The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1892-01-13
A DOUBLE DELUGE.
-, AMERICANS EXPERIENCE
WITH A HOLLAND STORM.

rsHceuC6 OF LIS DNsSA NeAS 80
-r;sa Its Drawbacks.
Fran. the ST. Louis Republic.
fay members of the army Of Ameri-
Tbieh yearly pours to Europe, 90 to
C 91-n.rd unless it be simply to fly through
arrsn giving. perhaps. day to Amster
a., that to those who know the fair
49," Nv countries" it has become matter of
great surprise
!, would seem natural that the soldier
- wish TO see the fields where were
-, the most heroic battles Of modern
-. ,,ban the citizen soldiers of a small
-. -1 ,nmilitsry country stood their ground
a.o;nst the mighty legions OF Alva, and did
@ot taIk of dying in the last ditch, but died
there.
-, tho dock wards whence Van Tromp,
-;,b his boom nailed to his masthead, went
~. and "swept the sea- and, at least, to
~ mon the cabin whe re the great Peter
:, Russia lived while very practically
s.ndving naval architecture.
II would seem as if the merchant would
,;,o 70 visit the marts where far.reaching
LAS commerce may be said to have had
~ Lirth That the engineer would wish to
80 Hollands dikes which, not including
~ constant repairs, which cost about
- ooI 400 year, have involved an outlay,
e. ssaid. of 1900, 100000, to study her
Tonderful canals, such as the one
connecting Amsterdam with the At
Iortic aud her astonishing system
If, drainage that includ pumping
Trost lakes dry to use their bottoms
okh no. fha or
Jont would wish to explore the treasures in
~ libraries of her noble and ancient uni
rarsities. That the artist would look upon
ia, holy ground. pilgrimage to which
Eonld in interest be second only to the one
IN italy. That the potter would wish to
-isi, delft: the lovers of curios to see the
collections from Java, the Indies and Japan,
tba last said TO be finer than can be seen in
Jspan itself; that the fine lady would wish
m examine some of the wonderful old
isca now feeblv initiated with machine
made thread in the factories of Brus-
saIs product which, although bring
Ing immense prices, is as different from
the real thing when maid or matron her.
self snun her flax to thread as fine as
those the cob spins when he makes his web
had some artist draw her a design, and
often gave her leisure hours for years to the
work. as is the Birmingham or Sollingeu-
made ssber of to-day to those the cunning
smiths Of Damascus and Toledo wrought
and that can safely be bent until the point
touches the hilt, and 80 the list might go ou.
But above all Holland is the paradise for
tbe mere seeker after novelty. In fact, the
novelty is, at first, almost too marked it is
bewidering. The rivers pour along far
over your head. Instead of going
down to sea in ships" you climb up long
flights to get at them. When the mer-
chants bark comes back from voyage
around the world, instead of his having to
60 down some hsrbor to see her, she most
politely and oblgingly comes TO anchor at
bis front step, thing Of no difficulty, for
the water, let US say for example, in the
canal along the Boompjes-a fashionable
street in Rotterdam, fronting on the Meuse
is nowhere less than twenty-four feet
deep, and a like depth is kept up to the sea-
But even to watch huge East Indiaman,
fresh perhaps from Java, swing up to the
door of gentleman living in the middle of
great city is hardly as preposterous as
the notion that, as some Englishman wrote,
the croaking frogs living in the sedges
that line Hollandish rivers lcok down with
Scorn upon the chimney-building swallows
Of the villages beneath. It seems a mad
land. The streets of the cities are water
the whole landscape is dotted with wind
! mills grinding, not grain. but water; you
may walk along the seeshore for days and
be no more able to tind pebble than to find
acrown diamond, go a little TO the north
where what by courtesy may be called the
land IS few inches above high tide and
there for miles and miles you will find the
sea sand neatly covered with mating tc
prevent its blowing away A still more
astonishing thing is that the men and
women do not seem lat first sight always
gnderstood) to belong to the same race
Inc men, most polite and courteou:
IN all classes, and hospitable to marked
degree, are staid, grave. formal and a;
solemn as the fourteenthly of the ser.
mon OF Puritan divine. The women, re-
narkably pretty. especially in Friesland
winch has more pretty girls in it than any
place on earth Of the same population (our
own town, OF course, excepted, are gay
ueCldedly, although demurely, coquettsh
anu not at all averse TO innocent fun. IT,
however, the stranger be so fortunate as tc
gam admittance as an intimate to the fam
ny circle Of some Dutchman, he gets tc
Know that the men are really very jolly fell
I'"S, and that their grave formality is only
. uatona! custom instilled in them from
Osoyhood. But there is no country in Eu-
rope where it is SO difficult for a stranger &c
gam such admittance, for the Dutch do moi
1--WE men OF other races.
nut the more one knows of this people
Me more the curiosity grows as to who
we're tnelr ancestors, and what in the name
VI al mat Is wonderful ever led them L
II.'s'e III SUCH country; country tina
t Sau not tree upon it, and has needed t.
ave I millions Of Norway pines driven int
~ unstable soil to hold its houses But, il
THtoeariy days, how build houses at all
aae'e was nota stone in the country; there
b. ds no wood and no coal, so how max,
nond AS there was no wood, absolutely
tt.rS' now make boats to bring necessarie
moiu oIher lands, or to hunt aquatic ami
maSi What did that strange people liv,
ttH. The soil was then certainly unfit
mat rlculture, barren sand and water
s,.u mud. There was no gam
sn;op t water fowl, certainly no lanC
ts -sllaIS nj for food or useful for theii
Rot% S now catch fish in any such numbers
I n.y. a 0e mainstay of life without boats
No suing during at least three months Of
Se !p9a tr being necessarily on the sea9 Fol
|snLnosl ie even to-day. deepened ant
hO,, rsu III as 1t Is, often freezes to the YER,
hmDa..' ana when 1t spread itself at will
rbsT1 nave been simply plain of ice
aye n. LOW low COOK the fish If caught? How
sirtas oil OIL through the fierce cold Of thei
s, -oo1 WITHOUT fuel, or at beyt with an oc
Tsr Vl "a blaze Of dried rushesa Why the,
s NJ. mere and how they survived are mys
s 7sna we only know that the tireless indus
ssi lu " lhdomitable pluck of the race ha
.Nsa we y. land to blossom as the rose, ant
NT' s II with fair cities.
stvo. lal llgguage Of the Dutch seems to eros
As rol herman and English, but the PEG
EeIS entirely unlike either Germans o
Gsbh1.en, and quite as unlike their othe
GTdos, inc Flemish and the French