# Things Seen in Holland/Chapter I

Things Seen in Holland
CHAPTER I
THE CHARM OF THE NETHERLANDS
FIRST impressions of a country and its people are, generally speaking, pleasurable; but the feelings of the traveller who sets foot on Dutch soil for the first time are also those of surprise and wonderment. Like a flash does it come through his mind that he is in a land unlike all others he has visited; that he is treading soil which has been wrested from an angry sea and overflowing rivers ​by a race which has for centuries fought and mastered, and which will to its dying day strive to keep under control, that devouring and all-powerful element—water. “God made the sea; we made the shore,” is the Hollanders' not overweening boast. They are, so to speak, living over a water-volcano all the time—ay, and dancing right merrily on it; but at the same time they remain on the look-out, mindful that their ever-present and relentless enemy shall not take them unawares.
A “POLDER” SCENE.
Holland's prairie studded with cows and windmills. The cows are invariably coloured black and white.
​discomfiture. “Peuple frondeur,” Louis Napoleon aptly characterized the nation over which he ruled for a few brief years. But, for all that, his reign was a popular one; he proved an acceptable ruler to his subjects, whose descendants cherish his memory to the present day. A great national peril might kindle the embers slumbering in the Dutch bosom, and arouse in it the spirit which defied the Duke of Alva and Louis XIV.
Truly a wonderful nation, which for eighty years struggled with all-powerful Spain, which was run over under Napoleon, accomplishing the while marvellous triumphs in drainage and land reclamation, producing the foremost scholars in Europe, a body of almost unparalleled painters, revealing remarkable colonizing and commercial aptitude, and the founders of the United States to a far greater extent ​than the Pilgrim Fathers. To-day this little nation pursues the even tenor of its way, keeping up its glorious traditions, while its population is smaller than that of Greater London. According to the latest census—that of 1905—the figures are 5,509,659 souls, of whom 60 per cent. are Protestants, 35 per cent. Roman Catholics, and about 100,000 Jews.
After a brief period of sight-seeing in one of the larger towns—Amsterdam, Rotterdam, or The Hague—the new arrival will map out his tour, which will take him by thriving towns, dainty little villages and hamlets; along endless canals, as quiet as if corpses of dead rivers; past verdant and luxuriant meadows, studded with flowerets, trodden by black-and-white kine with sleek and glossy coats, and akin in appearance to the famed Holsteiners.
As one journeys along the endless ​network of canals which make of the land one huge checker-board, there is but one drawback to the enjoyment of the landscape with which the paintings of Ruisdael, Cuyp, Ostade, and Paul Potter of days gone by, and those of the gifted Marises, Israels, Mauve, Willem Witsen, and others of the present time, have made us familiar. A fly lurks in the amber of those toy villages, amid the alleys of limes and poplars. It is the malodorous smell of the grey-green, muddy, stagnant canals. In many places the natives may be seen converting these water-ducts into main sewers while simultaneously rinsing out their coffee-pots and other articles of domestic use, with the utmost indifference to any sanitary regulations.
CHARACTERISTIC CANAL SCENE.
A flat-bottomed barge in full sail.
​skinny-looking ducks? On that point they are silent.
If the scene is a peaceful one, some of its prominent landmarks—the huge windmills, standing out against the sky—are seldom at rest; but on such rare occasions they present the appearance of great cobwebs hanging from the clouds. They are more often at work, and, as they revolve slowly against the line of the horizon, they are plodding along industriously, extracting oil from seeds, thrashing hemp, sawing wood, pulverizing gravel, and last, but not least, doing their utmost to prevent the polders (lands rescued from the water's sway, and devoted to agricultural production) from being inundated. They are unceasingly engaged in carrying water from the smaller canals to the larger ones, communicating by the same means with canals higher up, which in their turn carry the water to the sea.
​On the canals the trekschuit (drawboat or water 'bus) is fast becoming a thing of the past. Here and there only a cumbersome kind of house-boat is to be met with, moving slowly by dint of a deal of poling and pulling. Of such is the venerable boat which plies between Edam and Volendam, along perhaps the dirtiest canal in Holland. It may be slow in its progress along this sewer, but it is a pleasing remembrance, that of having been towed by one of the members of the Nierop family. Like a mule does he harness himself to the “express-boat,” and like a tortoise does he plod along the yellow-bricked towpath. He is in no hurry, nor would you be were it not for the “emanations” from the canal and the duck-farms. There is, however, compensation in all things, and the vista as one approaches Volendam is not to be forgotten.
KNITTING AND BASKING.
Volendam “Meisjes” taking it quietly at midday. This is one of the towns where the picturesque costumes of the women may be seen to the best advantage.
​In one of the slime-covered ditches of that noted fishing village on the shores of the Zuider Zee lies an old barge, quaintly and gorgeously embellished with mouldings once white. It is vaguely and more or less truthfully described as “belonging to the time of the French King, Louis XIV.,” and was in days past much in demand on festal and festive occasions; but its glory has departed, and it lies “on sluggish, lonesome, muddy waters, anchor'd near the shore, an old, dismasted, grey and batter'd ship, disabled, done, and broken … rusting, mouldering.”
As one passes through this noiseless landscape, unfolding itself, undisturbed by any other sound than the tinkling of the cow-bells and the musical chimes of the ​town or village belfry ringing out gently not only quaint old tunes familiar centuries ago, but also airs that are painfully modern, drawn, as they often are, from the répertoire of music that is not classical, one falls into the somnolence of a lazy reverie, in the midst of which arises the awakening recollection of the difficulties under which the entrancing landscape has been fashioned by the hand of man and the sweat of his brow. Over and over again have the cruel and greedy waters claimed more than their pound of human flesh and more than their share of the land, begrudging the poor Hollander every square inch of his country.
A BACK STREET IN VOLENDAM.
View of the alleged “old French” barge rotting in the muddy waters.
​and claimed 80,000 persons. In 1421 the Maas overflowed its banks as the result of a storm, carrying away seventy-two villages and 100,000 lives in a single night. Again, in 1532, the sea broke the embankments of Zeeland, and a hundred villages were of the past. Amsterdam, Zeeland, and the province of Utrecht were inundated in 1570, while 20,000 persons were drowned in Friesland. In 1825 North Holland, Friesland, Over-Yssel, and Gelderland were inundated. In 1855 the overflowing Rhine flooded Gelderland, a portion of Utrecht, and submerged a large portion of Brabant. As late as 1873 the polder of Borselen, 21 English acres in extent, sank into the waters. Undaunted by all these disasters, to mention but a few of the principal ones, the Dutch fought on, draining the Lake of Haarlem, 44 kilometres in circumference, because its waters were a perpetual ​threat to Haarlem, Amsterdam, and Leyden. And now they are seriously considering the draining of the Zuider Zee, an accomplishment that will add 1,400 square miles to their land. Holland may be called “toy-land,” or “the land of miniature,” but it is assuredly the “land of pluck,” for its citizens, undismayed by the numerous victories of sea and river, and by the terrible loss of life attendant upon them, pursue the even tenor of their way, for ever erecting new forts which are to repel the vigorous onslaught of the eternal enemy.
To return to the towns—the three most important ones—Rotterdam, Amsterdam, and The Hague. The town on the Rotte is given precedence because most travellers land there. It is the Liverpool or the Glasgow of Holland, and since 1830 the powerful rival of Antwerp. As you look up the haven, and catch a glimpse of a tall, ​commanding windmill, you feel that you have arrived in a very Dutch town. Its cosmopolitan shipping has perhaps given it a reputation abroad of being less Dutch than other towns in Holland, but here again the activity and energy of the race are prominent. Rotterdam's charm lies in its virile strength, its business-like aspect, its magnificent port, and a stroll along the Boompjes (so called from the "little trees," now fully-grown elms), the principal quay, is well repaid by the endless vista of ships flying the colours of all nations. Rotterdam is a merchant city pure and simple. The saying goes that you make your fortune at Rotterdam, consolidate it at Amsterdam, and spend it at The Hague.
Rotterdam has an appearance of solidity about it, but perhaps less of the conservative stolidity to be met with elsewhere in the Netherlands. It is an essentially ​progressive town, and both English and German influences have made and are making themselves felt in its daily life. About one-half of the total national imports by sea, and nearly one-half of the exports, pass through it, besides four-fifths of the Dutch trade with the Rhine. No lengthy stay need be made in Rotterdam. A pilgrimage to the statue and house of the illustrious Gerrit Gerritsz, better known to fame as Erasmus, is a tribute that should be paid to his memory. The Boymans Museum is also worthy of attention, although hardly a rival to the Amsterdam and The Hague galleries, as are also the Diergaarde, or “Zoo,” which is tastefully laid out, and the Gothic Groote Kerk, or Church of St. Lawrence, from the tower of which those of The Hague, Leyden, Gouda, Delft, Dordrecht, and Brielle can be distinguished in clear weather.
ON THE SCHIE.
Barge sailing towards Rijswijk, where a great peace was concluded.
​The next étape is to Amsterdam, the “Venice of the North,” built on hundreds of thousands of piles, the old Stadhuis, used for ten days in the year as a royal residence, having been erected on 13,659 piles driven into the ooze. As one wanders along its thoroughfares, the names of the streets, grachten (canals), singels (moats, girdles, or encircling ditches), and kaden (quays), tell the city's history to those who care to delve into it. A notable feature of this city, composed of some ninety islands, is the unusual height of its houses when compared with those of other Dutch towns. It derives its appellation from Gysbrecht II., Lord of Amstel, who built a castle there in 1204, and constructed the dam from which it is named. At one time it was reckoned the third city in the French Empire. It is Holland's money-market, and many Amsterdammers ​congregate about the Beurs, concerning the architectural beauty of which the citizens themselves are at variance, so a stranger may not settle the dispute. Its bridges are naturally numerous; some three hundred are to be counted. Amsterdam does its best to extirpate malarial germs, constantly renewing its waters by an arm of the North Sea Canal, and dredging them frequently. Still, these operations leave much to be desired, as the visitor will find out to his cost when visiting the vicinity of the Rijks Museum in summer-time.
CANAL SCENE IN AMSTERDAM.
The Zuider Kerk, not far from the Raam Gracht.
​quarter, still almost exclusively occupied by Jews, cannot be commended for its cleanliness, while the stenches engendered by the frying of foods in oil is only one whit less savoury than that of the country's canals. In the course of the centuries during which the Jews have sojourned in Amsterdam they have not acquired the Dutch netheid (neatness), but there is much life to be seen in the Joden-Bree-Straat, the principal street in the quarter, and anything and everything can be bought there, from a “genuine” Ruisdael to a rusty and dentated old razor.
The Kalverstraat—so called from the calves' market, which used to be there—formerly stretched from the Dam (as at present) to the so-called chapel (the present Kapelsteeg); it is a remarkable street. The other part of the street as it exists nowadays, running to the Spui, is only ​twenty-five years old; twenty-five years ago it was a canal still. Although this world-famed thoroughfare has been compared to Regent Street, or Broadway, or to the Parisian Rue de la Paix, it has an individuality peculiarly its own, and that is its narrowness; there is very little walking and driving space between its shop-fronts. Seldom is so bright and tempting a display of wares to be met with, and a lady needs to be a superwoman to resist the impulse to purchase the diamonds, jewellery, silverware, curios, and more or less “old” pottery exposed in the shop-windows. It must, however, be said, to the credit of the Kalverstraat vendor, that he is thoroughly frank in his transactions with you. He will not sell as “old” Friesland silver-ware that which is not nearly as old as the youngest purchaser; he will admit that it is “new”; but he will be equally candid in ​regard to the price, which will oftentimes be prohibitive. In this connection one needs to be an expert. England and the United States of America probably possess between them more “old Delft” and “old Friesland” silver-ware than were ever manufactured or wrought in the Netherlands. Merely to be fair to the ladies, it mast be recorded that very few of their escorts can pass the place of Lucas Bols; they cannot resist the temptation to taste his curaçoa.
The Nieuwen Dijk (if you wish to “air” your knowledge of Dutch, do not sound the final n in the first word, and do not say Nieuwen Dijk Straat, for to Dutch ears it would sound as strange as would “Strand Street” to us) is a less expensive shopping street than the Kalverstraat, and in it are to be found all Dutch articles in daily domestic use. It, too, has its fascinations. The quarter known as De Jordaan ​is worth walking through, if only to gather from its streets the origin of its appellation, for it has nothing in common with the River Jordan. The word is a corruption of jardin, and in this “garden,” which constitutes the workmen's quarter, we find Huguenot traces in the names of flowers and trees given to streets and canals, to wit: Rozen-Straat, Egalantin-Straat, Linden-Gracht, Palm-Straat, and so forth. The Schreiers Toren, or Weepers' Tower, where women bade farewell to men sailing away to far-off Newfoundland, to the West and East Indies, many never to return, is one of the landmarks of Amsterdam to be remembered.
A “STREET” IN AMSTERDAM.
Unlike Venice, no gondolas ply on its stagnant waters.
​sculpture dating from 1574, the date on which the porch was renewed after the great fire of 1421. The word “Begijn” may be derived from the old Dutch beggen or bedgen—saying prayers regularly. Wagenaar, the Town Historian in 1760, believed that the béguinages sprang up in 1170, when a priest of Liége, Lambert le Bègue (Lambert the Stutterer), induced widows and maidens to adopt a religious life without vows, passing their time in needlework and deeds of charity, and that the Dutch Begijnen followed. The word is also said to be derived from Begge, daughter of Pipinius van Landen, Duke of Brabant, who lived at the end of the seventh century. The Begijn Kerk (the English church), in the Begijnenhof, is of particular interest to English and Americans. Its tercentenary was celebrated in February, 1907.
​Wandering away from the central part of the city, one will find in the neighbourhood of its two famed museums, the Rijks and the Stedelijk, to be dealt with summarily hereafter, many picturesque residences, which will gladden the eye, and make one wish in vain that they could be transplanted and kept outwardly as bright and clean in London's murky atmosphere. Amsterdam, like Rotterdam, has its "Zoo." Both of these places were laid out from the very first with a view to the requirements and habits of their inmates, an example followed nearer home in recent years only. In conclusion, Amsterdam is a centre from which all places in Holland can be easily reached. From Amsterdam, too, all the steamers going to the Dutch East Indies take their departure.
THE NIEUWE MARKT OF AMSTERDAM.
A busy scene near the Kloveniersburgwal.
​that one's visiting-card no longer suffices to secure admission. Visitors must be personally recommended by the Consuls representing their countries.
The Hague, 'S Gravenhage, or den Haag (the Count's enclosure, or hedge), was in olden times a hunting resort of the Counts of Holland. Commercially it has no importance, and in many respects it resembles the capital of the United States. Although not a seaport, it is more cosmopolitan than Amsterdam, the Dutch city par excellence. The Hague's aspirations are modern, and Dutch traditions are to its citizens a negligible quantity; it is striving to fall in with modern Europe. It is a beautiful city, with its wide streets and well-shaded avenues. Its houses have a characteristic feature in their artistic balconies, and bear an imprint of aristocracy; its citizens are prone to display a certain amount of morgue, and ​to consider themselves vastly superior to the rest of the Dutch nation. It affords the former pleasure, but the latter treat the matter with cool indifference. Outside of The Hague the Court does not affect social life much, if at all, but the provinces delight in doing honour to the House of Orange.
A GENERAL VIEW OF AMSTERDAM.
Looking south-east from the Zuider Kerk. Some of the numerous bridges are here shown.
​Binnenhof quarter, nowadays so well known to all through the sittings of the Peace Conference, the monuments are few, the city's chief feature consisting in rich modern dwellings. The famed Bosch, or wood, in which stands the Huis ten Bosch, the Dutch Trianon, is a perfect oasis. According to tradition, it is, like the wood of Haarlem, the remains of an ancient forest spared by the Spaniards, who were not wont to show mercy to anything Dutch. Among the trees in the Bosch are to be found some said to have been planted by Jacob Cats, the humorous burgher poet, and by Jakoba van Beieren (Jacqueline of Bavaria, Countess of Holland). The Huis was built in 1647 by Princess Amalia von Solms, consort of Frederik Hendrik of Orange. Among its treasures is an octagonal room covered with paintings, not by Dutch, but by Flemish ​artists, whom the Dutch Stadhouders patronized—to wit, Jacob Jordaens and his school. Prominent among these stands Jordaens' allegorical tableau, representing the apotheosis of Frederik Hendrik.
The Koninklijk Kabinet van Schilderijen, better known as the Mauritshuis, is the picture gallery of The Hague. It contains Rembrandt's “Lesson of Anatomy” and Paul Potter's “Bull,” to say nothing of other valuable paintings; but this book does not purport to be a museum guide. In the Royal Cabinet of Curiosities at the Mauritshuis is the sword of De Ruyter; the bullet-riddled cuirass of Tromp (so often wrongly styled van Tromp); a ​lock of hair of the heroic Lieutenant van Speijk, who in 1831 blew up his ship at Antwerp to preserve the honour of the Dutch tricolour; the clothes worn by William the Silent at the moment of his foul assassination; and a miniature Dutch house, made for Peter the Great, who refused to pay its cost, whereupon its architect, Brandt, presented it to the museum.
In close proximity to The Hague lies the fishing village of Scheveningen, which can be reached from the capital by two roads. The Old Road, or Scheveningsche Weg, was planned by the elder Huygens, the statesman, to enable him to visit his friend the poet Cats at his home among the dunes at Sorgvliet. Scheveningen is a fashionable watering-place, and that description will suffice. The memory of one of its native residents must, however, be rescued from oblivion. Some there are ​who will remember that ancient mariner old Spaan. He was wont to beckon the stranger to follow him to the strand, when, with a comprehensive wave of the arm, he would say to his victims: “You see all this? Well, it is the sea—the sea!” the last word pronounced with much emphasis. And then his outstretched palm would be ready to receive a reward for the valuable information he had imparted.
A GROUP OF WINDMILLS.
“De Poel,” at Zaandam, where Peter the Great worked.
From a sketch by W. L. Bruckman.
​which is perhaps less dead, may be styled its sister city, for both these once prosperous ports show few signs of any activity. In the latter, the St. Jans Gasthuis is a quaint and marvellous architectural achievement. At Zaandam is a shrine visited yearly by hundreds, for there stands the hut (Czaar Peterhuisje) wherein dwelt one Peter Mikhailoff, also known to his fellow-workers as “Peterbaas”—“Boss” Peter—who learnt shipbuilding in a practical fashion in the yard of the Heer Kalb, and whom history knows as Peter the Great.
Down the Maas is a little town seldom trodden by the traveller; but the Watergeuzen, the sturdy “sea-beggars” lovingly enshrined in the chronicles of the Dutch, have given it immortality. Its official name is nowadays Brielle, but the true name is Briel. It has been stated that ​the word brill signifies spectacles, and that the Dutch sang words to the effect that
"On April Fool's Day Duke Alva's spectacles were stolen away.”
BRIELLE'S STADHUIS.
The town imortalized by the heroism of the “Sea-Beggars.”
​Briel has nothing in common with bril, but betokens a low-lying, swampy district, more or less covered with bushes, and suitable for pasturing cattle. Close to Prinsenhage, near Breda, there is also a hamlet called Briel, while in Vlaanderen (a district of Zeeland) the name Briel frequently occurs.”
Among many notable towns is Delft, with its mausoleum of William the Silent and the tombs of Grotius, of Tromp, who in 1652 defeated Blake at the battle of the Downs, and of Piet Hein, whose name survives in a Dutch song. Haarlem has ​erected a statue to Laurens Janszoon, called Coster (the Dutch word signifies “sexton,” for such was his occupation), and the Dutch claim that he invented printing before Gutenberg. The claim has long since been settled in favour of the latter, except in Dutch eyes. Among the pictures in the Stadhuis are the eight “Regent”
IN THE ISLAND OF WALCHEREN.
A Zeeland maiden arrayed in her finery.
​pieces of Franz Hals, constituting the highest expression of his art. The city is, moreover, the proud guardian of the banner of the widow Kenau Simons Hasselaer, who, with three hundred of her sex, defended the town against Frederic of Toledo, son of the Duke of Alva, in 1572. To Utrecht is due the honour that within its precincts the Netherlands formed a pact of union against Philip II. The famed Maliebaan, a triple avenue of magnificent lime-trees, which Louis XIV. preserved from the vandalism of his soldiers, is one of the glories of the city. Its Dom Kerk has undergone more transformations than any other religious edifice in the kingdom, and from its lofty tower all the provinces of Holland can be viewed with the aid of a telescope.
UTRECHT'S CATHEDRAL TOWER.
The illustration shows it in course of repairs, now completed. From it all the provinces of Holland can be viewed with the aid of a telescope.
THE HAVEN OF VOLENDAM, FROM A DRAWING BY A. LE COMTE.
Fishing-boats returning from a week's cruise in the Zuider Zee.
​known as the “Athens of the North.” The memory of the Elzevirs, those famous printers, haunts it still. There are people who are disappointed at not finding the “mill in which Rembrandt was born,” and some writers have expressed a regret that it no longer exists. As a matter of fact, Rembrandt was not born in a mill, as shown by the tablet now affixed to what is a stable or coach-house. Dordrecht is a pleasant town, with its vestal zone of four rivers—the Maas, the Waal, the Linge, and the Merwede—all embodied in its device:
Me Mosa, me Vahalis, me Linga Mervaque cingunt, Æternam Batavæ virginis ecce fidem.”
It was the first town to cast off the yoke of the hated Spaniard. Cuyp, Bols, and Maes, a glorious group, are her sons.
OLD DUTCH HOUSES.
The St. Nicholas Church at Amsterdam.
​The foregoing is a mere summary of the attractions of some of Holland's towns, serving to stimulate the interest of those visiting “the little country beneath the sea.”
* ↑ “The Dismantled Ship,” by Walt Whitman, the manuscript of which is in the author's possession.
* ↑ To the many who think of Paul Potter merely as a painter of animal life it will come as a surprise to learn that the Hermitage, in St. Petersburg, possesses eight magnificent landscapes from his brush.
* ↑ The first verse and the chorus of “Piet Hein” run as follows: " Heb je wel gehoord Van de zilveren vloot? Van de zilveren vloot van Spanje? Die had zooveel Spaansche matten aan boord En appelties van Oranje! Piet Hein! Piet Hein! Piet Hein zijn naam is klein Zijn daden bennen groot (bis) Hij heeft gewonnen de zilvereu vloot." A free translation of the above is: “Did you hear of the silver fleet, of the silver fleet of Spain? There were lots of Spanish piastres on board, and orange apples! Piet Hein! Piet Hein! Piet Hein, his name is little, but great are his deeds, for he has conquered the silver fleet.” “Orange apples” here signify gold. It was off Matanzas that Piet Hein captured the “silver Fleet,” which was conveying to Spain the large sum of £640,000.