 
 every civilized country. 
 
 Whether the Dutch or the Portuguese became the 
 first European tulip fanciers is a moot question. The 
 flower originally came from the East, its name being 
 derived from the Persian toliban, or turban. Suffice 
 it to say that by 1636 bulb culture in general and 
 tulip culture in particular had developed into a veri- 
 table mania in and about Haarlem. Bulbs became 
 then as much an item of speculation as shares of 
 mining stock are at the present day and just as 
 uncertain. Fortunes were made and lost in the open 
 market. Generally speaking, everybody in Haarlem, 
 whether or not he professed to be anything of a 
 floriculturist, dickered through the brokers in bulbs. 
 
 [102]
 
 LEYDEN AND HAARLEM 
 
 One speculator in Amsterdam netted almost $35,000 
 in four months. Prices went up steadily until, at the 
 height of the boom, the bulb of a " Viceroy " brought 
 $2,000, an "Admiral Liefkens " slightly more, and 
 a " Semper Augustus " was sold for $6,000. 
 
 Then came the panic. The bottom dropped out 
 of the bucket of bulbs. The government forbade 
 the gambling, and between suns the price of an off- 
 shoot of the " Semper Augustus " dropped to fifty 
 florins, or approximately twenty-two dollars. 
 
 After a century of quiet, somebody started a short- 
 lived palpitation in hyacinths, but the highest price 
 paid for a single hyacinth bulb was not more than 
 $800. 
 
 To-day the Dutch make more of a serious business 
 of bulb raising, and the rather inconspicuous off- 
 shoot has become a recognized article of trade and 
 commerce. Almost all of the 2,000 Dutch varieties 
 of tulips have been developed by patient and thought- 
 ful culture from the Tulipa Gesneriana, which Con- 
 rad Gesner purchased in Constantinople and brought 
 to Augsburg in Germany in 1559. 
 
 In Holland the tulip is propagated both from the 
 seed and from the offshoots of the bulb. The off- 
 shoots may be expected to reproduce their true vari- 
 ety as to colorings and markings, growing to a flower- 
 ing size in three or four years. Seedlings, on the 
 other hand, are less vain and more reticent. No 
 matter what the complexions of their parents might 
 
 [103]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 have been, the first flowers of a seedling, appearing 
 after it has had four or five years' growth, are of 
 a single color. A tulip in such a state is called a 
 " breeder," and remains so until, after several years, 
 its flower suddenly " breaks " into the gorgeous colors 
 of the " flamed " or the " feathered " tulip. It is then 
 classified according to color and variety and placed 
 upon the market. To hasten this period of " break- 
 ing" in the career of the tulip for no man can 
 compute with any degree of certainty the year in 
 which it will take place the growers resort to vari- 
 ous means, even sending the bulbs away sometimes 
 for a change of climate. " Breeders " that have 
 taken on the desired markings and colors are said 
 to have become " rectified." But the problem of 
 chance that the seedling tulips will "break" into 
 a new variety is one that the Dutch have been pon- 
 dering over for centuries, and, as has already been 
 said, they have been rewarded to the extent of 2,000 
 varieties. Much care is devoted to the preparation 
 of the soil and, after fertilizing thoroughly, the 
 grower will first plant it with potatoes for a couple 
 of years in order to diminish its strength and adapt 
 it better to the cultivation of tulips. The bulbs are 
 taken up each summer, their offshoots detached, and 
 then replaced in fresh soil. 
 
 The year before the siege of Leyden Haarlem 
 suffered a siege under Frederic of Toledo, the son 
 of the Spaniard, Alva ; but Haarlem was not so 
 
 [104]
 
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 LEYDEN AND HAARLEM 
 
 fortunate as her sister city. After bravely maintain- 
 ing the place against the enemy for a period of seven 
 weary months, with odds of seven to one against 
 them, the Prince of Orange, with heavy heart, sent a 
 message asking the commandant to make the best 
 terms he would with the Spaniards and surrender, 
 the many attempts of the Prince to rescue the city 
 having proved futile. 
 
 The massacre that followed the surrender was too 
 shocking to bear the telling of in detail. The garri- 
 son and its commandant, the Protestant clergy, and 
 2,000 or more burghers were cruelly butchered by 
 the Spaniards. Alva himself, however, was forced 
 to admit to Philip that " never was a place defended 
 with such skill and bravery as Haarlem " ; not only 
 the men of the town, little accustomed to arms, but 
 the women also had taken an active part in Haarlem's 
 defense, and Kenau Hasselaer, " a widow of dis- 
 tinguished family and unblemished reputation, about 
 forty-seven years of age, who, at the head of her 
 amazons" (some three hundred or more) "partici- 
 pated in many of the most fiercely contested actions 
 of the siege, both within and without the walls." 
 
 As the birthplace of a number of Holland's cele- 
 brated painters, including Franz Hals and Jacob van 
 Ruysdael, Haarlem holds as her most cherished pos- 
 session a handsome percentage of the works of the 
 former, numbering among which are his ten famous 
 corporation and regent canvases, arranged in chrono- 
 [105]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 logical order in the museum of the old Town Hall. 
 To know these will mean that you know the jovial 
 Franz. 
 
 Across the market place from the Town Hall 
 rises the Groote Kerk, and, just beside it, the old 
 meat market, erected in 1602, and said, by those 
 who know, to be the quaintest brick and stone Renais- 
 sance building in the Netherlands. The Groote Kerk 
 is of a graceful cruciform shape and around the edges 
 of its buttresses, like chicks peeping from under the 
 protecting wings of the mother hen, are built a 
 number of curious little one -story houses whose in- 
 teriors suggest the last word in coziness and cleanli- 
 ness, and where the much maligned Dutch decorative 
 taste may be seen at its best. The church contains 
 what was long considered the largest and loudest pipe 
 organ in the world, possessing three keyboards, sixty 
 stops, and 5,000 pipes of varying lengths and diame- 
 ters up to thirty-two feet in the case of the former 
 and fifteen inches with respect to the latter. A can- 
 non ball, imbedded in the wall of the south aisle of the 
 church, was allowed to remain undisturbed during 
 the restoration as a reminiscence of the siege of 1572. 
 
 At the side of the church, in the market place, 
 stands a bronze statue of a Dutchman of the name 
 of Coster, erected in 1856 upon rather fictitious evi- 
 dence of his having been the inventor of printing. 
 Nothing in the way of printed matter having been 
 proven to have been done by Coster prior to or even 
 
 [106]
 
 LEYDEN AND HAARLEM 
 
 shortly after 1447, when Gutenburg of Mayence 
 developed the art, the palm for this distinction was 
 finally, but reluctantly, relegated to the latter. 
 
 Instead of Spanish encampments, Haarlem is now 
 surrounded with a beautiful forest, a prominent col- 
 lection of attractive residences, municipal play- 
 grounds for the children, and lives in an atmosphere 
 of peace and comfort. The old Amsterdam Gate 
 at the east end of the city serves as the only reminder 
 that the place at one time possessed strong fortifica- 
 tions. 
 
 [107]
 
 VIII 
 
 THE CITY OF NINETY ISLANDS 
 
 FROM all practical points of view, if, indeed, it 
 is stretching the metaphor a bit with regard 
 to smells and scenes (to preserve the allitera- 
 tion), Amsterdam may be considered the Venice of 
 the Netherlands. Like Venice it seems to have as 
 many canals as there are blood vessels in the human 
 body; like Venice it is the home of the damp cellar, 
 for the city is built upon piles. 
 
 In the erection of a new building in Amsterdam 
 the first thing they do is to pump out the site, and, 
 after they have it fairly dry, keep on pumping to 
 prevent it from filling up again ; when the structure 
 is completed they celebrate the event by the installa- 
 tion of a permanent pump in the basement which 
 they must needs start running at stated intervals 
 to diminish the volume of water that has seeped in 
 through the cracks. The driver of piles takes the 
 place of our stone mason, for of piles is the city's 
 foundation. A foot at a whack, these piles are sunk 
 into the sand. They are then morticed with mud, 
 girders are strung between them, and behold! the 
 house on stilts commences to assume its architectural 
 
 [108]
 
 THE CITY OF NINETY ISLANDS 
 
 design. By and by the mud loses its adhesive prop- 
 erties to a certain degree, and the building commences 
 to lean dangerously forward or backward, although 
 without the dire results that one might imagine. 
 
 Amsterdam is the largest and most commercially 
 important city in Holland. Founded in 1204 by 
 Gysbrecht II, who built a castle here, and choked the 
 flow of the river Amstel by throwing a dam across it 
 from which more or less momentous event the town 
 derived its appellation, Florins V, of Binnenhof 
 fame, favored the place to the extent of granting its 
 exemption from the taxes imposed by Zeeland and 
 Holland. In 1311 it was formally absorbed by the 
 latter province. From that time on Amsterdam gath- 
 ered greater importance as a commercial center, until, 
 in the early years of the seventeenth century, after 
 the Dutch had finally succeeded in beating off the 
 Spaniards, the establishment of the Dutch East India 
 Company added its might to raise Amsterdam to 
 the rank of the foremost mercantile community in 
 the world. Later she commenced to gravitate slowly 
 down the incline of trade and her cogs refused to 
 take hold again until the latter half of the nineteenth 
 century, although at the time of the dividing of 
 the Dutch Republic, when King Louis Bonaparte 
 took up his residence in Amsterdam in 1808, she was 
 considered the third greatest city in the French Em- 
 pire. To-day she has advanced well past the half 
 million population mark. Although as regards her 
 
 [109]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 foreign trade she does not profess to compete with 
 Rotterdam, as a money market and clearing house 
 for colonial products she is preeminent in the 
 Netherlands. 
 
 The Dam a large square that owes its name to 
 the fact of its being the eastern boundary of Lord 
 Amstel's embankment across the river is the axis 
 around which Amsterdam revolves. It is literally 
 the hub of the Dutch universe. Every electric car 
 in the place starts from the Dam, and in due course 
 of time will wind its way back again. The principal 
 edifices adjacent to it are the Royal Palace, the 
 Nieuwe Kerk, or New Church, and the imposing post 
 and telegraph offices. 
 
 Completed in the year 1655 at a total cost of 
 more than $3,000,000, this Royal Palace was origi- 
 nally the Town Hall, but when Louis Bonaparte 
 came upon the scene the Dutch made him a present 
 of it for his use as a royal residence. At a later 
 date King William I of Holland handed it back to 
 the city, whose property it still remains, instead of 
 that of the Crown; so that when Wilhelmina makes 
 her annual ten days' visit to Amsterdam she comes 
 more as a private citizen and is the guest of the city 
 for the period of her stay. With its 264 feet of 
 length and its 207 of width it seems rather a strain 
 upon the imagination to picture the Royal Palace 
 as standing upon stilts ; but such is actually the case, 
 for its foundations consist of 13,659 piles (to be 
 
 [no]
 
 THE CITY OF NINETY ISLANDS 
 
 absolutely accurate) driven from forty to sixty feet 
 into the sand. 
 
 The difference in ages between the Nieuwe Kerk, 
 just around the corner from the palace, and the 
 Oude Kerk, or Old Church of Amsterdam, is that 
 the Oude Kerk was erected in 1300, whereas they 
 didn't commence work upon the Nieuwe Kerk until 
 a hundred and eight years later. Both were doing 
 their religious duties before America was discovered. 
 Successive conflagrations destroyed different parts 
 of the Nieuwe Kerk and the first service in the build- 
 ing as it stands to-day was not celebrated until 1648. 
 The church contains the tombs of three of Holland's 
 famous fighting admirals, that of Admiral de Ruyter 
 included, in addition to the hermes bust of another, 
 and the mausoleum of a Dutch lieutenant of marines, 
 van Speyk by name, who, during the revolution of 
 Holland, "maintained on the 5th of February, 1831, 
 before Antwerp, the honor of his native flag at the 
 cost of his life " by blowing up his gunboat in the 
 harbor of Antwerp to prevent it from falling into 
 the possession of the enemy. Since 1814 four kings 
 of Holland have taken the oath of the constitution 
 in the Nieuwe Kerk and here, on September 6, 
 1898, Wilhelmina was formally inaugurated Queen 
 of the Netherlands an event recently commemorated 
 by the installation of a handsome stained glass win- 
 dow in the church. Well might the Nieuwe Kerk be 
 said to be the Westminster Abbey of Amsterdam. 
 
 [in]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 Connecting the Dam with the central railway sta- 
 tion is the wide Damrak, part of which was at one 
 time a canal. In the opposite direction wiggles the 
 narrow Kalverstraat, Amsterdam's principal shop- 
 ping street, thronged in the late afternoon and even- 
 ing with that part of the population of the city that 
 isn't sipping coffee in the windows of its cafes. 
 
 Once I had the misfortune to be stopping in Am- 
 sterdam upon the occasion of the Queen's birthday, 
 the 31st of August. This not being sufficient 
 unpremeditated self-punishment, I was provincial 
 enough to have chosen as headquarters what appeared 
 from across the street to be a clean, quiet little 
 hotel in the Kalverstraat. The two blended most 
 harmoniously. Between the unmelodious patriots 
 who paraded the Kalverstraat from sunset to sun- 
 rise, and the battles royal participated in with the 
 ambidextrous entomological specimens among the bed- 
 clothes, I did anything but enjoy a refreshing night's 
 rest. To which tale there are two morals : avoid 
 Amsterdam on the Queen's birthday, and little Ju- 
 liana's as well, and eschew the hotels in the Kalver- 
 straat (one especially, which shall be nameless) as 
 you would the nest of the subtle hornet. 
 
 At the southeastern terminus of the Kalverstraat 
 stands the old Mint Tower of 1620, and still farther 
 to the east is the Rembrandtplein, a small, park- 
 centered intersection of streets named in honor of 
 Holland's painter par excellence, who lived for six-
 
 1 
 
 6 in 
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 g
 
 THE CITY OF NINETY ISLANDS 
 
 teen years at No. 4 Joden-Breestraat in Amster- 
 dam's Jewish quarter, the house having been since 
 marked with a small memorial tablet. 
 
 Here bordering the Rembrandtplein are the larger 
 sidewalk cafes, jammed of a summer's evening with 
 pleasure seeking Amsterdamers, each with a cup or 
 a glass of something in front of him. Like those 
 found in the ordinary German cafes these crowds 
 seldom change. Here you may find the same people 
 at eleven that you have seen at seven, and in exactly 
 the same positions. A cup of coffee followed by a 
 cordial is the usual evening's refreshment programme, 
 the consuming time of which the Amsterdamer 
 will expand into a couple of hours by the assiduous 
 perusal of every newspaper and periodical he can 
 inveigle the waiter to bring him, interrupted only 
 by an occasional sip of his beverage. Even the per- 
 sistent street singers, who come one at a time to 
 prolong the agony and stand but a few feet away 
 from his table, yelling triumphantly into his ear, fail 
 to disturb him in the least. If, unthinkingly, he 
 finishes his refreshment before he considers the time 
 has arrived to go home to bed, he will calmly smoke 
 out the remainder of the engagement. The expendi- 
 ture of half a gulden or less will buy his contentment 
 until the following evening. 
 
 Many of the indoor cafes charge a small admission 
 fee for the privilege of listening to a " lady orches- 
 tra." In each of these that part which is adjacent 
 
 [113]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 to the street will be partitioned off by a dark curtain, 
 so that the patrons of the place may choose, if there 
 be any choice, between the crowds on the street and 
 the vaudeville turns that may be scheduled to follow 
 the sufferings of the musicians. 
 
 On the Rembrandtplein stands also the Rem- 
 brandt theater, Amsterdam's principal playhouse, 
 which, by way of information, is closed in summer. 
 But, by way of further information, there are in 
 the city a number of vaudeville theaters that cater 
 to the less exacting in the matter of histrionic art 
 and are open throughout the year, offering more 
 or less respectable performances. 
 
 To one of these near the Rembrandtplein I 
 wended my way upon a certain evening, desirous of 
 being amused, no matter what the consequences. I 
 obtained my money's worth, and more. It cost me 
 one and a half gulden to get in, and it might have 
 cost me an ear, or other projecting appendage, to 
 get out if I had not slipped through a side exit as 
 inconspicuously as I could during the height of the 
 melee and commenced forthwith to accelerate my 
 gait toward the hotel. I think the disturbance was 
 inaugurated by an American protege of His Pugilis- 
 tic Highness, John Johnson, but I did not consider 
 it exactly safe at the time to tarry longer in order 
 to ascertain definitely. 
 
 It so happened that this particular vaudeville 
 house was in the habit of concluding its performance 
 
 ["4]
 
 THE CITY OF NINETY ISLANDS 
 
 each evening with a series of international wrestling 
 matches, offering a considerable monetary reward 
 to the winner of the finals. The first bout of the 
 evening of my visit was between an Englishman and 
 a Dutchman, which terminated satisfactorily for the 
 latter and with no casualties. The crowd went ram- 
 pant ; whereupon I became imbued with the spirit of 
 the thing, ordered another cup of coffee which, by 
 the way, was served gratis by the management and 
 settled myself more comfortably to enjoy the next 
 tilt between a Frenchman and a Swede. The goug- 
 ings and hair-pullings resorted to by the Latin 
 were not received with complacency on the part of 
 the audience, and when he lost the match, he made 
 his exit with ruffled temper, together with his full 
 share of hisses and catcalls. Then the promoters 
 of the scheme made a managerial mistake. They 
 pitted a bloated Belgian wrestler against the cham- 
 pion of Amsterdam. A brief reference to the pages 
 of any volume reciting the incidents of 1830-31 will 
 convey the correct impression that the Belgians and 
 the Dutch are not the intimate playmates they used 
 to be a fact which in itself precluded the possibility 
 of any amicable settlement of the forthcoming ath- 
 letic imbroglio. 
 
 The Belgian proved to be a past master in the 
 science of hair-pulling and eye-gouging. When the 
 even tempered Dutchman finally turned him on his 
 back he felt called upon to challenge the referee, the 
 
 [us]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 score keeper, the orchestra, the audience, or any other 
 single individual or group of them that happened 
 to be within reach. The crowd hooted the villain and 
 applauded the hero. 
 
 Just at this inopportune moment a dark, ominous 
 cloud, of African parentage, wrapped in a true Ala- 
 bama grin and peg top trousers, blew in from the 
 wings and commenced to congratulate the victor 
 hilariously. In order that the peace respecting repu- 
 tation of the house might be preserved, a brigade of 
 stage hands and ushers rused in double phalanx upon 
 the scene, and, with rather generous turn of mind, 
 attempted to distract the negro's attention and keep 
 him from maiming the Belgian. Ultimately they 
 tried to put the negro out- an inconsiderate proced- 
 ure, to say the least. I once saw the same thing 
 attempted during fair week in Albuquerque, to the 
 demolition of several plate glass windows and the 
 necessary services of half a dozen local surgeons. 
 
 The last I remember they were enticing the negro 
 toward the front door in a none too gentle manner, 
 while the more enthusiastic half of the audience was 
 making for the stage, and the other half, among 
 whom was the writer, for the exits. On my way to 
 the hotel there passed two police vans loaded to the 
 gunwales with a blur of arms and legs. 
 
 The Rijks or Royal Museum stands in a prominent 
 location to the south of the Old Town, surrounded 
 by the more fashionable residence section and the 
 
 [116]
 
 Diamond workers in Amsterdam. In a single year over 
 $13,000,000 worth of the gems were exported from this 
 district to the United States
 
 THE CITY OF NINETY ISLANDS 
 
 Vondel Park. From street floor to gables it is filled 
 with objects of historical and technical interest. It 
 would take just as long to "do" it thoroughly as 
 it would the British Museum in London or the Metro- 
 politan in New York. But the tourist in Holland, 
 usually of limited time allowance, contents himself 
 with a hurried inspection of the different collections 
 in the Rijks Museum and a view of the piece de re- 
 sistance of its picture gallery, namely, the world 
 renowned painting by Rembrandt erroneously styled 
 "The Night Watch." Many having been led to 
 believe, on account of the very marvelous chiaroscuro 
 of the picture, that Rembrandt intended it to repre- 
 sent a street scene at night, its present title has 
 been given universal usage ; but in reality the scene 
 depicted takes place in daylight. It is the largest 
 and most justly celebrated work by Rembrandt, be- 
 ing fourteen and a quarter feet long, and eleven 
 and three quarters feet wide. It was painted in 
 1642, and represents a small company of arque- 
 busiers under Captain Franz Cocq emerging from 
 their shooting gallery, or doele a name so commonly 
 given to Dutch hotels that you will find a " Hotel 
 de Doelen" in almost every town in Holland. The 
 supposed night shadows in the picture are in truth 
 cast by the lofty vaulting of the gallery. The por- 
 traits of the sixteen members of the guild were done 
 from life, and each member represented in the pic- 
 ture paid the artist one hundred gulden, which re- 
 C"7]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 numerated him to the extent of something less than 
 $800 for his labors. To-day the painting could not 
 be purchased at any price. 
 
 Not the least interesting nor most fragrant 
 section of Amsterdam is its Jewish Quarter, situated 
 in the eastern part of the Old Town. The quarter 
 is a typical city in itself, for of Amsterdam's total 
 population more than 60,000 are Jews. It possesses 
 ten synagogues, the largest of which, erected as early 
 as 1670 by the Portuguese Jews and said to resemble 
 as far as possible the ancient Temple of Solomon, 
 stands in the Muiderstraat. Freedom of religion 
 was accorded these persecuted peoples early in the 
 history of Amsterdam, and to Amsterdam as an 
 asylum they flocked, first from Spain in the fourteenth 
 and fifteenth centuries, a little later from Portugal, 
 then from the Spanish Netherlands, from Germany, 
 and from Poland. In the administration and the com- 
 mercial enterprises of the city their wealth wielded 
 much influence. 
 
 Amsterdam is indebted to those Portuguese Jews 
 who emigrated from Antwerp in 1576 for the intro- 
 duction of its most widely known industry, that of 
 diamond polishing an art utterly unknown in 
 Europe prior to the fifteenth century. To-day there 
 are more than seventy diamond polishing establish- 
 ments in and about the city, employing some 10,000 
 men, and they are building a new diamond exchange 
 to cost in the neighborhood of $240,000. The cut 
 
 [118]
 
 THE CITY OF NINETY ISLANDS 
 
 diamonds exported to the United States from the 
 Amsterdam district alone in 1909 the latest figures 
 at my elbow were valued at $13,319,417, in addi- 
 tion to more than a million dollars' worth in the 
 rough. 
 
 The rules of the London syndicate from which 
 every Amsterdam diamond polisher must purchase 
 his uncut stones are equally strict with the regula- 
 tion of the diamond workers' organization. 
 
 In the former case, a diamond polisher must pro- 
 cure an introduction to the London merchant through 
 the de Beers syndicate in order to obtain a " sight." 
 If a polisher is buying diamonds of one class, say 
 Kimberly, he may not under any circumstances ob- 
 tain a " sight " of diamonds of any other class, say 
 Jagerfontein. He may examine the parcel of dia- 
 monds offered to him for a " sight " for fifteen min- 
 utes, no longer. If they do not suit him his trip to 
 London has been of no avail. He must take what 
 is offered or nothing, and at the price quoted. Until 
 five years ago a polisher was punished by not 
 being able to obtain a " sight " for a year if he re- 
 fused to accept a parcel offered for purchase, and 
 he would often pay a premium of $4,000 for another 
 man's packet without seeing a stone. 
 
 With regard to the worker, no one in Amsterdam 
 
 may learn the trade of diamond polishing without 
 
 the consent of the organization and unless he be the 
 
 son of a diamond worker or jeweler. He must be 
 
 ["9] '
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 under eighteen years of age, he must pass a rigid 
 examination, and if he desires to become a cleaver 
 the highest salaried artisan in the diamond industry, 
 whose wages often amount to $120 a week he must 
 pay sometimes as much as $2,000. There are special 
 schools in Amsterdam for turners and polishers which 
 charge an instruction fee ranging from $120 to $150. 
 
 The rough diamond is first cleaved by hand, or, 
 if thought more profitable, it is set in a bar of hot 
 lead which, after having cooled, is placed in front of 
 a phosphor-bronze saw and sawed in half. Whether 
 or not this saw may be used a second time depends 
 upon the crystallization of the stone sawed. Some 
 stones that, after being sawed, are considered too 
 hard to polish, are pulverized and mixed with emery 
 dust to be used in making the saws. The two halves 
 of the original stone are then handed over to the 
 cutters who cut them round, or nearly so, and remove 
 the flaws. The polishers then polish the stones and 
 make their facets, which, in the case of a gem of 
 the first class, number from fifty-eight to sixty-four. 
 
 Amsterdam is also the home of a peculiar institu- 
 tion into the workings of which some of our own 
 municipalities might delve to their advantage. It 
 puts the predatory money-loan shark out of business 
 as effectually as a hydrochloric acid bath would a 
 potato bug. This institution is the municipal pawn- 
 shop, known as the Bank of Leening, of which there 
 are fifteen branches in the city. It has been in 
 [120]
 
 THE CITY OF NINETY ISLANDS 
 
 successful operation for centuries, the first pawn 
 ticket showing the early date of April 29, 1614. 
 Loans are made for six months, and all articles 
 not redeemed at the expiration of that period are 
 sold at public auction. It is interesting to note 
 that among the articles disposed of in this manner 
 in 1909 were 3,427 sewing machines, 1,325 bicycles, 
 and 106 pianos and organs. The maximum loan 
 allowed on a single article is approximately $201, 
 while the low rates charged have been the cause of 
 much anxiety on the part of the independent pawn- 
 brokers, and with the desired results. You may 
 pawn with the Bank of Leening anything from a 
 hair comb to a hair mattress, but it is an acknowl- 
 edged fact that forty per cent, of its business is 
 derived from that well-meaning Dutchman addicted 
 to the habit of wearing his best suit only on Sunday. 
 This he pawns on Monday and redeems on Saturday, 
 until the suit wears out from being passed over the 
 counter. 
 
 One item more to the credit of Amsterdam : all 
 the slaughtering of animals for food must be done 
 in the municipal abattoir, and meat which is brought 
 in from the country must be inspected there before 
 it is offered for sale. The dealers do their own 
 slaughtering and must pay for the use of the abattoir 
 sixty-four, thirty-four, or ten cents, according to the 
 size of each animal slaughtered. Especially con- 
 structed vans then transfer the meat to the shops 
 
 [121]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 of the different dealers. Inasmuch as horseflesh 
 is found on the daily menu of many families in 
 Amsterdam, 5,444 horses were numbered among the 
 150,000 or more animals slaughtered in the municipal 
 abattoir in 1909. Mutton, not being in particular 
 favor with the Dutch for some unknown reason, can- 
 not be bought in many of the meat shops, and there 
 is a large central market in Amsterdam that carries 
 only mutton as its stock in trade. 
 
 The Bank of Amsterdam antedates the Bank of 
 England by almost a century, being founded in 1609. 
 Under the administration of the Amsterdam Corpora- 
 tion, whose executives examined its specie annually 
 in order to verify the statements of its managers, 
 the business world became so confident of its solv- 
 ency that its guaranteed certificates were usually 
 offered at a premium, and as much as $180,000,000 in 
 coin has been held against these certificates at one 
 time. Ever since its establishment it has retained its 
 place as one of the strongest financial institutions in 
 the world. 
 
 [122]
 
 IX 
 
 EXCURSIONS ABOUT AMSTERDAM 
 
 IT is doubtful indeed if any other city in Holland 
 than Amsterdam can tempt the tourist with a 
 greater number of pleasant day's excursions. Ly- 
 ing at the very feet of North Holland a travel 
 territory no larger in area than the state of Rhode 
 Island, but replete with picturesque nooks and 
 corners, congested with types and abounding in pecu- 
 liar customs every part of the province is readily 
 accessible to Amsterdam by rail or by water. Back 
 of its central railway station there is a long line of 
 docks which berth the boats that only await your 
 patronage. Here you may board the large river 
 steamer that takes you to Zaandam in half an hour 
 for the price of one -half of one Dutch cent a min- 
 ute; here you may take the little excursion boats 
 for ports along the Zuyder Zee; here you may en- 
 gage passage to Alkmaar or to The Helder or even 
 to Leeuwarden or Groningen or Zwolle, situate in 
 that unpenetrated part of the kingdom which may 
 be termed the hinterland of Holland; and here you 
 may hire a private yacht or motor boat, master and 
 all, to carry you whither you will and for as long 
 as you wish for as little as five dollars a day in- 
 [123]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 elusive. If you cross the arm of the Zuyder Zee 
 they call the Ij much easier spelled Y by ferry 
 to the Tolhuis you have only to board the steam tram 
 to be rattled across country to Alkmaar, Edam, or 
 Volendam. To Haarlem is but fifteen minutes' ride 
 by rail, while The Hague itself is only an hour's 
 trip in the schnell zug, Zandvoort, on the North 
 Sea, is served by electric train direct from Amster- 
 dam, stopping at Haarlem to break the short journey. 
 
 A favorite excursion for a summer's evening is from 
 Amsterdam by steamer to Zaandam, the most typi- 
 cally Dutch of all Dutch towns. The course of 
 the steamer leads up the North Sea Canal to a 
 point a little beyond the Petroleum Harbor and 
 then turns off into the river Zaan. 
 
 It is in the North Sea Canal that Amsterdam 
 places her only hope of ever being able to compete 
 with Rotterdam as a shipping port. With its fifteen 
 miles of length, its sixty-five to one hundred and ten 
 yards of width, and its thirty feet of depth, this 
 canal pierces the one-time peninsula of North Hol- 
 land from the Zuyder Zee to its western boundary, 
 making an island out of part of the province and 
 placing Amsterdam in direct and easy communica- 
 tion with the North Sea. An " A. P. " gauge along 
 its bank would prove its water level to be about 
 twenty inches minus, that is, twenty inches below 
 the mean level of the water at Amsterdam the 
 bench mark of all water levels throughout Holland. 
 
 [124]
 
 41 
 
 Is 
 ss 
 
 ^ua 
 3 
 
 1 
 I 
 
 a
 
 EXCURSIONS ABOUT AMSTERDAM 
 
 To cut such a canal across country from one sea 
 to another and to protect it at either end with im- 
 mense breakwaters and lock gates has cost the gov- 
 ernment in the neighborhood of $18,000,000 and 
 consumed eleven years of patient labor. Since 1895 
 its western terminus has been divided into two out- 
 lets, the older being protected by a lock of three 
 openings, while the more recently completed branch, 
 diverging a little to the northward from the main 
 canal, has but one opening, 245 yards long, 27 yards 
 wide, and 33 feet deep. 
 
 Zaandam being the home and breeding ground of 
 the windmill, a bird's-eye view of it would give the 
 effect of four inverted centipedes kicking in their 
 death throes. It is the center of the Dutch lumber 
 trade, and since the windmill is the cheapest method 
 of generating the power that any lumber trade re- 
 quires in order to operate its sawmills, Zaandam 
 draws from the breeze what we conjure from steam. 
 There are upwards of four hundred windmills in its 
 immediate vicinity. Its houses, brightly painted 
 with green, red, or white, and surrounded with 
 pleasant little gardens, gayly reiterate the Dutch- 
 man's delight in contrasts, harmonious or otherwise. 
 
 Another of Zaandam's claims to the consideration 
 of the tourist is a little old house near the harbor, 
 that belongs, not to any resident of the town, nor 
 to any man in Holland, but to the Czar of all the 
 Russias personally. It is the house which Peter 
 [125]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 the Great made his domestic headquarters for a brief 
 week in the year 1697 while, as tradition has it, he 
 studied shipbuilding incognito in Zaandam. If the 
 villagers had not made themselves so pestiferously 
 inquisitive and penetrated his disguise a few days 
 after his arrival he might have learned a lot from 
 Mynheer Kalf, under whose competent tutelage he 
 apprenticed himself as a ship carpenter; but the 
 idlers about town became too importunate for Peter. 
 He gave up his position at the end of a week and 
 returned to Amsterdam. 
 
 Volendam, on the west coast of the Zuyder Zee, 
 and the little Island of Marken, just opposite, are 
 the two most advertised and, therefore, the show 
 places in the tourist territory of Holland and enjoy 
 the highest patronage. Both are being rapidly and 
 ruthlessly spoiled in consequence. However, as these 
 are the towns easiest of access from Amsterdam 
 that have retained the costumes and customs which 
 prevailed hundreds of years ago, embellishing both 
 to a certain degree as the signs of the times dic- 
 tate, one feels it his solemn duty, almost, to go there. 
 If the gentle reader has been to Amsterdam and has 
 weathered the many appeals to make a day's trip 
 to Volendam and Marken we should like to have 
 him raise his hand, please, so that we may inquire 
 as to the cause and effect of his superb indifference. 
 It would be worth noting in the minutes of any 
 travel club. 
 
 [126]
 
 EXCURSIONS ABOUT AMSTERDAM 
 
 The head porter of your hotel in Amsterdam 
 a sort of unproclaimed passenger agent himself 
 will try to sell you a round trip ticket to Volendam 
 and Marken in one of the many parties, each at- 
 tended by a conductor, which leave every morning 
 and return every evening during the season. But, 
 if you will bear a personal opinion, that which is 
 interesting under the guidance of the prosaic con- 
 ductor is twice as interesting to explore by yourself. 
 Start as early as you choose, if you can, and get 
 back when you can, if you choose, is the best advice 
 I am able to utter with regard to travel through any 
 country in the world and, on account of its many 
 facilities for getting about and the comparative 
 meagerness of the territory involved, it is especially 
 applicable to Holland. 
 
 Except to obtain a comprehensive view of the great 
 dam at the mouth of the Y, a mile and a quarter 
 in length, which protects the more delicate construc- 
 tion of the North Sea Canal from the ravages of the 
 Zuyder Zee, the trip to Marken made by this route 
 offers little compensation. The same view can be 
 had if you will take the electric car from in front 
 of the station in Amsterdam to the St. Anthonis Dyk 
 and walk a short distance across to the locks at the 
 Oranjesluizen near the north end of the embank- 
 ment. The five openings at this point of the great 
 breakwater permit the entrance and exit of vessels 
 and regulate the depth of water in the canals. Out 
 [127]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 of a total of fifty-six lock gates twenty-two are con- 
 structed of iron. 
 
 Then, too, there seems to be no stability about 
 the weather in Holland, and a voyage up the Zuyder 
 Zee in a cold, drizzling rain does not encourage 
 a pleasant afterthought of the excursion. Upon one 
 trip I made up the Zee in the middle of summer the 
 climate was of about the same temperature as that 
 of a Christmas in Spitzbergen. 
 
 A much more satisfactory route by which to tap 
 these towns is the steam tramway line through Mon- 
 nikendam and Edam, the method of procedure in this 
 case being to take the ferry from the end of the 
 Damrak near the station in Amsterdam to the Tol- 
 huis, or old customhouse, across the Y. 
 
 Here near the Tolhuis is the southern entrance to 
 the North Holland Canal, with its great lock gates 
 a channel which simplifies the boat voyage between 
 Amsterdam and the Helder, penetrating almost the 
 entire length of the province of North Holland, a 
 distance of forty-five miles or more, and dividing 
 into two the island already made by the North Sea 
 Canal. A hundred and thirty feet in width and 
 sixteen feet in depth, it was constructed a half cen- 
 tury before its North Sea predecessor at a cost of 
 about $4,000,000, and its water level at Buiksloot, 
 the first little station on the tram line, about a mile 
 from the Tolhuis, is as much as ten feet below that 
 of the sea at half tide.
 
 EXCURSIONS ABOUT AMSTERDAM 
 
 Broek, a little farther along near the tram line, 
 is reputed to be the cleanest town in the world, and 
 I have not the least doubt that its reputation is well 
 deserved. But its motive is ill chosen: it is clean 
 for a purpose. By its cleanliness it attracts visitors, 
 and so it can scarcely be reckoned as a criterion by 
 which to judge the other towns of Holland. No 
 doubt it was clean long before it ever had any visitors, 
 but since the tourists commenced to hear about its 
 hypertrophied spotlessness, they began to visit it; 
 now the more visitors it has the cleaner it becomes. 
 Like a duck, it is preening itself continuously from 
 dawn till dark. 
 
 From Monnikendam you may take steamer direct 
 for the Island of Marken, but it will be more to 
 your comfort to join the steamer in Marken and 
 return through the canals to Amsterdam by way 
 of Monnikendam. Such a procedure, however, is 
 dependent upon the steamer captain's consent to the 
 proposition; for the boats that ply this route carry 
 excursionists exclusively, so that even if the captain 
 can be induced to accept you as a passenger you 
 may have to pay the full fare for the trip from 
 Amsterdam to Marken and return. 
 
 Once about three and a half centuries ago 
 Monnikendam was included in the list of the most 
 important towns in Holland. In its halcyon days 
 its money chests contained enough bullion to 
 provide for the outfitting of a fleet which it sent 
 [129]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 under spreading canvas up the coast to Hoorn, to 
 demonstrate to the skeptics that a Spanish admiral 
 could be captured in battle, if only the scheme were 
 handled in the proper manner. Long since has Mon- 
 nikendam been relegated to the so-called " dead 
 city " class. It is almost too sleepy to keep awake 
 in the daytime, arousing but once a year from its 
 perennial slumber: when Amsterdam comes on skates 
 to hold an ice carnival. 
 
 Back somewhere in the fourteenth century, when 
 the only maritime means of access to Amsterdam 
 was down the Zuyder Zee, Edam held the strategical 
 position of being its picket port. Since those good 
 old days its 25,000 population has depreciated four 
 fifths in numbers. Were it not for its brand of 
 cheese, flourishing before the gastronomic world a 
 perpetual advertisement of the place, Edam would 
 soon find itself mentioned in the same breath with 
 Broek and Monnikendam. It has a fourteenth cen- 
 tury Gothic Groote Kerk, tremendous in comparison 
 with its population, and a Town Hall in which are 
 preserved the portraits of four or five erstwhile citi- 
 zens of Edam, the respective virtues of whom its 
 present inhabitants still like to mention as if they 
 bore some weight upon the town's past prosperity. 
 
 One of these local celebrities was a man of the 
 name of Osterlen, who, in the 1680's, could boast 
 about a merchant fleet of his own numbering ninety- 
 two sail. Three of the others were Trijntje, Peter, 
 
 [130]
 
 EXCURSIONS ABOUT AMSTERDAM 
 
 and Jan. Tri j nt j e ( the diminutive in this case must 
 have been merely a matter of irony) was said to 
 have been nine feet in height and of proportionate 
 width; Peter grew an ambiguous beard the dimen- 
 sions of which required it to be tied into a knot in 
 order to save it from being stepped on by its master ; 
 and Jan, an immigrant from Friesland who later pro- 
 cured papers of naturalization in Edam a " ringer " 
 we should have called him in small town baseball par- 
 lance Jan's net tonnage was four hundred and fifty- 
 four pounds on the date when he launched himself 
 into the forty-second year of his life. 
 
 At Edam you will scramble into a little sailboat to 
 be propelled by the breeze down the canal for a mile 
 or more to Volendam. Each side of the ditch it 
 isn't much more, if judged by its width; neither is 
 its odor any sweeter is bordered by low-lying fields 
 populated with the black and white bovines directly 
 responsible for the principal industry of that section. 
 They look docile enough at a distance, these cows 
 of North Holland, and they probably are at close 
 range, when it comes to showing the proper deference 
 due an unmolesting human being, but they are notori- 
 ous for their biased aversion to dogs. The dog seems 
 to be their time-honored and ancient enemy, and the 
 mere presence of one in the field can cause a deal 
 of agitation. If its owner accompanies the dog he 
 may be expected to commence a Dutch Marathon 
 almost any minute, because, at sight of him ? the cow 
 
 [131]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 will foreclose with the canine and open speedy nego- 
 tiations with the owner. I have been told that it is 
 unsafe even to walk along the canal bank with a 
 dog, for only during last summer one staid old 
 burgher of Volendam, in so doing, was hooked to 
 death, and two ladies of Edam, while taking an 
 evening walk, had to be hustled into a passing sail- 
 boat and pushed out from shore to escape a similar 
 fate. 
 
 Every ten feet or so, it seems, someone will be 
 fishing, for fishing, more than any other, appears 
 to be the national sport of Holland. No self-re- 
 specting fish would live in some of the canals they 
 fish in, but certain species must be able to survive 
 their density else the proverbial Dutch patience would 
 be soon exhausted. 
 
 The most odoriferous point along the canal from 
 Edam to Volendam is in the immediate vicinity of 
 a duck farm just near the journey's end. These 
 ducks are the amphibious flies in the amber of what 
 is otherwise transparently picturesque. They are 
 farmed throughout Holland, but only for their eggs, 
 which, being too strong even for the Dutchman to 
 relish, are sent to the more cosmopolitan cities or 
 exported into the foreign pastry kitchens. 
 
 Volendam, by reason of the curious costuming of 
 
 its inhabitants, its quaint, narrow main street, high 
 
 above the doorsteps of the bordering brick houses, 
 
 and its picturesque fishing fleet, is the haven of 
 
 [132]
 
 EXCURSIONS ABOUT AMSTERDAM 
 
 artists of all nationalities. One of the most interest- 
 ing picture galleries in the Netherlands comprises 
 the public rooms of the Hotel Spaander, hung with 
 sketches, more or less frivolous, and finished works, 
 more or less serious, done spontaneously by the hands 
 of such illustrators and painters as Phil May, Will 
 Owen, Edward Penfield, William Chase, and Burne- 
 Jones. The back yard of the hotel, which, without 
 the least excuse, it advertises as an " attractive gar- 
 den," is fringed with old buildings, each roof ex- 
 changed within the comparative recent development 
 of the town as an art center for the skylight of the 
 unmistakable studio. 
 
 Sunday, by all odds, is the most advantageous day 
 of the week to visit Volendam. Then are the dresses 
 of its women folk and the breeches of its men, copious 
 as meal sacks, garnished with the jewelry and the 
 silver buckles respectively which have been handed 
 down as heirlooms from mother to daughter, from 
 father to son, even unto the third and fourth genera- 
 tions. Then is the fishing fleet jammed together in 
 the little harbor to spend its accustomed week end 
 of lethargy, each masthead flying its long, narrow 
 pennant a sight which from a distance might be 
 mistaken for a hibernating flock of wild fowl. You 
 would have to use a rifle with an elbow in its barrel 
 to be able to shoot through this patch of pine forest 
 with its top cut off without puncturing one mast 
 at least. On other days of the week Volendam's 
 [133]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 citizens are preoccupied with whatever they have to 
 attend to, but on Sunday they stand around and 
 pose gracefully and easily for the commendation of 
 the visiting public. 
 
 The garb of the male Volendamer is about as 
 characteristic as any regalia in Holland. His round, 
 flat-crowned cap permits the exposure of its owner's 
 bronzed and finely cut features. He wears a loosely 
 tied scarf about his neck, and his shirt or jersey 
 usually displays a large patch cut from another shirt 
 or jersey regardless of any probable ambition to 
 match the patterns. Whenever and wherever the 
 garment wears out, then and there it is patched, and 
 by their patches ye shall know them; that is, you 
 can come within measurable proximity of telling the 
 daily duties of every man by the position of his 
 patches. One will have a livid green patch down 
 the collar bone of a dark maroon jersey ; another will 
 display a different colored sleeve from the elbow 
 down. The Volendamer's trousers extend in a south- 
 erly direction to the tops of the ankles only, and 
 are built with a voluminously exaggerated peg-top 
 effect, so much so that each cavernous side pocket 
 must hold at least a peck, and to be able to find 
 with any degree of proficiency such an insignificant 
 article as a penknife in its depths, the wearer would 
 have to go into early training as a contortionist. 
 Week days he wears klompen, or the ordinary poplar- 
 wood shoes, which may be used for as many different 
 
 [i34]
 
 EXCURSIONS ABOUT AMSTERDAM 
 
 and distinct purposes as the owner's ingenuity may 
 contrive such as amusing the little tots by sailing 
 a klomp across the canal as a boat, or tying one 
 on the end of a rod and offering it to the canal boat 
 master as a receptacle in which to drop the toll 
 as he poles his barge through the locks. The vrouw 
 sees that her " man " removes his klompen before 
 he dares enter the house, and upon each doorstep 
 you will invariably behold one or more pairs, in- 
 cluding, perhaps, those of a visitor in the kitchen 
 paying his respects in his stocking feet. On Sun- 
 days, however, the more fastidious Volendamer will 
 break the monotony by changing the klompen for 
 the more genteel-looking low, leather, pump-like 
 slippers. 
 
 The most distinguishable feature of the Volendam 
 feminine attire from that found on the Island of 
 Walcheren or at Scheveningen, for example, is the 
 immaculate white cap, somewhat of the shape of a 
 miniature miter, terminating at the sides in two 
 stiffly starched points that curl out from the ears 
 like the horns of a water buffalo. The hair is cropped 
 close and, according to the prevailing rules of de- 
 corum, only a fringe of it is allowed to be visible. 
 Never under any conditions should a man see an 
 unmarried member of Volendam's gentler sex with 
 her head uncovered. 
 
 Over in Marken the proper thing to do to com- 
 plete the delusion is to allow one of the many chil- 
 [135]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 dren who pester the passengers upon landing from 
 the boat to lead you to his home, reimbursing him 
 financially to the extent demanded not a very vast 
 sum, in any event. It will be a scrupulously clean 
 little place of one, and not often more than two 
 rooms. It will contain the usual amount of brass 
 work and a nondescript collection of Delft ware. 
 The floor will be brick, the fireplace will have its 
 ingle nooks, and its pot of whatever-it-is suspended 
 over the fire from a crane, will be simmering gently. 
 In the side walls will be built the sleeping accommo- 
 dations, like bunks on a ship, draped with curtains 
 at night and closed to view and air in the day- 
 time by means of paneled wooden doors. This will 
 be about all to see in Marken, and you will be happy 
 enough to be led back to the boat to escape further 
 mercenary moves on the part of the populace. 
 
 The shirt of the male Markener can show as many 
 patches as that of the male Volendamer, but instead 
 of the little round cap he sees fit to favor a sort of 
 derby hat having a two-inch crown. His breeches 
 are of the knickerbocker type, but still very much 
 peg-topped, and his Mompen are sometimes varnished 
 yellow and carved in more or less delicate tracery. 
 Unlike those of Volendam, the women of Marken 
 let the hair grow, plaiting it into two braids which 
 hang down, one from each ear, in defiance to any 
 custom that may obtain across on the mainland. 
 
 [136]
 
 ALKMAAR AND THE HELDER 
 
 IT is as imperative that the traveler through Hol- 
 land should journey from Amsterdam to Alk- 
 maar by canal as it is that he should not overlook 
 the steam tram trip between The Hague and Leyden. 
 The twenty-four and a half miles between the 
 commercial metropolis and the cheese capital of 
 North Holland is made in a little less than three 
 hours. Taking all things into consideration, it is 
 one of the most enjoyable steamboat excursions in 
 the kingdom. Bearing up through the North Sea 
 Canal and the River Zaan, the packet makes its first 
 stop at Zaandam ; then on up the river it winds be- 
 tween the bristling windmills, turns from one canal 
 into another, crosses a small lake, and finally nego- 
 tiates the waterway that leads eventually to Alkmaar. 
 The polders on either hand are far below the level 
 of the water you are steaming over, so that you see 
 no more than the tops of the farmhouses. Although 
 the wake of the passing boat rattles the reeds along 
 the banks, the fishermen concealed here and there 
 among them seem not the least perturbed, but con- 
 tinue to fish with all their might and main, allowing 
 
 [i37]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 the steamer to play what havoc it will with the move- 
 ments and inclinations of their prey. 
 
 Alkmaar, and not Edam, is the geographical and 
 industrial center of the cheese trade of North Hol- 
 land, and the cheese market is the geographical and 
 industrial center of Alkmaar. To give some idea 
 of the length of time they have been marketing 
 cheeses in Alkmaar you will be told upon inquiry 
 that the town weigh-house was constructed in 1582, 
 and for no other purpose than to weigh the cheeses 
 bought and sold at the weekly market. To give 
 some idea of the town's importance as a cheese cen- 
 ter, the astonishing number of forty-odd million 
 pounds of round, golden cheeses are bargained for 
 at the side of the weigh-house in every twelve months. 
 
 In addition to the weigh-house the town boasts 
 of but few historically remunerative objects of in- 
 terest. There is the old Church of St. Lawrence, 
 built in 1470, the surrounding walls and buttresses 
 of which protect a part of the eminent remains of 
 Floris V, Count of Holland and builder of the Hall 
 of the Knights at The Hague, although why they 
 were interred at such a distance to the north of the 
 scenes of his activity is a matter of some conjecture; 
 there are a few relics and mediocre paintings on 
 show in the Municipal Museum ; and there is the old 
 water gate that seems to forbid any farther penetra- 
 tion into the town on the part of the packet from 
 Amsterdam. In history Alkmaar played its solemn 
 
 [138]
 
 ALKMAAR AND THE HELDER 
 
 role by making a stubborn and ultimately successful 
 resistance against the besieging Spaniards in 1573. 
 Five to one were the odds against which the burghers 
 fought and, as at Leyden, the water of the ocean 
 was the all-powerful lever that rewarded the besieged 
 and routed the besiegers. 
 
 As early as daybreak the Friday visitor for 
 Friday is cheese day in Alkmaar will find plenty of 
 activity in the vicinity of the town weigh-house. 
 It is therefore advisable to reach the place the pre- 
 vious Thursday evening, because the unloading of 
 the cheeses and the stacking of them upon the stone 
 pavement of the market square during the early hours 
 of the following morning are among the most in- 
 teresting phases of the whole proceeding. And so, 
 by daylight on Friday, gayly painted farm wagons 
 from the surrounding country already fringe three 
 sides of the market, and every one of them is dis- 
 gorging, two at a time, its load of golden cheeses. 
 On the canal that bounds the fourth side of the 
 square lie berthed a double row of long, narrow boats, 
 also loaded from keel plate to hatch cover with the 
 product of the district. From every point of the 
 compass cheeses are being tossed through the air 
 from the wagons and boats, only to have their flight 
 checked with a smack by the men who catch them 
 and pile them upon the pavement in long, double- 
 decked rows, ten cheeses in width. Later, canvas 
 is thrown over the piles to protect the cheeses from 
 
 [i39]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 the rays of the sun until it is time for the cheese 
 makers and the wholesale commission merchants from 
 the cities, soon to descend upon the scene, to com- 
 mence their dickerings. All through the early morn- 
 ing this unloading continues, its accompanying 
 smacks to be heard half a block away, until perhaps 
 250,000 cheeses have been piled up in neat rows 
 with alleyways between them, across the market 
 square from one edge to the other. 
 
 At half-past nine, half an hour before the market 
 opens, the weighmen, all garbed in immaculate white, 
 meet in executive session in the weigh-house and 
 absorb a ceremonious talking-to by the superinten- 
 dent of the market probably upon the subject of 
 honest weights and the penalties to be imposed upon 
 the unfortunate man caught trifling with the rules and 
 regulations of the game. 
 
 These weighmen constitute a distinct feature of 
 every cheese market in Holland. Their dress may 
 seem ludicrous and their duties a bit undignified, 
 but they go about their calling with all the seriousness 
 of statesmen. Until recently they were divided, one 
 might say, into four colors: red, blue, green, and 
 yellow, as distinguished by their hat bands. Latterly, 
 a fifth color, orange, has been added. In the weigh- 
 house there are five pairs of scales, each pair painted 
 a different color corresponding to the colors of the 
 weighmen. The "red" weighmen must weigh their 
 barrowfuls of cheeses upon the " red " scales ; the 
 
 [140]
 
 ALKMAAR AND THE HELDER 
 
 "blue" weighmen, upon the "blue" scales, and so 
 on. An Alkmaar cheese weighman holds a life posi- 
 tion, is elected by the community, and receives in 
 commissions a certain percentage, determined by the 
 value of the cheeses, of each hundred kilos weighed, 
 or fraction thereof. 
 
 At ten o'clock promptly the heavy sheets of canvas 
 are dragged from the piles. The market is thus 
 officially opened, and for the ensuing two hours the 
 visitor will be treated to some of the shrewdest of 
 shrewd Dutch bargaining. The stolid, unemotional 
 makers of cheeses stand doggedly by their respective 
 piles, while the crafty wholesale merchants flit hither 
 and yon testing. Not a word passes between them 
 other than a surly " how d' y' do " in Dutch. The 
 merchant selects a cheese at random, jams into it an 
 instrument that any competent housewife might mis- 
 take for an apple corer, gives it a twist, pulls it out 
 slowly, and tastes the end of the sample thus taken. 
 What remains of the sample is drawn from the in- 
 strument, slipped back into the parent cheese, and 
 the tester moves along to attack another pile. 
 
 At the end of an hour every merchant on the 
 ground will have tested and tasted every pile of 
 cheeses in itself no small saporific achievement. Not 
 only will he have used the taste test on the different 
 piles, but he will have called upon his other four 
 senses to confirm or countervail its decision. He 
 will have examined cheeses by sight; he will have 
 
 [141]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 held them to his ear and shaken them, as we might 
 an egg; he will have felt of the weight and solidity 
 of them ; and he will have taken long, knowing whiffs 
 of their fragrance. At the end of an hour, then, 
 he is qualified to approach this or that particular 
 dealer and offer him so much per hundred kilos for 
 his cheeses. Then it is that Greek meets Greek. In 
 a moment's time the dull-looking, uncommunicative, 
 apparently unconcerned provincial maker of cheese 
 seems to be transformed into a cunning, canny, clear- 
 headed man of business. The two of them, merchant 
 and maker, stand for a full minute with their right 
 hands outstretched, like a picture of Captain John 
 Smith sealing a treaty with the Indians. Suppose 
 the maker finally agrees to the price offered: with- 
 out uttering a syllable he grips the hand of the mer- 
 chant, and the bargain is closed. If he does not 
 agree, he slaps the merchant's hand a whack that 
 resounds across the square. By eleven-fifteen the 
 walls of the surrounding houses reverberate with 
 what a stranger around the corner might easily sup- 
 pose to be the premature explosion of a number of 
 toy balloons for cheese makers are but human and 
 would rather wait in the hope of being offered more 
 for their stock. Competition is the essence of trade, 
 even in Holland. 
 
 When a bargain is negotiated, they call a pair of 
 weighmen who load the cheeses upon a barrow a 
 queer kind of barrow that resembles more a stretcher 
 
 [142]
 
 ALKMAAR AND THE HELDER 
 
 on sled runners and carry them to the scales to 
 be weighed. After being weighed and their sale re- 
 corded upon the books of the superintendent, the 
 cheeses are loaded back into the wagons and boats 
 to be transferred to the warehouse for shipment. 
 
 The cheese goes through no further preliminaries 
 if intended for native consumption. If destined for 
 export, however, it must needs undergo a peculiar, 
 yet withal a simple process : it must be well scraped 
 and painted over with a thin aniline dye which 
 rapidly turns as it dries to a glorious vermilion. 
 The scraping is done by machinery, but the dyeing 
 is done by hand and with almost incredible swiftness 
 by the men employed in some of the establishments 
 in Alkmaar. 
 
 The question was asked if the dyeing assisted in 
 the preservation of the cheese or helped to keep it 
 immune from mould or corrodings. Not at all. The 
 ultimate consumer across the seas would turn up 
 his nose at an un-dyed cheese and snub it as a 
 cheap imitation. The foreign public demands that 
 the genuine North Holland cheese bear a distinctive 
 hall-mark. That hall-mark is its coat of red dye. 
 Since this province probably supplies a good three- 
 fifths of the 55,000 tons of cheese exported in a 
 single year the reader can imagine what a deal of 
 red dye it takes to satisfy a foreign fancy. 
 
 A distance of thirty miles or more north of Alk- 
 maar lies The Helder, figuratively the top of the
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 kingdom. Geographically, it is only in the same 
 latitude as the most northerly point of Newfound- 
 land at the Straits of Belle Isle, and so there are 
 plenty of towns over in Friesland and Groningen 
 that lie still farther to the north, but these do not 
 have the conditions to contend with that does The 
 Helder. Surrounded on three sides by the waters 
 of the Zuyder Zee and the North Sea, The Helder 
 assumes much of the responsibility of protecting the 
 whole province of North Holland from a general and 
 disastrous inundation. More than any other part 
 of the province, indeed of all Holland, it is exposed 
 to the ravages of the most violent winds, which kick 
 the sea into a maelstrom and pound it with re- 
 lentless fury upon the coast line. 
 
 Here at The Helder may be found the finest fruits 
 of that " big story " of Holland : the constant battle 
 of mere man against an all but omnipotent element 
 water; the romantic, persistent, patient strife of the 
 Hollander to insure as much as possible his own 
 safety and that of the land which he has weaned 
 from the sea from utter and inexorable annihilation. 
 If for nothing else, it is for this "big story" that 
 one should go to The Helder. If the traveler through 
 Holland has not been already duly impressed with 
 the silent, continuous fight of the Dutch for mere 
 existence, he will return from this northernmost prom- 
 ontory of North Holland with augmented faith in 
 the ingenuity and dogged perseverance of the men
 
 .S 
 
 _ o 
 
 " 43 
 
 bo -g 
 3 Q 
 
 H 
 
 t-i 
 <
 
 ALKMAAR AND THE HELDER 
 
 who have made a country out of what once was sea 
 bottom. 
 
 The foregoing preamble is meant to prepare the 
 traveler to appreciate The Helder. If it fails in 
 its mission, it may be all for the best, because the 
 unanticipated often strikes with the greatest degree 
 of accuracy and forcefulness and brands the experi- 
 ence upon the mind, never to be obliterated. 
 
 Disembarking from the train, you will turn in- 
 stinctively to the north through a wide avenue a 
 veritable tunnel through the trees. After crossing 
 the drawbridge that spans the canal at the end of 
 the avenue, you must turn abruptly to the left. The 
 first cross street little more than an alleyway be- 
 tween the houses is barricaded at its farther ex- 
 tremity by a steep, grass-grown embankment that 
 towers almost to the same altitude as the chimney 
 pots of the house tops below. A flight of thirty- 
 one steps ascends to the top of this peculiar em- 
 bankment and you scramble up, expecting to behold 
 on the other side a view of you scarcely know what. 
 You are surprised to discover that the view is a 
 sea-scape, for, if you have failed to observe The 
 Helder's lofty lighthouse, it has not been suggested 
 to you that the sea is anywhere in the neighborhood. 
 
 You will be standing on the top of one of the 
 
 greatest and strongest dikes in Holland, its business 
 
 side stretching away before you at an angle of forty 
 
 degrees for two hundred feet into the Strait of 
 
 [145]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 Marsdiep. Extending a total distance of five miles 
 in the arc of a circle, this, then, is the sloping- buttress 
 that North Holland relies upon for its very life. A 
 severe storm will lash the water of the strait into 
 spray, and fling it across into the windows of the 
 bordering houses, but the highest of tides cannot 
 come over the backbone of the dike, while at all 
 times the water laps restlessly at its foundations. 
 The top of the dike is mounted with a roadway twelve 
 feet in width. Some feet above the water line at 
 low tide the tops of great stone breakwaters, like the 
 ribs of a dinosaur, stretch seaward at regular in- 
 tervals. The whole of this remarkable artificial 
 coast is constructed of Norwegian granite. 
 
 Upon the summits of a few sand dunes that raise 
 themselves here and there behind the dike the Dutch 
 have completed the construction of some rather crude 
 military fortifications which Napoleon commenced 
 in 1811. But improvements upon them are going 
 on apace, for Holland is not exactly anxious to 
 suffer an experience with regard to her string of 
 islands in the north, in furthering German aggran- 
 dizement as did the Danes of Helgoland before the 
 gun muzzles of the British in 1807. 
 
 The single point of North Holland, however, most 
 exposed to sea encroachments is a few miles south 
 of The Helder on the North Sea. Here there is a 
 chain of three great dikes, one beyond the other, 
 named significantly, beginning with the one farthest 
 
 [146]
 
 ALKMAAR AND THE HELDER 
 
 from the shore, " The Waker," " The Dreamer," and 
 "The Sleeper." Still farther to the south, on the 
 same side of the province, are the great sand dunes, 
 three miles in width in some places, under the pro- 
 tection of which the freight boats from Amsterdam 
 creep to their destinations along the North Sea 
 Canal. 
 
 Off the northern dunes the combined English and 
 French fleets of war suffered defeat at the hands 
 of the Dutch admirals, de Ruyter and Tromp, two 
 hundred thirty-eight years ago to the day, as I 
 write (the 21st of August), and in September, 1799, 
 two armies of 10,000 and 13,000, English and Rus- 
 sian troops respectively, commanded by the Duke of 
 York, landed here to try their luck at tempting the 
 Dutch to revolt against the French. The Russian 
 forces lost their way and were defeated by the French 
 before they had advanced as far as Alkmaar, and 
 the British, bearing in mind the comforting old 
 adage about discretion being the best part of valor, 
 retreated after having penetrated as far south as 
 Castricum, near Zaandam. 
 
 In the town of The Helder itself why they refer 
 to it as "The" Helder I do not know, unless it be 
 for the reason that the article makes of it a pseudo- 
 nym for a Dutch John o' Groats in the town itself 
 there is little of interest. One street I have in mind, 
 however, which is of rather peculiar construction. 
 The north side of it, from the middle of what ought 
 [147]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 to be the common roadway, is possibly three and a 
 half feet higher than its south side, the upper part 
 built upon an embankment faced with a brick wall. 
 
 The place is full of Dutch sailors and navy people, 
 for about three quarters of a mile down the dike 
 lies Nieuwediep, the Dutch combination of Hampton 
 Roads, Annapolis, and the Brooklyn Navy Yard. 
 Situated at the mouth of the North Holland Canal, 
 Nieuwediep is the most important naval station in 
 Holland, maintaining large wharves, docks, machine 
 shops, and a naval academy, the students of which, 
 two, four, and six abreast Holland's future Tromps 
 and de Ruyters can be seen strolling up and down 
 the great dike. A fraction of the country's one hun- 
 dred vessels of war and of her 8,000 men that man 
 them receive their orders at the station at Nieuwe- 
 diep. 
 
 Across the Strait of Marsdiep is the Island of 
 Texel,, the most southerly unit of the long series of 
 vertebrae that curve far to the northeast, as if 
 made to fit exactly the coast lines of the provinces 
 of Friesland and Groningen. A steamer plies to 
 Texel from Nieuwediep and returns four times daily ; 
 but you may profitably omit the island from your 
 itinerary unless you are particularly interested in 
 natural history and you happen to come upon Texel 
 during the bird nesting season. The northern ex- 
 tremity of the island, called Eyerland, or " The Land 
 of Eggs," is infested with sea fowl, the eggs of 
 [148]
 
 ALKMAAR AND THE HELDER 
 
 which are collected by the myriads and shipped to 
 the large cities. Texel is seventy-three square miles 
 in area and supports one or two very plain bathing 
 places, but most of its six thousand inhabitants 
 are chiefly engaged in the business of sheep raising 
 on the long, crater-like pasture land hemmed in by 
 the sand dunes. 
 
 [i49l
 
 XI 
 
 FROM HOOEN TO STAVOREN 
 
 IN the matter of ancient buildings, Hoorn is one 
 of the gems of all the towns of Holland. Its fine 
 old harbor tower, its Town Hall, its weigh-house, 
 its Oosterpoort the most prominent remaining fac- 
 tor of the walls that once surrounded the town its 
 assortment of quaint old gateways and entrances, 
 its steep-roofed dwellings and warehouses that lean 
 forward or backward at more acute angles than even 
 the oldest buildings in Amsterdam all combine in 
 contributing to Hoorn a medieval charm that is 
 puissant and irresistible. 
 
 But whatever Hoorn may be noted for as she 
 stands to-day, her name has gone down in history 
 as that of the mother of Dutch navigators. Three 
 of them were famous in their day : Schouten, Tasman, 
 and Coen; and, in the eye of the Dutch nation, the 
 greatest of these was Coen Jan Pieters Coen, the 
 founder of the Dutch dominions in the East Indies 
 and the creator of Batavia as their capital. A statue 
 of him in bronze stands in the Kaasmarkt of the town 
 of his birth. 
 
 Tasman was numbered among the foremost dis- 
 [150]
 
 FROM HOORN TO STAVOREN 
 
 coverers of the seventeenth century. In the year 
 1639 he was assigned to a voyage of exploration 
 by Van Dieman, the governor general of the Dutch 
 East Indies at the time, his cruise leading him to 
 the Western Pacific. After exploring part of the 
 coast of Luzon in the Philippine Islands, he sailed 
 farther to the northward and around Japan, but, 
 discovering no land not already nailed to the flag of 
 some nation, he set sail again for home on October 
 15th of the same year. 
 
 The Hollanders having already discovered and ex~ 
 plored a part of the west coast of Australia, the 
 Dutch East India Company was desirous of obtain- 
 ing fuller and more accurate information about the 
 territory with a view of exploiting its natural re- 
 sources and whatever others the company itself might 
 develop. Accordingly, on August 14, 1642, Tasman 
 was dispatched from Batavia in command of two 
 ships and intrusted with the task of bringing back 
 a full and authentic account of whatever he saw 
 and conquered. Owing to the inaccuracy of his 
 sailing charts, head winds that blew him from his 
 prescribed course, and what not, he went south of 
 his mark, and came upon a hitherto undiscovered 
 country which he promptly named Van Dieman's 
 Land, in honor of his sponsor. But being unaware 
 that what is now known as Tasmania was an island 
 by its own right, he hoisted his flag and set to work 
 exploring what he thought at the time to be the most 
 [151]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 of Australia. He set sail again from the newly dis- 
 covered territory, bearing to the eastward with a 
 vague idea of reaching the Solomon Islands. On the 
 13th of December he discovered a "high, mountain- 
 ous country," which he noted in his log book as 
 " Staatenland." For some unaccountable reason the 
 English have allowed its name to remain as New 
 Zealand, neglecting to change it when they took it 
 over, as they did that of the Dutch colony of New 
 Amsterdam. 
 
 William Schouten, having had an earlier relapse 
 under the spell of the spray, was the first to sail 
 round the southern extremity of South America, his 
 goal being one and the same with that of Henry 
 Hudson, who attempted a supposed route to China 
 from Amsterdam, first by way of the Chesapeake 
 Bay, and later, the Hudson River. Schouten, in 
 passing, christened the point " Cape Hoorn," latterly 
 contracted to " Horn," in honor of his birthplace. 
 
 In addition to these, Hoorn refers proudly to the 
 exploits of another of her sons, John Haring by 
 name, a Dutch Horatius whose signal courageous 
 achievement consisted in holding in check, single- 
 handed, a round thousand of Spaniards, while his 
 compatriots gathered themselves together in order 
 to retreat in a systematic manner at least. 
 
 It took place before Amsterdam in 1573, when 
 the city was held in the grip of the Dons. The 
 Prince of Orange had taken up a position to the 
 
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 FROM HOORN TO STAVOREN 
 
 south of the city, and Sonoy, his general, was en- 
 camped to the north. The operations of both were 
 hampered by the lack of sufficient forces. Sonoy 
 having gone to Edam for the purpose of gathering 
 reinforcements, the Spaniards in his absence made 
 a concentrated attack upon his division entrenched 
 behind the Diemer Dike. Seeing the fight was going 
 against his fellows, Haring of Hoorn, as Motley re- 
 lates, " planted himself entirely alone upon the dike, 
 where it was so narrow between the Y on the one 
 side and the Diemer Lake on the other that two 
 men could hardly stand abreast. Here, armed with 
 a sword and a shield, he had actually opposed and 
 held in check one thousand of the enemy, during a 
 period long enough to enable his own men, if they 
 had been willing, to rally and effectually to repel 
 the attack. It was too late the battle was too far 
 lost to be restored; but still the brave soldier held 
 his post, till, by his devotion, he enabled all those 
 of his compatriots who still remained in the entrench- 
 ments to make good their retreat. He then plunged 
 into the sea, and, untouched by spear or bullet, 
 effected his escape." 
 
 But John Haring survived only to suffer death 
 in the attempt of an equally valiant feat a few months 
 later before the sea-gates of his own native town. 
 
 The siege of Alkmaar having terminated unhap- 
 pily for the Spaniards, they dispatched a fleet from 
 Amsterdam under Count Bossu, to effect the sur-
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 render of Hoorn and Enkhuizen. No sooner had 
 the project been contemplated than the Dutch got 
 wind of it ; Admiral Dirkzoon sailed in command of 
 a fleet of twenty-five vessels, and, having had favor- 
 able winds and weather, bore down upon the Spanish 
 armada near Hoorn. 
 
 "After a short and general engagement," accord- 
 ing to Motley, "nearly all the Spanish fleet retired 
 with precipitation, closely pursued by most of the 
 patriot Dutch vessels. Five of the King's ships were 
 eventually taken the rest effected their escape. 
 Only the Admiral remained, who scorned to yield, 
 although his forces had thus basely deserted him. 
 His ship, the Inquisition, for such was her insolent 
 appellation, was far the largest and best manned 
 of both fleets. Most of the enemy had gone in 
 pursuit of the fugitives, but four vessels of inferior 
 size had attacked the Inquisition at the commence- 
 ment of the action. Of these, one had soon been 
 silenced, while the other three had grappled them- 
 selves inextricably to her sides and prow. The four 
 drifted together, before wind and tide, a severe and 
 savage action going on incessantly, during which the 
 navigation of the ships was entirely abandoned. No 
 scientific gunnery, no military or naval tactics, were 
 displayed or required in such a conflict. It was a 
 life-and-death combat, such as always occurred when 
 Spaniard and Netherlander met, whether on land or 
 water. Bossu and his men, armed with bullet-proof 
 
 [i54]
 
 FROM HOORN TO STAVOREN 
 
 coats of mail, stood with shield and sword on the 
 deck of the Inquisition, ready to repel all attempts 
 to board. The Hollanders, as usual, attacked with 
 pitch hoops, boiling oil, and molten lead. Re- 
 peatedly they effected their entrance to the Admiral's 
 ship, and as often they were repulsed and slain in 
 heaps, or hurled into the sea. The battle began at 
 three in the afternoon, and continued without in- 
 termission throughout the whole night. The vessels, 
 drifting together, struck on the shoal called the Nek, 
 near Wydeness. In the heat of the action the oc- 
 currence was hardly heeded. In the morning twi- 
 light, John Haring of Hoorn, the hero who had kept 
 one thousand soldiers at bay upon the Diemer dike, 
 clambered on board the Inquisition, and hauled her 
 colors down. The gallant but premature achieve- 
 ment cost him his life. He was shot through the 
 body, and died on the deck of the ship, which was 
 not quite ready to strike her flag. . . . At eleven 
 o'clock Admiral Bossu surrendered, and with three 
 hundred prisoners was carried into Holland. Bossu 
 was himself imprisoned at Hoorn, in which city he 
 was received, on his arrival, with great demonstra- 
 tions of popular hatred." 
 
 It was on a feast-day that I came upon Hoorn, and 
 the place was garbed in gala attire. Throughout 
 the morning the hotel stableboys were kept busy 
 tending the horses of rural arrivals, and every stable- 
 yard was congested with wagonettes and carts. 
 
 [155]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 Never have I seen such a variety of vehicles. There 
 was the painted produce wagon with its white canvas 
 cover ; there was the gayly decorated antique " two- 
 wheeler," its body swung upon heavy straps held fore 
 and aft at the ends of great protruding springs ; 
 there was the commodious, shapely cart of plum- 
 colored upholstery, belonging to the "gentleman 
 farmer"; and there was a host of others too numer- 
 ous to describe in detail. 
 
 Hoorn's main street had been roped off, and the 
 bricks covered with a thick layer of sand, in prepara- 
 tion for the series of horse races that was soon to 
 take place up and down its length. Along about 
 noon the Dutch David Harums led their horses down 
 to the improvised race track behind the village band 
 in all its glory, and the festivities were on. 
 
 Running races were of necessity tabooed on ac- 
 count of the danger to life and property the actions 
 of the horse being restricted to such an extent by 
 the limited fairway of the course that, in event of 
 the horse's losing its head, even the side ropes along 
 the street could not restrain it from dashing through 
 the crowd and into the window of the nearest cheese 
 shop. But there were sulky races between the Hal 
 Pointers and the Palo Altos of the district, driven 
 with rope reins by erstwhile jockeys, some of the 
 costumes of whom were no less curious than the har- 
 ness of the horses. Breeches, in some cases, and 
 blouses, in others, looked as if they might have been 
 
 [156]
 
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 FROM HOORN TO STAVOREN 
 
 recently redeemed from many years of confinement 
 in Amsterdam's municipal pawnshop, their public sale 
 having been repeatedly overlooked. 
 
 Riding, instead of driving, would seem with us a 
 less effective method of developing the speed of a 
 trotting horse, and it certainly appears to be a less 
 comfortable one, but ride them they do in many parts 
 of Holland. I can imagine only one reason for the 
 prevalence of the custom, and that is that the trotting 
 horses are so rotund and ponderous that the shafts 
 of no sulky would fit them, and if it did, no driver 
 could spread his lower limbs so far apart as to drive 
 the horse from the sulky's seat. Large and ample 
 as Percherons are some of these North Holland and 
 Friesland horses, with long, well-groomed tails and 
 manes ; but they have a faster gait than they might 
 be given credit for when seen hitched to a cart or 
 a farm wagon. Pads with knee braces, which serve 
 the riders in place of saddles, are strapped to the 
 horses' backs, and they trot the course with but 
 little less action than blue grass Kentuckians. A 
 singular thing is that they seldom " break," their 
 weight apparently holding them to the trot. 
 
 The express trains from Amsterdam to Leeuwar- 
 den make the run in just over three hours and a half, 
 including the ferry passage of an hour and ten 
 minutes across the neck of the Zuyder Zee from 
 Enkhuizen to Stavoren. The line runs through 
 Zaandam to Hoorn and thence to Enkhuizen through 
 
 [i57]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 the richest farming district in North Holland. The 
 farmhouses, somewhat more substantially built than 
 those in the south, resemble what we rather ambigu- 
 ously call "country residences." They have their 
 lawns and their gardens full of flowers, and each is 
 surrounded with its little moat, bridged by a tiny 
 archway which connects the house with the road at 
 but a single point. 
 
 Enkhuizen is the unfortunate victim of what its 
 inhabitants must consider to be a depraved taste for 
 salmon rather than herring. The Rhine salmon has 
 taken the place of the humble herring on the Dutch 
 menu cards, and the town of Enkhuizen has dwindled 
 accordingly. Of its fleet of four hundred herring 
 vessels and its population of 40,000 souls in the 
 seventeenth century, not a single fishing smack and 
 only 6,300 descendants of its earlier inhabitants 
 remain. 
 
 Aside from the magnitude of its one-time fishing 
 industry, Enkhuizen courts the fickleness of fame 
 by being the birthplace of Paul Potter, Born in 
 1625, he painted his most renowned canvas, "The 
 Bull" now in the Mauritshuis at The Hague at 
 the age of two-and-twenty, and died but seven years 
 later only another of the many instances where 
 Death has chosen to lay his hand upon the shoulder 
 of one so young and signally gifted in preference 
 to an octogenarian dullard. 
 
 Waiting alongside the dock station at Enkhuizen 
 [158]
 
 FROM HOORN TO STAVOREN 
 
 will be the side-wheel steamer that ferries the pas- 
 sengers the fourteen miles across the Zuyder Zee 
 to Stavoren in Friesland. The old Dromedary Tower, 
 as they call it, at the harbor, diminishes rapidly into 
 the general skyline of Enkhuizen, and you will be 
 sailing out over what was once a broad isthmus of 
 dry land for the Zuyder Zee was not always the 
 Zuyder Zee. Until the thirteenth century it con- 
 sisted of but a comparatively small inland lake called 
 Flevo. Near the close of that cycle in 1282, to 
 give the exact year the German ocean burst over 
 the land from the north, wiping the lives of 80,000 
 people out of existence and combining itself and 
 Lake Flevo into one, which was henceforth called the 
 Zuyder Zee. Above the ferry crossing, beginning at 
 the eastern end of the little island of Wieringen, they 
 will build the contemplated dam across it, the first 
 process in the reclamation of more than a million 
 acres of what was once a fertile, productive district. 
 
 In pleasant weather it is a beautiful trip across 
 the neck of the Zee, but if the breeze blows from 
 the north, bringing with it the customary cold 
 drizzle of rain, the best method of putting in the 
 time is to go below to the cabin and follow the in- 
 variable custom of the country of eating bread and 
 great, thin slices of Dutch cheese. 
 
 Stavoren is the deadest of all the " dead cities 
 of the Zuyder Zee." At the beginning of the thir- 
 teenth century the merchants of Stavoren were pre- 
 
 [i59]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 potent among the rulers of the world of trade and 
 commerce. Treasures from all the then known 
 corners of the earth lay in their storehouses. The 
 homes of these merchant princes were palaces com- 
 parable only with those of kings and furnished with 
 the sumptuousness and incomputable grandeur of 
 the famous abodes of the Sultan Harun-al-Rashid 
 in the " Arabian Nights." Previously, Stavoren had 
 been the residence of all the Frisian princes. But 
 riches contributed to the pride that came before its 
 fall. To-day the census taker counts its population 
 in three figures and its commerce is not worthy of 
 mention in a trade report. The smoke of the linger- 
 ing express train that will subsequently carry you 
 to Friesland's capital is the only evidence that the 
 town may not be abandoned completely. 
 
 As you sail into the harbor, a wide, grass-grown 
 embankment in front of the town can be seen plainly 
 from the steamer's deck. This is the Vrouwensand, 
 and it recalls the legend that attributes the fall of 
 Stavoren to the whims of a woman. The reader 
 himself must be the judge whether or not the tale 
 is worth the telling. One writer on Holland asserts 
 that no author dealing previously with the country 
 in a literary way has been gifted either with the 
 independence or the imprudence to avoid it. His 
 predecessors have been numerous and illustrious, and 
 if the story be so important that each of them has 
 seen fit to relate it, I can do naught but imitate. 
 [160]
 
 FROM HOORN TO STAVOREN 
 
 Of all the inhabitants of the old city of Stavoren, 
 none was so blessed with riches as the wife of a 
 certain wealthy merchant. Continually bathed in 
 the high lights of smiling fortune, she plucked one 
 by one the treasures that were thrown daily at her 
 feet. She owned everything of intrinsic value that 
 the fabulous wealth of her husband could bestow 
 upon her. But one thing she did not possess, and 
 that was love. Her character was devoid of a 
 woman's tenderness. She was cold, indifferent, super- 
 cilious, insouciant. Exaggerated pride in her own 
 wealth and an undying envy of those whose fortunes 
 dared to compete with hers these were the only 
 passions of her life. 
 
 One day, while acting as hostess at a great ban- 
 quet, a stranger from the Far East was ushered 
 into the room. He had come, he said, to behold the 
 marvelous wealth of Stavoren with his own eyes, and 
 now that he had penetrated into this merchant's 
 house, he felt he had been amply rewarded. 
 
 The merchant's wife, not impervious to flattery, 
 requested the traveler to be seated and to partake 
 of the banquet as her unbidden but welcome guest. 
 He accepted the invitation in part, but asked, ac- 
 cording to the custom of the Orient whence he came, 
 for nothing but some bread and salt. Servants 
 were dispatched to bring both, but returned, say- 
 ing that no such simple articles of food could 
 be found in the house. Thereupon the stranger, 
 
 [161]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 without further word, ate of the costly and unfa- 
 miliar dishes prepared for the banquet. 
 
 After the feast he told of his travels, he expatiated 
 upon the successes and the failures of his life, he 
 discoursed with much eloquent verbiage upon the 
 instability of earthly fortunes, and he prognosticated 
 the ultimate fall of wealth and splendor. His hos- 
 tess became offended, not only because of his con- 
 tumelious belittling the value of riches in her pres- 
 ence and before her guests, but because he had failed 
 thus far to compliment her upon her personal beauty 
 and the luxuries to be found in her home. Before 
 he took his leave he mollified his views to this extent: 
 " O gracious lady," he said, " marvelous indeed is your 
 home and fit for a queen; if you traveled far and 
 near you could not find its equal. But, my lady, 
 among your treasures I miss one thing, and that is 
 the noblest that all the earth produces." He de- 
 parted forthwith, leaving the gathering in a state of 
 perplexity. 
 
 To please the whim of his wife, the merchant dis- 
 patched a fleet of ships to cruise the world until it 
 should find "The noblest thing that all the earth 
 produces," whereupon the fleet's commander should 
 fill the hulls and cover the decks with it and bring 
 it to Stavoren. For months the ships sailed about, 
 touching at one port and then at another, blindly 
 searching for this most costly of all treasures. 
 
 One day a heavy sea came over one of the ships, 
 [162]
 
 FROM HOORN TO STAVOREN 
 
 flooding the 'tween decks and spoiling the provisions. 
 The crew became in need of bread, but there was 
 no flour with which to bake it. The men grew 
 mutinous. The captain saw that neither gold nor 
 silks nor precious jewels could outweigh the value 
 of bread, and the occurrence led him to believe that 
 bread was the most expensive thing in the world. 
 He reported the matter to the commander, who 
 agreed with his specious argument, and the whole 
 fleet hurried to the nearest port, which happened to 
 be Danzig. They loaded the vessels with the finest 
 wheat, and set sail direct for Stavoren. 
 
 When the merchant's wife heard of the nature 
 of the cargo the fleet had brought home, she ordered 
 the wheat thrown into the sea. The poor of the town 
 begged and implored, stormed and reproached, but 
 of no avail; the order of the woman was executed 
 to the letter. 
 
 By and by myriads of blades of grainless wheat 
 commenced to appear above the surface of the water. 
 Their stocks and roots collected the sand as it was 
 washed up by the tides of the German ocean, forming 
 a great sand dune that blocked the port so that 
 vessels could neither enter nor leave. The inhabi- 
 tants of the place were suddenly brought face to 
 face with the fact that commerce, the source of their 
 wealth, had to be abandoned. Poverty and want 
 reigned where riches ruled before. The wife of the 
 once wealthy merchant wandered about from village 
 [163]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 to village, begging the bread which no one who had 
 heard of her improvidence would give her. She suf- 
 fered death from utter starvation. Then one night 
 the sea began to boom and, bursting over the dunes, 
 buried the town forever. 
 
 To this day the more superstitious of the fisher- 
 folk who ply their vocation along that coast of the 
 Zuyder Zee talk of the wonderful sunken city of 
 Stavoren and how its pinnacles and palaces at the 
 bottom glitter up through the pellucid waters under 
 the rays of a summer's sun. 
 
 [164]
 
 .2 B 
 
 
 
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 3 
 
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 -2U,
 
 XII 
 
 FRIESLAND AND ITS CAPITAL 
 
 EEU WARDEN is the most important town in 
 Friesland ; therefore its capital. Also it is the 
 only place in the province that is really worth a 
 protracted visit. On the way from Stavoren you 
 may wander up the coast a short distance to Hinde- 
 loopen, once famed for its highly decorated furniture 
 and the many-colored costumes of its natives ; you 
 may stop off at Sneek and see its stadthuis and its 
 waterpoort, better examples of which you will have 
 already seen in North Holland; you may journey 
 over to the coast town of Harlingen a much less 
 interesting fishing port than Volendam breaking 
 the trip at Franeker to see the wonderfully ingenious 
 astronomical model of the workings of the solar sys- 
 tem which took one of the more inventive citizens 
 of the place, Eise Eisenga by name, seven years to 
 construct; but all of these especial features, and 
 more, can be seen and studied in Leeuwarden. 
 
 When you enter the interior of Friesland you will 
 be penetrating one of the three or four provinces 
 of Holland that are not overrun with tourists. 
 Even in its capital an American is more or less of 
 
 [165]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 a curiosity and he may expect to be stared 
 at until the people stumble over each other, almost, 
 in their well-meaning efforts to divine his nationality ; 
 but he may console himself in the thought that they 
 will be just as curious, if not as humorous, to him 
 as he is to them. 
 
 Before the time of the terrific geographical con- 
 vulsion responsible for the formation of the Zuyder 
 Zee, there had been but one Friesland, stretching 
 over much of the entire territory later known as that 
 of the Dutch Republic, including Holland. Its in- 
 habitants, the Frisians, were renowned throughout 
 Europe for their physical prowess. Imbued with an 
 unquenchable love for political independence, they 
 had shaken off the yokes of the imperial counts and 
 had formed the league of the seven " Sea Lands " in 
 the eleventh century. After being subjugated for 
 a time by Charlemagne, they suddenly rebelled, and 
 in 1256 defeated and put to death the German king, 
 William II of Holland. When the German ocean 
 rolled in over the land, engulfing considerably more 
 than a thousand Frisian villages, it separated kindred 
 peoples, creating not only a geographical but a polit- 
 ical chasm between them. West Friesland became 
 absorbed in Holland, but East Friesland continued 
 its career as a confederation of independently gov- 
 erned maritime provinces, until Saxony, hard pressed 
 for funds, sold its sovereignty to the house of Austria 
 for a paltry 350,000 crowns. 
 [166]
 
 FRIESLAND AND ITS CAPITAL 
 
 Then Charles V, Count of Holland, Emperor of 
 Germany, King of Jerusalem, Sicily, and Spain, 
 Duke of Milan, dominator of much in Asia and 
 Africa and " autocrat of half the world," established 
 his predatorial authority, and "this little country, 
 whose statutes proclaimed her to be * free as the 
 wind as long as it blew,' whose institutions Charle- 
 magne had honored and left unmolested, who had 
 freed herself with ready poniard from Norman tyr- 
 anny, who had never bowed her neck to feudal chief- 
 tain, nor to the papal yoke," finally forfeited her 
 independent existence. Her peoples are the only 
 Germanic tribe that have preserved an unaltered 
 nomenclature since the time of the Romans; they 
 will be Frisians to-morrow, as they were the day 
 before yesterday. 
 
 The most prominent and characteristic feature of 
 the Frisian costume is the headdress of its women 
 in fact, it is the only one extant worthy of any 
 notice whatever, for the remainder of the make-up, 
 not only of the men but of the women also, is com- 
 monplace and unattractive. This headdress consists 
 of a kind of metal skullcap, as often made of gold 
 as of silver, fitting closely at the temples and em- 
 bellished at these points with a pair of spiral orna- 
 ments. Over this is worn a cap of white or light 
 blue lace, having a so-called " tail piece " dangling 
 down the back of the neck like the scoop of a fireman's 
 helmet. On top of all this, many of the women 
 
 [167]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 as if their violent efforts to adapt the modern were 
 wrestling with a series of sturdy determinations to 
 retain the antique will crown the sublime with the 
 ridiculous by wearing an old-fashioned black " poke 
 bonnet," with the strings tied in a bow under the 
 chin. These gold and silver head-pieces are handed 
 down from one generation to another, and the gold 
 ones, especially, are expensive; but that item does 
 not curb the desire and ambition of every mother's 
 daughter in Friesland to own one, where the usual 
 heirloom has not been forthcoming. 
 
 An admirable collection showing the evolution of 
 the Frisian metal skull plate is on view in the Frisian 
 Museum in Leeuwarden. Adapted first as a kind of 
 hair ornament of two coin-sized flat pieces connected 
 simply by a thin wire, its size developed gradually 
 until the two small termini became consolidated into 
 a single large one that covered the entire head of 
 the wearer. The latest specimen in the Museum is 
 decorated in front with a diamond-studded brooch, 
 the whole costing in the neighborhood of $1,200. 
 
 The Frisian Museum in Leeuwarden contains also 
 about the most valuable and comprehensive collection 
 of old Delft, Chinese, and Japanese ware in Holland, 
 tastefully cabineted in one of the large rooms on the 
 ground floor. To the connoisseur in such matters 
 this room is a treat that cannot be overlooked with 
 impunity, for the character of its contents is un- 
 paralleled and its value indeterminable. Shelf after 
 
 [168]
 
 Leeuwarden's structural curiosity is the Olde-Hove, an unfin- 
 ished church tower of brick, leaning with all the abandon 
 of Pisa's Tower
 
 FRIESLAND AND ITS CAPITAL 
 
 shelf there are of the most delicately tinted tea 
 sets and table services, vases and urns of every de- 
 scription, and the wooden columns that support the 
 floor above are hung with graduated festoons of 
 plates and saucers, so that it would take the greater 
 part of a week to inspect them all. 
 
 On the second floor are a number of tiled rooms 
 furnished in authentic sixteenth and seventeenth cen- 
 tury style, even to the sleeping bunks in the walls 
 and the miniature ladders that once assisted in climb- 
 ing into them. The models of these and most of their 
 furnishings were found in Hindeloopen. To increase 
 the realistic effect of these apartments the authorities 
 have introduced groups of three or four stuffed 
 figures attired in the costumes of the period, posed 
 in front of the fireplace or about a center table, but 
 they are so stiff and ludicrous-looking that they might 
 well be dispensed with, and their costumes shown to 
 better effect behind the glass of a cabinet. In the 
 basement can be seen a few rooms finished and out- 
 fitted with the domestic and culinary implements of 
 the same centuries. 
 
 In addition to all these there are two adjoining 
 rooms on the second floor of the Museum containing 
 old furniture and decorations bequeathed to the State 
 by the artist Bisschop. The most conspicuous ob- 
 ject in one of these rooms is an immense cabinet of 
 beautifully carved oak, black and glossy with age, 
 that would excite the envy of any lover of the antique. 
 
 [169]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 Built in 1610, it was purchased thirty-five years ago 
 by Bisschop for something like twelve or fifteen dol- 
 lars; to-day it has a valuation of $2,000. On its 
 top stand two pieces of old Delft for which the artist 
 originally gave as little as ten gulden. 
 
 The remaining rooms of the Museum contain col- 
 lections of Roman and Frisian coins and medals, 
 Roman curiosities found in the neighborhood, fine old 
 silver plate and flagons, remarkably carved ivory 
 hunting horns, and, since the early Frisians were 
 alleged by some to be the first pipe smokers in Eu- 
 rope, an instructive conglomeration of pipes and 
 tobacco pouches and all the accessory appurtenances 
 necessary to the full enjoyment of the weed. 
 
 The Chancellerie, a large building just around the 
 corner from the Museum, erected in the reign of 
 Philip II and used originally as a law court, still 
 serves the government by housing the national 
 archives and the provincial library. With its hand- 
 some Gothic fa9ade, this building is Friesland's archi- 
 tectural masterpiece and one of the best preserved 
 of ancient buildings in all Holland. In forceful 
 contrast to it is Leeuwarden's structural curiosity, 
 an unfinished church tower of brick, called the Olde- 
 Hove, one hundred and thirty feet in height and 
 marking the western boundary of the city proper. 
 Just when it will take it into its head to topple over 
 is a problem of uncertain solution, but, judging from 
 this Dutch Leaning Tower of Pisa's utter disregard 
 
 [170]
 
 FRIESLAND AND ITS CAPITAL 
 
 for the perpendicular, it looks as though it might 
 bury a part of Leeuwarden's pretty park under its 
 debris almost any minute. 
 
 The city of Leeuwarden is entirely surrounded by 
 the cobra-like coil of a wide canal, the quays of which 
 afford loading and unloading facilities for the many 
 boats that ply to and from Leeuwarden from and to 
 almost every point in Holland. Along the north 
 and west edges of this canal on the town side they 
 have planted lawns and flower beds on the site of the 
 old city bastions. And, speaking' about flower beds, 
 the largest.geraniums I think I ever saw were grow- 
 ing in a little plot near the station in Leeuwarden; 
 each cluster of blossoms seemed as great in diameter 
 as the head of a small cabbage. Friesland is also 
 the land of begonias, but in Groningen the plants 
 seem to bear a larger flower than they do in Leeu- 
 warden. 
 
 Distant as it is from the great centers of Dutch 
 life and activity, Leeuwarden seems of more recent 
 vintage than any city of its size you will have seen 
 so far in the Netherlands; its types are fewer than 
 in almost any town on the other side of the Zuyder 
 Zee and its old buildings and churches are less numer- 
 ous. Most of the former they have adapted to mod- 
 ern usage, and even the old weigh-house that stands 
 severely alone beside the canal in the Waagsplein 
 has been turned into a fire station. The canal that 
 sweeps through the town from west to east is lined 
 [171]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 where the space permits with little colonies of shops 
 on wheels, built of corrugated iron and capable of 
 being closed at night against the mischievous pranks 
 of young Holland peripatetic shopping and market- 
 ing districts, offering anything and everything for 
 sale that may be found in the permanent stores. 
 
 Hotel accommodations, however, are more provin- 
 cial. In the dining-room everyone is seated at one 
 long table, as in the smaller hotels in The Hague, 
 so that an ordinary mealtime looks more like a ban- 
 quet. The business and social phases of the hotel 
 are conducted in one large room wherein the men 
 gather after dinner to sit and smoke, read, or play 
 chess. Here in a corner at a little desk holds forth 
 the head waiter. Although he is the functionary who 
 assigns you to your room and to whom you pay your 
 bill, he is not so preeminent as the head waiters 
 of most of the hotels in the south, for the proprietor 
 usually shows a preference to manage the place ac- 
 cording to his own ideas. As a general rule he will 
 do his own marketing and, if conditions require it, 
 he is not above helping to wait upon the table and 
 making himself useful in many other ways. 
 
 Not far from Leeuwarden, in the village of Don- 
 rijp, was born, in 1836, one of Holland's most emi- 
 nent modern artists, although a naturalized subject 
 of Great Britain since 1873 Sir Laurens Alma 
 Tadema, some noted examples of whose work are to 
 be seen in the Mesdag Museum in The Hague. 
 
 [172]
 
 FRIESLAND AND ITS CAPITAL 
 
 Another town, Marssum, a few miles distant, is 
 famous as the center of the cattle district, and dealers 
 and breeders come to some of the large farms in the 
 vicinity from all over the world, including America, 
 to purchase blooded Frisian stock. Indeed, all along 
 the thirty-three miles of railway between Leeu- 
 warden and Groningen the pastures are dotted with 
 fine, healthy-looking black and white cows. Each 
 field being surrounded by a small canal eight or 
 ten feet in width, the cattle may be segregated, one 
 herd from another, by simply closing the gates on top 
 of the narrow hills that lead across the intervening 
 canal from one pasture to its neighbor ; thus the labor 
 and expense of building fences is saved. As much 
 as North Holland is noted for its cheese, just so much 
 is Friesland famed for its butter, and between 130,- 
 000,000 and 140,000,000 pounds of it are churned 
 annually. The conditions of the trade are excep- 
 tionally sanitary and at all times under government 
 inspection. 
 
 Here and there through Friesland in fact, 
 through almost any part of the Netherlands you 
 will see a high wooden tripod topped with the usual 
 cartload of debris that constitutes a stork's nest; 
 for the stork, be it remembered, is the national bird 
 of Holland, and if the farmhouse offers no suitable 
 place, such as a chimney pot, for example, for the 
 stork to build its summer home, the farmer is wont 
 to court the luck that a nesting stork about the place 
 
 [i73]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 is thought to be sure to bring, and builds a nesting 
 place for it. 
 
 They wend their migratory way northward, these 
 storks, from the interior of Africa near the sources 
 of the Nile, and make their appearance in Holland 
 contemporaneous with the first signs of approaching 
 spring. Their coming is regarded as a veritable 
 Godsend by the Netherlander and the various Dutch 
 journals feature the "stories" of first reported 
 arrivals, and devote to them an amount of space com- 
 mensurate with the importance of the event, while 
 any decrease in the numbers of the birds is quickly 
 observed and promptly linotyped. 
 
 When the storks, so high in the air that they 
 appear as mere specks, approach the familiar scenes 
 and nesting places of previous summers, they descend 
 to the earth in pairs to hunt about for their old 
 abodes. Having finally discovered these, a deal of 
 repairing will have to be done to render them once 
 more habitable. Both the male and the female labor 
 with a great deal of energy and no little re- 
 sourcefulness in the reconstruction of the old nest, 
 collecting sticks and twigs, and weaving them to- 
 gether with much mathematical precision. Endowed 
 with no vocal power of calling each other or criticis- 
 ing their work, their silence while at the task is punc- 
 tuated only with a comical snapping of bill and a 
 suggestive flapping of wings. If a certain pair has 
 been a little premature, perhaps, and chosen, not
 
 FRIESLAND AND ITS CAPITAL 
 
 always by mistake, another pair's nest, the ensuing 
 imbroglio often results in such a complete destruction 
 of the point at issue that both pairs instead of one 
 must build anew. 
 
 The story of the " Stork's Judgment " is one of 
 the best known among the Dutch with regard to these 
 birds. It is that in the fall, prior to the departure 
 of the storks for southern climes, all the old and 
 decrepit ones, too weakly to stand the long trip, are 
 killed off so that the general migration may not be 
 delayed or impeded. Another belief held by the 
 Hollander, more or less a child of the imagination 
 but not without at least a tinge of fact, is that among 
 the stork communities a certain number of picked 
 birds are detailed each season to act in the capacity 
 of a regular police force to preserve the peace and 
 protect the interests of the colony at large. 
 
 A stork's nest on the roof serves, according to the 
 superstitions of many Dutch farmers, as a prevention 
 to the ravages of lightning and the contraction of 
 contagious diseases by their families. Misfortune in 
 some form or other is sure to follow if the stork does 
 not see fit to nest somewhere near the house, and 
 simply because of this, land holders have been known 
 to pack up, bag, baggage, and agricultural imple- 
 ments, and move into another district. 
 
 [175]
 
 XIII 
 
 THE HINTERLAND OF HOLLAND 
 
 IF Friesland be considered the frontier of Holland's 
 tourist territory, the provinces of Groningen, 
 Drenthe, and Over-Yssel certainly constitute its 
 hinterland. 
 
 With the exception of one or two towns they lack 
 the symmetry of scenery, the quaintness of costumes, 
 the masterpieces of art that adapt the provinces 
 west of the Zuyder Zee to intensive sight-seeing, so 
 to speak, while their peoples differ in manner so 
 much from those in the west that you seem to be 
 traveling through another country altogether. Old 
 buildings they have in plenty, and rural and urban 
 beauty spots may be discovered here and there, but 
 taken by and large, they offer fewer attractions for 
 and cater less to the invasion of the tourist than any 
 portion of Holland. 
 
 For the above reason, in planning a trip through 
 this land of the brave and the home of the sea, 
 it might be well, if practicable, to tap these three 
 provinces at the beginning, embellishing first impres- 
 sions by reversing the time-honored route and return- 
 ing, instead of advancing, through North and South 
 
 [176]
 
 THE HINTERLAND OF HOLLAND 
 
 Holland, Utrecht, North Brabant, and Zeeland, and 
 spending a profitable day at least on the Island of 
 Walcheren as a kind of tasteful cordial after the 
 seven course tour. 
 
 Groningen, the capital of the province of the same 
 name, shares the distinction with Leyden and Utrecht 
 in being one of the three university towns in Holland. 
 Although twice as large as Leeuwarden, it is barely 
 half as interesting. It seems, too, a vastly more 
 modern place, with its trolley service, its large assort- 
 ment of wide streets, its apparent dearth of silent 
 canals, while its narrow, busy Heerestraat emulates 
 the examples set by the Kalverstraat in Amsterdam 
 and the Spuistraat in The Hague. 
 
 Its university, established in 1614, is attended by 
 half a thousand students, and has within recent 
 years moved into more commodious and modern 
 quarters in the form of an appropriate and hand- 
 some building erected in 1850. Among the treasures 
 of its library, housed in a separate building, is to be 
 found a copy of the revised New Testament by 
 Erasmus, bearing marginal annotations in the hand- 
 writing of Martin Luther. This much for learning. 
 With respect to art, Groningen is the birthplace of 
 two of Holland's best known modern painters, H. W. 
 Mesdag and Josef Israels, the latter being especially 
 distinguished for his ability to record upon canvas 
 the sadder aspects of humble life. At the advanced 
 age of eighty-seven this master of his craft died 
 [177]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 during the past summer in The Hague, where he had 
 resided for a number of years. 
 
 At the foot of the tower of the church of St. 
 Martin on the edge of the market square stands the 
 old regthuis, a small brick building of early sixteenth 
 century erection, lately restored and put into use as 
 a guardhouse. With its green and white shutters 
 of diamond design it looks strangely out of place 
 as the opponent of a building of such conglomerate 
 architecture as the columned stadthuis, on the west- 
 ern side of the square. Grain being one of the 
 staple commodities of the place, one end of the 
 visch-markt is bounded by the corn exchange. Be- 
 hind this stands the Aa-Kerk, of Gothic construction 
 and thirteenth century origin. And, as is the habit 
 with many of the towns in this section of Holland, 
 Groningen has made the most of the site of her old 
 ramparts and city fortifications by transforming it 
 into a public park. 
 
 Without the least savor of favoritism, Groningen 
 might easily capture the palm for supporting about 
 the most uninteresting market in Holland. Held in 
 the great square that serves the town as a center for 
 outdoor business transactions and trolley service, it 
 is a market of everything and a market of nothing. 
 It looks as if all the shopkeepers had put up tents 
 and transferred their stock from their shops to the 
 street. Here they sell anything from cucumbers to 
 cocoanuts, from stepladders to safety matches a 
 [178]
 
 THE HINTERLAND OF HOLLAND 
 
 nondescript assortment of edibles, cooking utensils, 
 secondhand clothing, cheap crockery, old books, and 
 umbrellas. There are no types to speak of, and the 
 place reeks with the essence of small and insignificant 
 bargaining. The hotel at which I registered in 
 Groningen was centrally located too centrally, in 
 fact on the market square. Just in front along the 
 curb a purveyor of dried fish held forth in his tent. 
 The breeze was blowing gently, and the hotel stood 
 to the leeward of the dried fish purveyor. As Sam 
 Bernard would say, " Sufficiency ! " 
 
 The railway line from Groningen down through 
 Assen and Meppel to Zwolle penetrates a flat, barren, 
 unattractive-looking country which, in places, might 
 be mistaken for the " meadows " near Atlantic City. 
 The roadbed of the railway itself is the worst in the 
 world at least I think it is the worst in the world, 
 although the allegation may arouse the envy of one 
 or two Mexican roadbeds that I am no longer on 
 speaking terms with, each of which claims the same 
 distinction. The engineers who were responsible for 
 this piece of track, through a perfectly flat country 
 with no curves or grades to cope with, could hardly 
 have done much worse. It is even beyond the powers 
 of the imagination how they contrived to make it as 
 bad as it is. Its construction reminds one vaguely 
 of the story of the "jealous pie," whose top and 
 lower crusts grew jealous of each other for fear 
 something might come between them. So with this
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 railway. If one rail bulges outward a little the 
 other rail bulges inward sympathetically. And 
 it is fortunate that they are so attached to each 
 other, because if one rail bulged outward and the 
 other rail likewise bulged outward at the same point 
 we might not be here to tell of it. 
 
 Neither is the tediousness of the two-hour ride 
 relieved at all by the congeniality of one's traveling 
 companions. For the information of the prospective 
 tourist through Holland it might be well to state in 
 this connection that smoking is only forbidden in 
 those few and far-between compartments of the rail- 
 way carriage marked " Niet Rooken." In all others, 
 whether labeled " Rooken " or not, whether occupied 
 by men, women, or children, smoking is not only per- 
 mitted but encouraged; and however vigorous and 
 healthy a Hollander may be, his one weak point is 
 his aversion to ventilation. In this matter he may 
 be likened to the elephant afraid of a mouse. Con- 
 sequently, the first move he makes when he enters the 
 compartment is to close both windows. If he lacks 
 the boorishness to reach over deliberately and try to 
 curtail your supply of fresh air, which is not often, 
 he will huddle himself in a corner as far from the 
 offending draft as possible, and eye you up and down 
 for your failure to appreciate his position. 
 
 For the full distance from Groningen to Zwolle I 
 traveled in the same compartment with three of the 
 most rabid stale air agitators I have ever run afoul 
 
 [180]
 
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 o 
 H
 
 THE HINTERLAND OF HOLLAND 
 
 of. To make matters worse, one was highly per- 
 fumed with a mixture of musk and mint, and wore 
 the nails of his little fingers long half an inch would 
 not be an exaggeration as some sort of a mark of 
 caste, possibly borrowed from the Chinese. During 
 the trip they tried to make things as blithe and agree- 
 able for me as possible although with the opposite 
 intent, judging from several remarks which I finally 
 succeeded in translating by giving a variety of imi- 
 tations of various barnyard animals because I guarded 
 one open window with my life. 
 
 All through the province of Drenthe the sources 
 of another industry in which little Holland is pre- 
 eminent may be seen from the car windows the 
 great peat bogs. Upon peat the Dutch housewife 
 must rely for her fuel, for the coal mines in the 
 Netherlands are next thing to null and void ; so the 
 preparation of peat has become at once an art and 
 an industry. Towns and hamlets are named for it 
 " veen " with an appropriate prefix. It is as indi- 
 gent to Holland as the wild turkey to the mountains 
 of Virginia. But, instead of striving to eliminate 
 as quickly as possible a very essential natural re- 
 source, the Dutch have developed the scientific culti- 
 vation of peat and made the vast bogs into almost 
 inexhaustible producers of fuel. 
 
 The lighter, more fibrous peat, laagveen, in Dutch 
 found several feet in thickness in the eastern part 
 of Groningen, all through Drenthe, and even stretch- 
 
 [181]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 ing well across the German border is contrasted 
 with the dry peat, or hoogeveen, underlying a thick 
 layer of clay. In the case of the latter, the layer 
 of clay is removed carefully, the peat is dredged from 
 under it, and what water remains is drained off. 
 The peat is then spread upon the ground and worked 
 by foot pressure until the process, assisted by ex- 
 posure to the sun, brings it to a certain consistency. 
 It is then cut into convenient lengths, stacked, and 
 allowed to dry. In the meantime the layer of clay 
 has been mixed with sand, replaced, and planted with 
 crops. With respect to the bog peat, the fen is first 
 surrounded with a canal for drainage purposes ; also 
 the plant putrefaction is assisted by successive re- 
 formations of soil from city refuse, laden with which 
 the peat boats return to the fens. 
 
 The bait with which Assen, the capital of the 
 province of Drenthe, should lure the tourist to stop 
 off, if only between trains, is the church of an ancient 
 nunnery suppressed during the Reformation. This 
 relic, with a fragment of the old cloisters still attached 
 to it, has been transformed into Assen's Town Hall, 
 and forms a part of the adjoining provincial offices 
 erected on the site of the nunnery. The great tu- 
 muli, or so-called "giants' caves," within half an 
 hour's drive from Assen, and marked with huge 
 boulders borne down by the glaciers from Scandi- 
 navia, are of interest more to the profound archeolo- 
 gist than to the ordinary sight-seer. 
 
 [182]
 
 THE HINTERLAND OF HOLLAND 
 
 Meppel, farther down, is a peat town of no artistic 
 or historical importance, although it is the junction 
 of the peat and the butter routes through the hinter- 
 land. From it the traveler may journey up through 
 the butter district direct to Leeuwarden, or he may 
 break through the peat country on another line to 
 Groningen. 
 
 Zwolle, the first stop below Meppel, is an attrac- 
 tive town, but with fewer types even than Groningen. 
 Here the familiar windmills and wooden shoes begin 
 to diminish perceptibly in numbers. With its 32,000 
 inhabitants, Zwolle is but a shade smaller than Leeu- 
 warden. It is the capital of the province of Over- 
 Yssel and was the birthplace of Gerard Terburg, one 
 of Holland's celebrated seventeenth century wielders 
 of the brush and crayon. But like too many other 
 towns in the Netherlands, Zwolle has been so short- 
 sighted and so remiss in her duty that she has failed 
 to preserve for public appreciation a single example 
 of the work of her most famous son. 
 
 The most striking architectural feature of the 
 town is her old Sassen-Poort, or Saxon gateway, the 
 five Gothic spires of which tend to relieve any 
 monotony of city skyline. It stands but a short dis- 
 tance from the station, framed behind a green mat 
 of trees that lends a pleasant contrast to its diamond 
 window shutters of delicate blue and spotless white. 
 The modern stone bridge across the canal just in 
 front, although forming rather an inappropriate 
 [183]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 approach to the old tower, is one of the most artistic 
 in all Holland. 
 
 Upon a certain warm, sunlit morning I crossed 
 this bridge and turned down along the canal, fol- 
 lowing one of the many labyrinthian pathways under 
 the spreading trees. Soon I came upon what anyone 
 on not too familiar terms with the customs of the 
 country might have supposed to be a public cafe. 
 It was neither fenced nor hedged in, and the path I 
 was following led straight as a die to its low, broad 
 veranda, carpeted and freely sprinkled with com- 
 fortable wicker chairs. Little round tables were scat- 
 tered here and there, and I concluded that the place 
 lacked nothing for the enjoyment of a glass of liquid 
 refreshment. 
 
 Accordingly, I followed the course of least re- 
 sistance, and presently found myself reclining deeply 
 and luxuriously in one of the wicker armchairs on 
 the veranda. 
 
 After a short struggle, my thirst overcame my 
 lethargy, and I summoned enough energy to push a 
 convenient electric button. 
 
 No response. 
 
 A second, and then a third push at the button. 
 
 Still no response. 
 
 As a drastic last resort, I arose with no little 
 effort, and wended my angry way into the building 
 to ascertain the cause for such delinquent service. 
 
 I was approached by a gentleman who, having 
 [184]
 
 The best of Kampen's gateways, of which architectural features 
 the town originally possessed seven
 
 THE HINTERLAND OF HOLLAND 
 
 observed my impatience, had come to my rescue from 
 his little secluded comer in the reading room. 
 
 In my very best Dutch my vocabulary consists 
 of some three or four words I asked the gentleman 
 where on earth the waiter might be in hiding. In 
 his very best English the gentleman replied politely 
 that the place was a private club and not a public 
 grogshop. Whereupon, I could have accomplished 
 an exit through any convenient keyhole without the 
 least pinching. 
 
 Near Zwolle, in a monastery on the Agnetenberg, 
 reached after a drive of three or four miles from the 
 town, lived and died Thomas a Kempis, the author 
 of " The Imitation of Christ " a work that has been 
 translated into almost every tongue. 
 
 A short ride in the train from Zwolle brings you 
 to Kampen, on the broad Yssel at its point of 
 discharge into the Zuyder Zee. It is Holland's 
 home town of ancient gateways, no less than three 
 of which, leading out into the park that has super- 
 seded the old fortifications, are in excellent state of 
 preservation and worthy of study from an archi- 
 tectural point of view. Originally the town pos- 
 sessed seven of these gates, and there might have 
 been fourteen, had the City Council listened to a 
 learned one of its members who arose at a certain 
 meeting and proposed that they double the original 
 number; for, he argued, had not each of the seven 
 gates contributed its 10,000,000 florins a year to the 
 
 [185]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 town treasury in the shape of taxes upon merchandise 
 and produce passing through it? Therefore, it 
 would be a simple matter to double the town's reve- 
 nue, for all they had to do was to double the number 
 of gates. 
 
 But the rank and file of tourists that include 
 Kampen in their itineraries come to view its Town 
 Hall, a venerable building erected in the fourteenth 
 century, restored after a devastating fire in 1543, 
 and which may be numbered to-day among the most 
 characteristic curiosities in the Netherlands. Among 
 the features of its Gothic facade are six statues in 
 stone, dating from the original building. From left 
 to right these may be recognized as the effigies of 
 Charlemagne and Alexander the Great and the char- 
 acterizations of Moderation, Fidelity, Justice, and 
 Neighborly Love. One of the windows of the weather- 
 stained edifice still remains trellised with iron as in 
 the days of Kampen's olden time importance. The 
 interior contains a medieval council room with mag- 
 istrates' seats of oak, handsomely carved, and a 
 gigantic chimney piece, unfortunately overladen with 
 ornaments. 
 
 Kampen stripped of its gateways and its Town 
 Hall would scarcely be worth the time spent to reach 
 it. The town itself seems to be given up to small man- 
 ufacturing establishments, and its people made up of 
 the class that keeps them in operation. But the 
 fine architectural relics of its earlier days raise its 
 [186]
 
 instructive power to as high a degree as that of 
 any town now within Holland's tourist area. 
 
 From Kampen you may take a steamer out across 
 the Zuyder Zee to the Island of Urk, inhabited by 
 a colony of daring fishermen who are less spoiled, 
 yet whose costumes and customs are less interesting, 
 than those of the people of Marken. But you will 
 have to hurry if you wish to pay it a visit, for 
 Urk will soon go the way of Schokland, an island 
 nearer to Kampen, the habitation of which has re- 
 cently been forbidden by the government on account 
 of the imminent prospects of total encroachment by 
 the sea. To-day Urk is tussling for life with every 
 tide ; it may be merely a question of months, perhaps 
 of weeks or days, before its people will be compelled 
 to give up their homes and move to the less dangerous 
 mainland. 
 
 Eighteen and a half miles south of Zwolle, still 
 on the river Yssel, and just across the frontier of 
 Gelderland, lies Deventer, noted commercially for a 
 rather incongruous assortment of enterprises: iron, 
 carpets, and honey cakes. A weigh-house, abnor- 
 mally large for a town of Deventer's size, having a 
 great flight of steps ascending to its entrance from 
 the Brink, the principal square of the town, has been 
 converted into a gymnasium. Also facing the Brink 
 are several handsome private houses of seventeenth 
 century erection. Deventer, strange to say, seems to 
 be most athletically inclined ; it maintains no less than 
 [187]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 fifty different association football clubs, which strive 
 with each other for the title of champion on the 
 many athletic fields along the banks of the Yssel. 
 
 After years of study in Spain and other foreign 
 lands, after a lengthy residence in Haarlem, and his 
 experiences in the studio as co-worker with Franz 
 Hals, to Deventer came Gerard Terburg, where he 
 finally settled down and where he died in 1681 at the 
 age of sixty-four. Unlike Rembrandt, Hals Holbein, 
 and Jan Steen, Terburg took a lively interest in public 
 and municipal affairs, and in his later years he served 
 his adopted city as Burgomaster. 
 
 [188]
 
 XIV 
 
 GELDERLAND 
 
 FROM Deventer to Apeldoorn is simply a matter 
 of a quarter of an hour in a railway carriage 
 which now darts past so many fields of grain, 
 now past so many fine old woods and terraced summer 
 homes that the effect upon the tourist is kaleidoscopic 
 like being shot through a Christmas wreath. 
 
 Apeldoorn is a beautiful little city, very much un- 
 like what might be expected of Holland, since its 
 canals are few and its windmills at a premium. Its 
 streets remind one more of those of an English village. 
 Its outskirts and environs are freely sprinkled with 
 attractive country homes and villas belonging to 
 that class of Hollanders that passes its time, for one 
 purpose or another, hovering in the neighborhood of 
 royalty, for near by at Het Loo the Queen is wont 
 to summer. The town's two parks, named appropri- 
 ately Oranje and Wilhelmina, present effects in land- 
 scape gardening incomparable with those of almost 
 any other parks in Holland, and the broad avenues 
 that lead out to Her Majesty's palace are barely 
 surpassed in beauty even by the Old Way from The 
 Hague to Scheveningen. Like the spokes of a wheel 
 [189]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 their shaded roadways stretch straight as a die, with 
 the palace of Het Loo as their common hub. 
 
 Pensions and private villas are as thick in and 
 about Apeldoorn as seventeen-year locusts. Each 
 has its velvety lawn ; each its variegated flower gar- 
 den. Apparently the town boasts of everything to 
 make the lives of its summer residents one blissful 
 dream of being some day bidden to dinner or tea 
 at the dazzling white palace at the end of the avenue. 
 I imagine the sanitary arrangements of some of 
 the summer homes of these pseudo patrons of royalty 
 must be primitive in the extreme. This may or may 
 not be a criterion by which to judge the others, but, 
 as I drove by the estate of one of Apeldoorn's nabobs, 
 a maidservant appeared upon the second-story bal- 
 cony and emptied the contents of a pocket folding 
 rubber bath tub full upon the lawn in front any- 
 thing but a discreet exhibition, to say the least 
 about it. 
 
 Het Loo, or The Grove, was the favorite palace of 
 Wilhelmina's father, William III, and of his grand- 
 father, William I, the first King of the Netherlands. 
 A steam tram operates upon rather uncertain sched- 
 ule between the railway station at Apeldoorn and 
 Het Loo, but a much more pleasant method of con- 
 suming the time, if only between trains, is to drive 
 by carriage out the long avenue, returning through 
 the parks of Apeldoorn. 
 
 The peasants of the surrounding country are 
 [190]
 
 GELDERLAND 
 
 of purely agricultural proclivities, and their land 
 seems more like real farm land than the lower level 
 portions of the Netherlands. Apeldoorn itself lies 
 in the district known as the Veluwe, a territory be- 
 tween the Yssel and the Zuyder Zee, in places as 
 much as three hundred feet above the level of the 
 ocean and, with few exceptions, the highest in Hol- 
 land. Parts of it, however, are so sandy and sterile 
 that the ground is available after complete fertiliza- 
 tion mainly for the cultivation of tobacco. 
 
 Zutphen, a few miles below Apeldoorn, was the 
 first city in the east to offer any speakable resistance 
 against the Spaniards during the war of independence, 
 and there still stands the gateway, called the Nieuw- 
 stadtspoort, through which Don Frederic of Toledo, 
 the son of the notorious Duke of Alva, forced an 
 entrance into the town on the 16th day of Novem- 
 ber, 1572. Mons and Mechlin having been captured 
 and promptly sacked, Alva had repaired to Nym- 
 wegen, leaving Don Frederic to conquer the prov- 
 inces in the north and east preferably by force, for 
 they were a blood-thirsty lot, those Spaniards. A 
 seeming lack of patriotism on the parts of the cities 
 which had already submitted, too enthusiastically 
 perhaps, to the Spaniards, gave these international 
 marauders little excuse to resort to their usual heinous 
 methods of effecting subjugation. 
 
 When Zutphen, therefore, offered a feeble and half- 
 hearted resistance against the troops of Frederic of 
 
 [191]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 Toledo, and the fact was reported to his father, the 
 commander in chief and arch brigand of the whole 
 depredating crew, he promptly sent orders to his son 
 to enter the city and kill every man and burn every 
 house to the ground. According to Motley, " the 
 Duke's command was almost literally obeyed. Don 
 Frederic entered Zutphen, and without a moment's 
 warning put the whole garrison to the sword. The 
 citizens next fell a defenseless prey; some being 
 stabbed in the streets, some hanged on the trees which 
 decorated the city, some stripped stark naked and 
 turned out into the fields to freeze to death in the 
 wintry night. As the work of death became too 
 fatiguing for the butchers, five hundred innocent 
 burghers were tied two and two, back to back, and 
 drowned like dogs in the river Yssel. A few strag- 
 glers who had contrived to elude pursuit at first, were 
 afterwards taken from their hiding-places and hung 
 upon the gallows by their feet, some of which victims 
 suffered four days and nights of agony before death 
 came to their relief." 
 
 To-day Zutphen is a quiet old city, very un-Dutch, 
 if the expression may be permitted, with many nar- 
 row, crooked streets and a few canals of varying 
 degrees of picturesqueness on its outskirts. Lumber 
 is the principal industry of the place, and a great 
 deal of poplar wood which goes to supply the wooden 
 shoes for many parts of Holland is shipped from 
 Zutphen. 
 
 [192]
 
 GELDERLAND 
 
 Arnhem on the Rhine is the most thriving town 
 as well as the capital of Gelderland. It is essentially 
 an ancient place, dating back to a remote period in 
 the history of the Netherlands; even some there be 
 who give Arnhem the credit of being the original 
 Arenacum of the Romans. It lies upon the southern 
 slopes of the Veluwe district, and from its railway 
 station the visitor will actually have to go down hill 
 into the town a topographical condition so foreign 
 to any of the other Dutch cities already visited that 
 Arnhem's allegiance to Holland is questioned at first 
 sight. 
 
 Although Arnhem is old, it lacks many of those 
 gifts of age that one sees in other old cities through- 
 out the country. Its appearance is German, but its 
 people, realizing the monetary benefits that rival 
 Dutch municipalities are deriving annually from the 
 hordes of tourists that descend upon them, try to ad- 
 vertise it as typically Dutch, and issue frantic appeals 
 to the traveler to be sure to pay it a visit on these 
 grounds. With its 60,000 inhabitants it is the sixth 
 city in point of population in Holland. Although 
 it enjoys every advantage of transportation its com- 
 merce is pitiable; as a residence city, however, it is 
 particularly favored. Because of the attractions of 
 its environs, Arnhem is a favorite spot for the retired 
 Dutch merchant, who, having amassed a fortune in 
 the colonial trade after a long residence in the remote 
 Straits Settlements, seeks some quiet place at home 
 [193]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 endowed with the beauties of nature, in which to spend 
 the remainder of his days in comfort. 
 
 The oldest part of Arnhem is the southern end 
 of the city, bordering on the Rhine and clustering 
 about the Groote Markt as a center. The Groote 
 Kerk, an ecclesiastical building of large parts and 
 deep excavations, containing numerous monuments 
 in memory of various historical celebrities, bounds the 
 market square on the west, and on the south one may 
 pierce the surrounding buildings to the Eusibius 
 Square and the Rhine bank through the ancient Sabil- 
 Poort, a Gothic gateway recalling the days when Arn- 
 hem was fortified with the customary town wall. 
 
 At the side of the Groote Kerk Arnhem holds a 
 weekly market which is scarcely more distinctive than 
 that of Groningen but so popular with the peasants 
 that it overflows into the neighboring streets, and 
 places trolley service through the vicinity in a state 
 of disruption. Having driven into town the evening 
 before, the country people unhitch their horses and 
 leave their wagons standing in the square so as to 
 lose no time in getting ready for business in the 
 morning. Much faith they must have in the honesty 
 and orderliness of the citizens of Arnhem, for their 
 loads of vegetables and whatever they have for sale 
 remain in the open, when the weather is propitious, 
 without even a covering. 
 
 A few blocks to the east of the market square lies 
 the Eusibiusbinnensingel, a beautiful park-like place, 
 
 [194]
 
 GELDERLAND 
 
 but a mouthful to pronounce, with a lake in the 
 center surrounded by great shade trees and geometri- 
 cal flower plots. If you follow this to the northward, 
 you will come, after a short walk, to the Velper 
 Plein, the pulse of Arnhem's trolley traffic, the prin- 
 cipal feature of which is a large building that goes 
 under the poetical name of the Musis Sacrum, con- 
 taining a restaurant and various halls for exhibitions. 
 Here at the tables of the open air cafe the German 
 tourists are wont to forgather for refreshment pur- 
 poses, guarding the while their little ten-by-two-inch 
 satchels, scarcely large enough to hold half a dozen 
 cigars, as if they contained the entire wardrobe and 
 family jewels of their owners. 
 
 In the Velperplein one may board an electric car 
 for any part of the city and many of its suburbs. 
 And it is best to patronize the trolley service of 
 Arnhem whenever possible, because taxicabs, horse 
 drawn or motor propelled, are not to be found in 
 operation. The buccaneering cabbies of Arnhem, 
 next of kin to the piratical baggage porters of Fiume, 
 charge a goodly price to take you out upon a drive 
 in the environs, and double the amount to bring you 
 back, on the ground that your ignorance of their 
 language, not considering their ignorance of yours, 
 was the cause of a misinterpretation of directions. 
 And the worst of this tourist bleeding system is that 
 the hotel head porters connive with the cabbies. 
 
 On top of a real hill half a mile to the north of 
 [195]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 the railway station is Sonsbeck, a favorite rendezvous 
 of the pleasure-seeking Arnhemers, thickly wooded, 
 containing a small lake or two, and, of course, the 
 inevitable cafe, while the ascent of a tower called the 
 Belvedere is offered as a temptation only to those 
 who expect to obtain a magnificent and inspiring view 
 where only a mediocre one exists. 
 
 The Velperweg, the Amsterdamschestraatweg but 
 if this kind of thing goes on it might tangle my type 
 into a knotted, inextricable mass ; for purely mechan- 
 ical reasons, therefore, I shall revert to an English 
 version. The Velper Road, the Amsterdam Road, the 
 Zyp Road, the Utrecht Road, and the Apeldoorn 
 Road are the five principal arteries that tap the en- 
 virons that have made Arnhem famous with the 
 Dutchman. Each one penetrates imposing woods, 
 the like of which the Hollander never saw before, 
 but ruthlessly tramped almost threadbare by his fre- 
 quent pilgrimages through them in search of a 
 " panorama," no matter how insignificant. At the 
 different points where the foliage permits of a view 
 of sometimes several miles across the wheat fields, 
 fruit venders have set up their stands, the ground is 
 littered with papers and the empty boxes discarded 
 by many picnicers, and the importunate picture post- 
 card man is seen in his element. 
 
 The Velp Road, which leads at length to Zutphen, 
 is, perhaps, the gem of all the five. Wide and well 
 kept, it is lined on either side as far as the village 
 
 [196]
 
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 133
 
 GELDERLAND 
 
 of Velp, a distance of three miles from Arnhem, with 
 handsome residences and tastefully laid out lawns 
 and gardens which are girt with small canals in lieu 
 of fences, so that each may be admired from the 
 roadway. 
 
 Halfway along is Bronbeek, the royal asylum for 
 invalid soldiers who have served in the colonial wars. 
 It was bought by King William III in 1854 from its 
 private owners, and presented by him to the State five 
 years later on condition that it be devoted to its 
 present purpose. Little cascades trickle here and 
 there through its grounds, while the pair of cannon 
 mounted on its front lawn bespeaks its use as no 
 blaring signboard could possibly do. Not far from 
 the corner entrance to its park stands a statue of 
 William II as Crown Prince, portrayed as carrying 
 his arm in a sling after having received a wound in 
 the battle of Waterloo. The interior of the building 
 contains collections of portraits of East Indian 
 heroes, and of weapons, flags, and other trophies of 
 war taken in the colonies. 
 
 Rozendaal, one of the largest estates in Gelder- 
 land, can be reached after a pleasant walk of a mile 
 in a northerly direction from Velp. Mentioned for 
 the first time as early as 1314, its grounds are still 
 kept in a state of baronial magnificence, but of its 
 old castle only a comparatively small part of a great 
 round tower remains. 
 
 Another walk, but toward the east on the road
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 to the village and wood of Beekhuizen, brings you 
 to -the castle of Biljoen, erected by Charles, Duke of 
 Guelders, in 1530, upon the foundations of an elev- 
 enth century stronghold. 
 
 Nymwegen may be considered the twin city of Arn- 
 hem ; when one is mentioned the other is instinctively 
 thought of. They lie close to each other, are of 
 about the same population, offer the same gen- 
 eral aspects, and have played parts of equal impor- 
 tance in the general history of the country ; but of the 
 two, Nymwegen is possibly the more diverting. It is 
 two cities in one the older part being purely Dutch, 
 with its old Dutch buildings and a few Dutch types 
 which are mocked by the declivity of some of its 
 streets ; the more modern and larger part being dis- 
 tinctively German, with its platzes, the general 
 distribution and embellishment of its thoroughfares, 
 and the density of its greenery. The center of this 
 German portion of Nymwegen is the Keiser-Karels- 
 plein, a beautiful square from which the different 
 streets radiate ; but what should be the pleasing quiet 
 of the neighborhood is constantly and mercilessly 
 broken by the shrieks of the engine of a noisy tram 
 train that rattles around among the trees as if hunt- 
 ing in vain for a convenient exit. 
 
 Yet another example of the very esthetic habit 
 that the Dutch have of demolishing old fortifications 
 and planting the sites as public pleasure grounds 
 may be seen in the Kronenburg Park, the contour of 
 
 [198]
 
 GELDERLAND 
 
 whose slopes adds admirably to the general landscape 
 effect. Down at the bottom is a duck-dotted lake 
 bordered with the benches that constitute the trysting 
 places of many a young Nymwegen couple, so un- 
 conscious of any but their own affairs that they suffer 
 old ladies to sit upon the same bench and knit and 
 spy with generous eyes upon the lovers' advances. 
 At the farther edge of the lake they have mercifully 
 preserved one of the sixteen towers that once strength- 
 ened the town walls. 
 
 The Waal, one of the many branches of the Rhine, 
 is a busier river at Nymwegen than the real Rhine 
 is at Arnhem. Tows of long, narrow boats, typical 
 of the Rhine above Cologne, ply up and down under 
 the great iron railway bridge and lend to the city 
 more of a German air than ever. 
 
 Overlooking the river some distance above the rail- 
 way bridge are the shady pleasure grounds of the 
 Valkhof, one of the seven hills upon which the city 
 of Nymwegen was originally built and where Charle- 
 magne erected an imperial palace, later destroyed 
 by the French in 1796. An interesting and pictur- 
 esque ruin is a small fragment of the old palace 
 church, built by Emperor Frederick Barbarossa, 
 while near by may be seen the oldest remnant 
 of ecclesiastical architecture in the Netherlands the 
 sixteen-sided Gothic castle chapel, rebuilt a number 
 of times after being consecrated originally by Pope 
 Leo III in 799. 
 
 [199]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 Across what must have been the castle moat and 
 connected with the Valkhof grounds by an iron 
 bridge, a tower of the seventeenth century affords 
 the people of Nymwegen an attractive view of which 
 they are justly proud, embracing as it does the fertile 
 farming districts as far as Cleve, to the southeast, 
 as far as Arnhem, to the north, and, upon a clear 
 day, as many as four rivers : the Rhine, the Maas, the 
 Waal, and the Yssel. 
 
 The old Church of St. Stephen and the brick gate- 
 way that leads to it from the market square, the 
 weigh-house with its red and black shutters, the 
 Town Hall, and a number of other old buildings in 
 the vicinity of the Groote Markt are all essentially 
 Dutch, but for which the visitor might easily imagine 
 himself in a German city. 
 
 With those of Anihem, however, Nymwegen's en- 
 virons can scarcely hope to compete. The steam 
 tram that rattles around the Keiser-Karelplein 
 eventually escapes the city limits and climbs the long 
 hill to the Hotel Berg en Dal, from the vicinity of 
 which one may look out upon a much vaunted 
 " panorama " that might at least be worth while under 
 certain conditions. But what with the blatant strum- 
 mings of an automatic piano that considers itself of 
 valuable assistance to the complete enjoyment of the 
 view, and the petty vibrations of a more or less 
 popular photographer intent upon making likenesses 
 of visitors in the unusual and startling act of look- 
 
 [200]
 
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 'CO- 
 
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 GELDERLAND 
 
 ing from the top of a hill in Holland, the view is 
 rendered more of a bore than a diversion. 
 
 The Dutch province of Limburg, a narrow tongue 
 of land successfully battled for by the Dutch against 
 the Belgians in the war of 1830-31, lying away to 
 the south of Gelderland and wedged in between Bel- 
 gium on the west and Germany on the east, is so un- 
 Netherlandish, both as to peoples and topograhy, 
 that it can scarcely be considered as a part of the 
 Holland that the tourist expects. Its inhabitants 
 even speak a low German dialect instead of Dutch. 
 Futhermore, it is not on any route that a tour 
 through Holland might include, for Maastricht, its 
 historical old capital, is on the direct railway line 
 between Brussels and Cologne and may be more easily 
 visited from either of those points than from any 
 city in Holland proper. 
 
 [201]
 
 CHAPTER XV 
 
 UTKECHT AND 'S HERT OGENB OSCH 
 
 THERE can be only one reason for my clearing 
 my conscience of Utrecht and 'S Hertogenbosch 
 in one and the same chapter. This may or 
 may not be apparent to him who has already toured 
 Holland, for the two towns cannot be said to be on 
 the same line of traffic; they are not even in the 
 same province; neither are they alike in appearance. 
 Utrecht, the capital of the province of that name, 
 with its canals and old houses, its lime avenues and 
 its shady parks, has more of the typical Dutch ele- 
 ment in its make-up, and can be as easily reached, 
 and as profitably, from either Rotterdam or Am- 
 sterdam. 
 
 'S Hertogenbosch, on the other hand, the frontier 
 town of the southern provinces, lies along the route 
 that leads into Germany, and its " windmills and 
 wooden shoes " are conspicuous in their absence. It 
 seems, out of respect for its geographical position, 
 more of a Belgian city. Indeed, the Belgians, unable 
 to conquer its Dutch nomenclature, long ago re- 
 christened the place, and now it is as often spoken 
 of by the more euphonious name of Bois le Due a 
 [ 202 ]
 
 UTRECHT AND 'S H ERT O GE N B O S C H 
 
 merciful convenience for all of my personal pur- 
 poses, because it is as difficult to write 'S Hertogen- 
 bosch as it is to pronounce it. Since to Bois le Due 
 it has been simplified, Bois le Due it shall be hence- 
 forth called within these pages. 
 
 Now to divulge my secret for treating Utrecht and 
 Bois le Due in the same chapter: with their famous 
 churches they are the most important ecclesiastical 
 cities in Holland. Utrecht, in addition, is a uni- 
 versity town, a cattle center, and one of the oldest 
 places, as well as one of the largest, in the Nether- 
 lands. In Roman times it was known by the Latin 
 translation of " The Ford of the Rhine " Trajec- 
 tum ad Rlienum. In the seventh century, under the 
 Frisians, King Dagobert I founded here the first 
 Frisian church. Subsequently the archbishops of 
 Utrecht grew to be the most powerful of medieval 
 prelates, and their see at an early date became re- 
 nowned for the magnificence of its houses of wor- 
 ship. Utrecht was included in the French province 
 of Lorraine, was later annexed to the German em- 
 pire by force of circumstances, and enjoyed the dis- 
 tinction of being a favorite residence of the em- 
 perors. The union of the seven Dutch provinces was 
 formed in Utrecht in 1579, under the sponsorship and 
 direction of John of Nassau, brother of William, 
 Prince of Orange, to establish the independence of 
 the Netherlands. From that time on until 1593 the 
 States General assembled here; in that year the seat 
 [203]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 of the Dutch Government was transferred to The 
 Hague. The most celebrated event in the old city's 
 history, however, took place on the llth of April, 
 1713, when the peace was here concluded that ter- 
 minated the Spanish wars of Succession. 
 
 That much for history. 
 
 Twentieth century Utrecht is different. Its old- 
 time importance as one of the foremost commercial 
 cities of the Middle Ages was owing to its enviable 
 position on the Rhine where the river wrenches itself 
 into two branches the Old Rhine and the Vecht. 
 The former percolates, according to the will and 
 calculations of the Dutch engineers, into the North 
 Sea at Katwyk, and the Vecht empties into the Zuy- 
 der Zee, near Muiden. The city's commercial im- 
 portance and activity have dwindled piteously into 
 a weekly cattle market held in the Vreeburg, Utrecht's 
 great central square, occupying the site of a castle 
 built in 1517 by Emperor Charles V. 
 
 With the break of day on Saturday the farmers 
 from the surrounding country, " Jclomped " in more 
 varied styles of wooden shoes than you will find in 
 any other single town in Holland, begin to arrive 
 with their stock at the Vreeburg. In the night a 
 conglomerate collection of little side-show tents and 
 canvas-covered stalls for the sale of almost every- 
 thing, has sprung up like a bed of mushrooms on 
 the outskirts of the market place, so that the cattle 
 dealer, after he has negotiated a substitution of stock 
 
 [204]
 
 Utrecht's Cathedral, erected in the eleventh century upon the 
 site of a church founded in 720
 
 UTRECHT AND 'S H ERT O GE N B O S C H 
 
 for its equivalent in the coin of the realm, may want 
 for neither amusement nor a convenient place to pur- 
 chase the hundred and one articles that his better 
 seven-eighths has cautioned him not to come home 
 without. 
 
 Singularly enough, the same methods obtain in 
 bargaining for cows in Utrecht that are prevalent 
 while dickering for cheeses in Alkmaar. There is 
 the same placid composure on the part of the seller, 
 the same minute examination on the part of the buyer; 
 there is the same Captain John Smith pose; there is 
 the same whacking of hands ; there is the same gen- 
 eral exodus from the market place, after the cere- 
 monies, to the more blithesome lunchrooms and halls 
 of frivolity. I wish I might have followed up the 
 case of a cattle dealer whom I saw in a certain cafe 
 after the market, making a lunch of the uncertain 
 mixture of a glass of beer and a dish of currants. 
 The notation of the after effects of the combination 
 might have been of value to materia medica. 
 
 Utrecht's famous old churches have been pillaged 
 and desecrated to a great extent by the elements and 
 the changes wrought by time and tide. Once, long 
 ago, when the followers of the various creeds were 
 all at sixes and sevens, the Munsterkerk, the Pieters- 
 kerk, the Janskerk, and the cathedral itself, no doubt, 
 with their cloistersful of clergy, were walled in and 
 moated, and patronized as much as asylums of refuge 
 as for worship. To-day they are simply tolerated. 
 
 [205]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 A coffeehouse does a land office business in the arch- 
 bishop's palace, and the tramcar company has tun- 
 neled through the vaulted archway of the great de- 
 tached cathedral tower rather than go to the trouble 
 of laying the tracks around it. 
 
 And what a cathedral this Gothic curiosity of 
 Utrecht is ! Erected in the eleventh century upon the 
 site of a former ecclesiastical edifice founded in 720, 
 in its day it must have easily outclassed anything of 
 its ilk in all the Netherlands. Now its back is 
 broken, so to speak, beyond repair, for in 1674 a 
 violent hurricane that bowled a spare with the church 
 towers in the district, tore out the nave of the 
 cathedral and left the tower and the choir com- 
 pletely disconnected. The site of the demolished 
 nave now forms the center of the Cathedral Square, 
 and is as much a thoroughfare as any street in the 
 city. 
 
 The interior of the church, like the interior of al- 
 most every church of any size in Holland, offers lit- 
 tle of originality or interest. The walls are covered 
 with many layers of unbecoming whitewash, and any 
 pleasing effect that the columned interior might have 
 originally had is lost, for a portion in the center is 
 boarded up, like a bull ring with its barrier, segregat- 
 ing the inclosed space for the purpose of uninter- 
 rupted worship. The one redeeming feature of the 
 whole place, aside from a few meritorious monuments, 
 is a handsome oaken pulpit, elaborately carved by 
 
 [206]
 
 hand, so as to give the effect of a miniature cathedral 
 in itself. 
 
 After being a city of disabled and decrepit 
 churches, Utrecht is a university town, and the seven 
 or eight hundred students in attendance do their best 
 to emulate the early ecclesiastics by trying to keep 
 the place in a state of perennial siege, for it is to be 
 remembered that the drudgery and frugality of uni- 
 versity life in Holland is not what it is cracked up to 
 be. In a way, a Dutch college education is a good 
 bit of a farce. The student is under very few 
 obligations except to himself. He does not have to 
 appear in chapel; he does not even have to attend 
 classes, and there are a large number of students in 
 each of Holland's three universities young men of 
 private fortune who take up a course in law or what 
 not, with no intention of ever practicing, in order to 
 avail themselves of the gaiety and freedom of uni- 
 versity life who never enter a lecture room from one 
 term's end to the other. Consequently, there is much 
 hilarity and much extravagance, all of which is more 
 or less resented by the thrifty, peaceful townspeople, 
 and which sometimes places the two factions under 
 strained relations. When a student does complete a 
 course, having seen fit to relegate himself to the hard, 
 honest work necessary to the attainment of a doc- 
 tor's degree, he deems it of such momentous occur- 
 rence that he forthwith has his thesis published in 
 book form de luxe, and, hiring a carriage, which is 
 
 [207]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 manned by student initiates into his Corps, he drives 
 in state to the residences of his several professors and 
 intimate friends, leaving with each a copy of his 
 work. 
 
 In the above mentioning of the Students' Corps, I 
 have named a salient feature of student life in Hol- 
 land, and one which none of her universities is with- 
 out. Although of broader membership, it takes the 
 place of our own fraternities. It includes, however, 
 all the students who can afford to pay its dues and 
 subscriptions. A senate, comprising a rector, a secre- 
 tary, and three other functionaries, elected annually 
 by the Corps from among its members of four or 
 more years' standing, dictates the policy of the Corps 
 and administers its affairs. Any member of the 
 Corps is eligible for membership in the Corps Club, 
 the culminating distinction of Dutch university life, 
 or for any of its various subdivisions of athletic or 
 social societies. The initiates undergo most of the 
 harmless little byplays, not to mention some new 
 ones, that provide for such a halcyon period in the 
 careers of our own fraternal neophytes. 
 
 Among its numerous idiosyncrasies Utrecht has a 
 canal, called the Oude Gracht, that is unique in 
 comparison with other canals in other cities in Hol- 
 land. The water in this canal lies far below the 
 level of the bordering streets. Between the street 
 and the water there is a great stone step that forms 
 the real canal bank. In the old days the " riser " 
 
 [208]
 
 UTRECHT AND 'S H ERT O GE N B O SCH 
 
 above this step was made up of foundation arches of 
 stone upon which were built the specious mansions 
 that fronted the thoroughfares alongside the canal. 
 To make use of spaces which would otherwise be 
 wasted, these vaulted foundations served as cellars, 
 with the street for a roof, and were in as constant 
 use as any other part of the dwelling. Most of 
 them are now occupied as shops, to the entrances 
 of which you must descend a flight of steps from 
 the roadway above; but here and there their win- 
 dows display the lace curtain and the boxful of 
 flowers that give evidence of domestic habitation. 
 
 Utrecht, too, has many verdant beauty spots, the 
 most verdant being the Hoogeland Park, with its cir- 
 cumference bordered with attractive villas and reached 
 through a wide lime avenue they call the Maliebaan. 
 In the Antiquarian Museum, situate in the park, one 
 may behold the two most interesting relics in the pos- 
 session of Utrecht, if we exclude, perhaps, the sev- 
 enty different kinds of lace on view in the Archiepis- 
 copal Museum on the Nieuwe Gracht. These are: a 
 table, handsomely and delicately carved, at which the 
 signatories of the famous Peace of Utrecht were 
 said to have sat in 1713 ; and the " Doll's House," an 
 accurate reproduction in miniature of a patrician 
 dwelling of the period, executed in 1680, and worked 
 out in the minutest detail from cellar to chimney pot, 
 from kitchen utensils to genuine oil paintings by cele- 
 brated masters on the walls of the drawing room. 
 
 [209]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 Surrounding Utrecht and penetrating far to the 
 east and the south are the great fortifications, 
 of whose presence the casual observer is entirely 
 unaware, belonging to the first line of national 
 defense that might be used to protect the Dutch 
 capital from invasion a defense in which she 
 seeks the assistance of her mortal enemy, and dis- 
 covers him weighed in the balance and not found 
 wanting. Upon a process of general inundation, by 
 fresh water wherever possible so as not to impair the 
 future productiveness of the fields, does Holland de- 
 pend for her safety from invasion both by land 
 and by sea. In the probability of the latter, her 
 power of self-exclusion is augmented by a treaty with 
 Belgium, signed in 1892, confirmed in 1905, and only 
 recently made public, reserving for her the right 
 to block the great estuary of the Scheldt in case of 
 war or rumors of war. In times of peace Belgium 
 shares with the Netherlands all rights of navigation 
 of the Scheldt, and Holland may not displace or 
 remove buoys, lights, or other aids to navigation, 
 without Belgian consent. 
 
 But with regard to Holland's ability to isolate her- 
 self by general inundation, it is a scheme that gives 
 little outward evidence of being in operation. A 
 stranger might roam within her boundaries for a 
 year and a day without even surmising that such a 
 thing could be accomplished, so successfully are her 
 greatest works hidden from the eye. The scheme 
 [210]
 
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 UTRECHT AND 'S H ERT O GE NB O SCH 
 
 provides, in brief, for the blowing up of railway 
 bridges and for the opening of the sluice gates of 
 great reservoirs, regulating the amount of water to 
 be poured in over the country so that it should all 
 be of the same depth, prohibiting both the possibility 
 of wading through it and the passage of vessels 
 over it. 
 
 A half a day, if time presses, will suffice to see Bois 
 le Due. After you have wandered about in its great 
 Gothic cathedral of St. John, one of the largest and, 
 by all odds, the fanciest church if a church can be 
 said to be fancy in Holland, you will have done with 
 the town. It holds nothing else of interest. Al- 
 though of 32,000 population, and the capital of the 
 Province of North Brabant, it is dull and unappeal- 
 ing to the tourist. There are few types and few dis- 
 tinctive mannerisms. Of its costumes, the only 
 feature is a headdress, affected by some of the coun- 
 trywomen of the surrounding district, composed of 
 white lace and topped with garlands of artificial 
 flowers as ridiculous and disappointing as the " poke 
 bonnets " worn by the middle-aged matrons of Leeu- 
 warden, and just as out of place. 
 
 Even the market square is devoid of the usual 
 fringe of ancient buildings. Here they hold a cat- 
 tle market on Wednesdays, but to strike every city 
 in Holland upon the day of its distinctive market 
 would necessitate a vast amount of vibratory travel- 
 ing, which in itself, and not considering the markets, 
 
 [211]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 would soon grow monotonous. I happened upon Bois 
 le Due on a Saturday, when one of those nondescript, 
 unsavory bazaars of cooking utensils and crockery 
 was in full swing. It was a hot day, for Holland, 
 and the sun beat down upon the unprotected square 
 with a most uncomfortable effect. So I spent most 
 of my spare time under the awning of a nearby cafe 
 watching the business transactions of a couple of 
 " hokey-pokey " wagons, decorated and garnished so 
 that they resembled the floats in a Queen of the May 
 pageant. 
 
 But an inspection of Bois le Due's cathedral will 
 reimburse any traveler who has planned to pay the 
 town a visit. It stands on the edge of a wide parade 
 ground, not far from the market, from the opposite 
 side of which the church's Gothic gargoyles and en- 
 tablatures can be seen to good advantage above the 
 trees. 
 
 Founded in the eleventh century, this cathedral was 
 originally erected as a Romanesque edifice. After 
 suffering the inevitable results of a devastating con- 
 flagration, it was rebuilt in the early half of the fif- 
 teenth century, its Romanesque design having been 
 discarded and a late Gothic one adopted. Since 1860 
 it has been subjected to a plan of restoration. And 
 not only from without is it a pleasing contrast to 
 the usual run of Dutch churches, but it is the only 
 one in Holland whose interior, having marvelously 
 escaped the iconoclasm of early days, and having 
 
 [212]
 
 UTRECHT AND 'S H ERT O GE N B O S C H 
 
 been allowed to remain undesecrated by the customary 
 coat of whitewash and the central bull ring, is what 
 it ought to be. The visitor of to-day may obtain 
 an uninterrupted view from one end of the cathedral 
 to the other, for the authorities, always in need of 
 funds to carry on the restorations to the church, sold 
 its handsome choir screen some years ago and realized 
 $4,500 on it. But the absence of the screen will 
 scarcely be noticed in the cathedral indeed, the gen- 
 eral effect is more satisfying without it. Stowed 
 away, however, among a collection of other ecclesi- 
 astical curios in the new Victoria and Albert Mu- 
 seum in South Kensington, London, without the 
 lights and shadows of its church to enhance its rich- 
 ness, it has lost much of its beauty. 
 
 From Bois le Due I was ticketed to quit the coun- 
 try. I had seen the cathedral, and time hung heav- 
 ily, so I wandered back to the station all of an hour 
 before the scheduled departure of my train, to jot 
 down a few notes and indulge in a few final musings 
 upon a great nation the only little thing about which 
 I found to be its area a nation of great deeds in 
 peace and in war, a nation of great men, a nation 
 that has, by the sheer character of its people, sur- 
 mounted great obstacles, and a nation with a future 
 as great as its past. 
 
 Each time I have visited Holland I have been loath 
 to leave, but in more ways than one this feeling was 
 mitigated in Bois le Due, for Bois le Due is a more 
 [213]
 
 WINDMILLS AND WOODEN SHOES 
 
 satisfactory place to leave from than The Hague, 
 for example, and when the always solicitous station 
 master, in black frock coat and bright red cap, 
 finally came to tell me that my train was due, I gath- 
 ered together my impedimenta and followed him re- 
 signedly toward the train shed. 
 
 As I passed through the waiting-room my eye 
 caught some lettering over the mantel of an artistic 
 fireplace. Its words pronounced the traveler's bene- 
 diction : " Goede Rets." Whether he appreciated the 
 fact or not, that old fireplace had stood there for 
 years, wishing the voyageur a pleasant journey, and 
 the gentleness, the simple kindliness of the message 
 struck me as being characteristic of the men who put 
 it there the Hollanders. 
 
 THE END 
 
 [214]
 
 INDEX 
 
 Aanspreker, the, 53, 54 
 Acreage, 1 
 
 Admiral de Ruyter, 111, 147 
 Admiral Dirkzoon, 154 
 Albert Cuyp, 41-48, 49 
 Alexander of Parma, 66, 67 
 Alkmaar, 123, 124, 137, 138, 
 
 147, 153 
 
 Alma Tadema, Laurens, 172 
 Alva, Duke of, 20, 63, 65, 
 
 191 
 
 Amalia, Princess, 84 
 Amstel, 109 
 Amsterdam, 1, 5, 6, 14, 55, 57, 
 
 75, 83, 107, 108, 112, 118, 
 
 123, 124, 127-130, 137, 147, 
 
 150, 152, 153, 157 
 Amsterdam, Bank of, 122 
 Amusements, 88, 114, 115, 116, 
 
 156, 157 
 Animals, 57, 58 
 Anjou, Duke of, 66, 67 
 Antwerp, 20, 111 
 Apeldoorn, 189-191 
 Arnhem, 1, 193, 195, 198, 199 
 Arras, Bishop of, 63 
 Ary Scheffer, 41 
 Assen, 179, 182 
 Atlantic, 1 
 Australia, 152 
 
 Batavia, 151 
 Bathazar Gerard, 65-69 
 Beekhuizen, 198 
 Bergen-op-Zoom, 34, 36, 37 
 Beurs, 57 
 Bicycles, 23, 24 
 Biesbosch, 39 
 Biljoen, 198 
 Binnenhof, 41, 78-80 
 Bishop of Arras, 63 
 Bishop of Cambrai, 55 
 Bois le Due, 202, 211-214 
 Bonaparte, Louis, 109, 110 
 Bosch, The, 84 
 Bossu, 153 
 
 Botanical Gardens, Leyden, 99 
 
 Boymans Museum, 50 
 
 Broek, 129 
 
 Bronbeek, 197 
 
 Buiksloot, 128 
 
 Building, 108 
 
 Bulbs, 103, 104 
 
 Canals, 7, 31, 34, 56, 57, 58, 
 61, 91, 101, 124, 125, 127, 
 131, 132, 137, 171, 173 
 
 Canal packets, 2 
 
 Castricum, 147 
 
 Catherine of Schwartzburg, 70 
 
 Cats, Father Jacob, 18 
 
 Cattle raising, 173 
 
 Charitable institutions, 100 
 
 Charles V, 19, 167 
 
 Church of St. Lawrence. 50 
 
 Cleanliness, 8, 34, 35, 59, 60, 129 
 
 Cleve, 199 
 
 Coen, 150 
 
 Coinage, 8 
 
 Coligny, Louisa de, 65 
 
 Colonial Offices, 80 
 
 Comparative size, 1, 2 
 
 Conference, International Peace, 
 84 
 
 Conquests of the sea, 4, 5 
 
 Corcoran Galleries, 80 
 
 Cornelius De Witt, 41, 79 
 
 Costumes, 22, 23, 135, 167, 168 
 
 Cromwell, Oliver, 19 
 
 Cultivation, 91, 158 
 
 Cuyp, Albert, 41, 48, 49 
 
 Dairy products, 173 
 Dam, The, 110 
 Damrak, 112, 128 
 Delft, 55, 59, 60-62, 65-67, 72 
 De Noord, 40 
 
 De Ruyter, Admiral, 111, 147 
 Descartes, 101 
 Deventer, 187 
 
 De Witt, Cornelius and John, 
 41, 79
 
 INDEX 
 
 Diamond trade, 118-120 
 
 Dlemer Dike, 153 
 
 Dikes, 5-7, 26, 32, 42, 91, 92, 94, 
 
 95, 145, 146, 153 
 Dirkzoon, Admiral, 154 
 Domburg, 16, 25, 26, 100 
 Domestic animals, 57, 58 
 Donrijp, 172 
 
 Dortrecht, 29, 39, 40-44, 48 
 Dou, Gerard, 92 
 Dredging, 5 
 Drenthe, 176, 181 
 Duke of Alva, 20, 63, 65, 191 
 Duke of Anjou, 66, 67 
 Duke of Mecklenburg-Schwerin, 
 
 82 
 
 Duke of Orange, 63 
 Duke of York, 147 
 Dutch East Indies, 151 
 Dutch East India Company, 61, 
 
 109, 151 
 Dutch West India Company, 80 
 
 Edam, 21, 124, 130, 131, 138, 
 
 153 
 
 Eendragtsweg, 55 
 Else Eisenga, 165 
 Endegeest, 101 
 England, 19 
 
 Enkhuizen, 154, 157, 158 
 Erasmus, Desiderius, 55 
 Eusibiusbinnensingel, 194 
 Ewyksluis, 33 
 Eyerland, 148 
 
 Family life, 57 
 
 Feijenoord, 46 
 
 Fishing, 158 
 
 Flevo, Lake, 159 
 
 Floris V, 78, 109, 138 
 
 Flowers, 102-104, 158 
 
 Flushing, 14, 15, 19, 20, 25 
 
 Foolish Betsy, 21 
 
 France, 8 
 
 Franeker, 165 
 
 Franz Hals, 105 
 
 Frederic of Toledo, 104, 191, 
 
 192 
 Frederick Henry of Orange, 
 
 Prince, 84 
 Friesland, 33, 63, 144, 148, 160, 
 
 165, 168, 173 
 Frisian Monks, 5 
 Frisian Museum, 170 
 Fuel, 181, 182 
 
 [21 
 
 Gemeelandshuis, 62 
 Gerard, Bathazar, 65-69 
 Gerard Dou, 92 
 Gerard Terburg, 183 
 Germany, 8, 11 
 Gevangenpoort, 36, 79 
 Gherardts, Gherardt, 54, 55 
 Goes, 29, 31, 32, 34 
 Goldsmith, Oliver, 13, 92 
 Government, 8 
 Groningen, 123, 144, 146, 148, 
 
 176-178 
 
 Groote Ryndyk, 91 
 Grooteveerhaven, 55 
 Grotius, 79, 92 
 Guides, 76 
 Gysbrecht, 109 
 
 Haarlem, 77, 78, 102, 124 
 Haarlem Lake, 6 
 Haarlem Polder, 101 
 Haarlemermeer, 5, 6, 101 
 Hague, The, 14, 24, 41, 56, 75- 
 
 78, 80, 83, 84-86, 91, 124, 138, 
 
 204 
 
 Haring, 152 
 Haring, John, 153, 155 
 Harlingen, 165 
 Hasselaer, Kenau, 105 
 Helder, The, 123, 128, 143-147 
 Hendrik de Keyser, 55 
 Hendrik Landman, 17, 18, 21 
 'S Hertogenbosch, 55, 202 
 Herr van Klaes, 52, 53 
 Het Loo, 190 
 Hindeloopen, 165 
 Holbein, 81 
 Holland, North, 4 
 Holland, South, 4 
 Hollandsch Diep, 39 
 Homes, 57 
 Hoogstraat, 83 
 Hook, The, 2, 59 
 Hoorn, 130, 150, 154, 155, 157 
 Hotels, 172 
 
 IJ, The, 124 
 Imports, 49, 50 
 Inundations, 5 
 Inquisition, 73, 74 
 Island of Texel, 148, 149 
 Island of Urk, 187 
 Israels, Josef, 177 
 
 Jansen, Zacharias, 18, 37 
 Jan Steen, 81, 92 
 
 6]
 
 INDEX 
 
 Jan van Oldenbarnevelt, 79 
 
 Joden-Breestraat, 113 
 
 John, Long, 16, 17, 20 
 
 John Lothrop Motley, 65, 67, 72, 
 
 73, 84, 153, 154, 192 
 Josef Israels, 177 
 Juliana, Princess, 11, 82 
 
 Kaiser Frledrlch's Museum. 80 
 Kalf, Mynheer, 126 
 Kalverstraat, 83, 112 
 Kampen, 185, 186 
 Katwyk, 100, 101 
 Kenau Uasselaer, 105 
 King William I, 110 
 Kreekerak, 34 
 
 Lake Flevo, 159 
 Landman, Hendrik, 17, 18, 21 
 Language, 29, 30, 31 
 Leeuwarden, 123, 157, 165, 168, 
 
 169, 171 
 Leyden, 6, 42, 64, 91, 92, 93, 95, 
 
 98, 101, 104, 139 
 Lieutenant van Speyk, 111 
 Limburg, 201 
 Loevenstein, 79 
 Long John, 16, 17, 20 
 Louis Bonaparte, 110 
 Louis of Nassau, Count, 93 
 Louvre, 80 
 
 Maas, 1, 40, 45, 46, 49, 199 
 Maastricht, 201 
 Maes, Nicolas, 41 
 Maps, 3, 33 
 Margaret of Parma, 63 
 Marken, 126, 127, 129, 135 
 Markets, 34, 178, 194, 204, 205 
 Marriage, 9-11 
 
 Meuse, 94 
 
 Middelburg, 15, 16, 20, 21, 22, 
 
 24, 25, 27, 29, 64 
 Ministry of Justice, 80 
 Mint Tower, 112 
 Monnikendam, 21, 128, 129, 130, 
 
 135 
 
 Mons, 191 
 Morsch Gate, 99 
 Motley, John Lothrop, 65, 67, 
 
 72, 84, 153, 154, 192 
 Municipal Abbatoir, 121, 122 
 Municipal Pawnshop, 120, 121 
 Murillo, 81 
 
 Napoleon Bonaparte, 24, 81 
 New Zealand, 152 
 Nicolas Maes, 41 
 Nieuwediep, 148 
 Noordwyk, 100 
 North Holland, 4 
 North Sea, 4, 39, 124, 144 
 Nymwegen, 191, 198, 199 
 
 Oliver Goldsmith, 13, 92 
 Oosterkade, 51 
 Orange, Prince of, 94, 105 
 Osterpoort, 150 
 Over-Yssel, 176 
 
 Parklaan, 55 
 Patriotism, 12 
 Paupers, 100 
 Pavements, 21, 22 
 Peace Palace, 85 
 Peter the Great, 126 
 Petroleum Harbor, 124 
 Philip II, 19, 62, 63 
 Piaam, 33 
 
 Pile Driving, 108, 110 
 Plein 1813, 83 
 
 Marsdiep, Strait of, 145, 146, p o lder, 7, 31, 32, 33, 101, 137 
 
 148 
 
 Marssum, 173 
 Maurice of Nassau, 78 
 Maurice of Orange, 79 
 Mauritshuis, 80, 81 
 Mauritsweg, 55 
 Mechlin, 191 
 Mecklenburg-Schwerln, Duke of, 
 
 82 
 
 Meppel, 179, 183 
 Merwede, 40 
 Mesdag, H. W., 177 
 Mesdag Museum, 83, 172 
 
 [217] 
 
 Population, 1 
 
 Potter, Paul, 81 
 
 Prince of Orange, 20, 61, 64 
 
 Princess Juliana, 11, 82 
 
 Prinsenhof, 65 
 
 Queen Wilhelmina, 12, 74, 82, 
 110, 111, 190 
 
 Railways, 2, 7, 38, 39, 43, 57, 
 80, 91, 92, 137, 157, 179, 180, 
 181
 
 INDEX 
 
 Reclamation, 159 
 Rembrandt, 80, 92, 117 
 Rembrandtplein, 112, 114 
 Rhine, The, 12, 40, 46, 50, 101, 
 
 199 
 
 Rljks Museum, 116, 117 
 Rosendaal, 37, 197 
 Rotterdam, 1, 40, 45, 46, 48, 49, 
 
 50, 51, 52, 54-58, 75, 79, 83, 
 
 94, 95, 110, 124 
 Royal Palace, 82, 110 
 Rubens, 81 
 Rynland, 101 
 Rynsburg, 101 
 
 Scheldt, 16, 19, 34 
 
 Schenckweg, 91 
 
 Scheveningen, 83, 85, 87, 89, 
 
 90, 100, 135 
 Schiedam, 94, 95 
 Schokland, 187 
 Schools, 9 
 Schouten, 150, 152 
 Sea, conquests of the, 4, 5 
 Sea, North, 4, 39, 124 
 Shoes, wooden, 4 
 Size, 1, 2 
 Smoking, 51, 52, 53 
 Sneek, 165 
 Society for the Public Welfare, 
 
 100 
 
 Solomon Islands, 152 
 Sonoy, 153 
 Sonsbeek, 196 
 South Holland, 4 
 Spaniards, 42, 64, 95-97, 139, 
 
 152, 153, 191 
 Spinoza, 101 
 Spuistraat, 83 
 St. Nicholas Abbey, 21 
 St. Pancras, 99 
 Staple, 40, 41 
 
 Stavoren, 157, 159, 160-164 
 Steen, Jan, 81, 92 
 Storks, 173-175 
 
 Strait of Marsdiep, 145, 146, 148 
 Straits Settlements, 52 
 Street railways, 51 
 Sumatra, 52 
 Switzerland, 8 
 
 Tasman, 150, 151 
 Tasmania, 151 
 Telegraph line, 56 
 Terburg, 81, 183 
 
 [21 
 
 Texel, 149 
 
 The Hague, 14, 24, 41, 56, 75-78, 
 
 80, 83-86, 91, 124, 138, 204 
 The Hook, 2 
 The Rhine, 12, 40, 46, 50, 101, 
 
 199 
 
 Tolls, 27 
 Topography, 1 
 Tromp, 147 
 Tulips, 102-104 
 
 Utrecht, 63, 202-204, 208 
 Utrecht, University of, 207, 208 
 
 Valdez, 94 
 
 Van der Werf, 95 
 
 Van der Werf Park, 99 
 
 Van Dieman, 151 
 
 Van Dyke, 81 
 
 Van Ruysdael, Jacob, 105 
 
 Veere, 16, 21, 23-27 
 
 Velasquez, 81 
 
 Velper Plein, 195 
 
 Venice, 44 
 
 Verdronkenland, 34 
 
 Vermeer, 81 
 
 Volendam, 124, 126, 127, 131- 
 
 135 
 
 Voorburg, 92 
 Voorschoten, 92 
 Vroek, 130 
 Vrouwensand, 160 
 
 Waal, 40, 199, 200 
 Wagenaarstraat, 18 
 Walcheren, 14-17, 20, 22, 24, 26 
 Wegenstraat, 83 
 West Hove, 25 
 Westkapelle, 26, 27 
 Westplein, 46 
 Wilhelminakade, 47 
 Wilhelmina, Queen, 12, 74, 82, 
 
 110, 111, 190 
 Willem'splein, 80 
 Willem's Park, 83 
 William I, 190 
 William II, 78, 79, 166, 190, 
 
 197 
 
 William III, 197 
 William of Orange, Prince, 20, 
 
 61, 64, 94 
 William the Silent, 62, 63, 65, 
 
 66, 69, 71-73, 80, 82, 93 
 Windmills, 4, 125 
 Wooden shoes, 4 
 Wynstraat, 41 
 
 8]
 
 INDEX 
 
 Y, The, 124, 128 Zeeland, 4, 14, 15, 22, 27, 34, 64 
 
 Yssel, 94, 95, 185, 191, 200 Zuid-Beveland Canal, 34 
 
 Zuid-Holland, 39 
 Zuidplas Polder, 7 
 
 Zaan, 137 Zuyder Zee, 1, 2, 4, 32, 35, 123, 
 
 Zaandam, 123, 125, 126, 1ST, 124, 126-128, 130, 144, 157, 
 
 147, 157 159, 166, 176, 185, 191 
 
 Zaandvoort, 124 Zutphen, 191, 192 
 
 Zacharias Jansen, 37 Zwolle, 123, 179, 183 
 
 [219]
 
 UCSOUTHERN REGIONAL LIBRARY FACILITY 
 
 A 000 577 488