Putnam patriot., 1930-12-11

iicient reason therein for including in the wanderlngs of a French sum. mer a brief flight into Belgian and Holland.
 For us 1t was a reminiscent trip reminiscent of that winter and spring of 1919 when. in the inter. ests of that great American spree, known unto history as the Aneri- can Conference to Negotiate Peace, we enjoyed to the hilt several weeks attached to the Legation at Brussels under the guidance of that charming gentleman, Mr. Brand Whitlock. now and then taking trip over the bord- CT into Holland, to the Hague. to Amsterdam, to Leyden. to Haarlem snd to Delft. And in particular We remembered an Easter Sunday when we motored out to Leyden and saw the tulip fields in a glory of color never to be forgotten.
 In those days we had left Paris in the week after King Albert and his Queen had returned to Brussels from their wartime exile at La Panne. We left Paris al daybreak and trailed from early morn to midnight over the railroad which practically follow. ea the line of battle. through Albert, with it's hanging Virgin,-through St. Quentin with it's shattered cathedral, through le Chateau with its memor. ies of the bleeding Twenty-Seventh through dreadful Cambrai. Bethune the waste that was La Basee. into dreary Lille and thence to Brussels where we lodged for the week in the Palace Hotel which, thanks to the in vaIers was sans locks. sans keys sans metal of any sort, but replete with a gay and freedom-intoxicatec British staff and all the better knowr and more prosperous cocottes ol Paris.
 How different this peace-time tril decade laterl We board the super comfortable "Etoile du Nord" at | in Paris. and We know O. no more comfortable train in all of Europe We glide quickly out into the coun. try. through Senlis,-where the Ar, Essistiee was signed. through St Quentin, a new and almost rebuilt city, the splendid old Cathedral now being laid bare to the eye again as it's protecting scaffolds are removed Thence through ie Cateau and almost before We have finished lunch We are rushing through Mons Chow wei We remember the young British of ficer who gave us a blessed cup oi coffee one May morning at Mons - and are in Brussels itself. From Brussels we glide swiftly out to Nal ines.-- land how we'll too. We remem i ber the day when we knelt in tho mud of the square before the Cathe dral while Cardinal Mercier, of bles sed memory. ehanted his benedictio, on us and all Americans who ha, ] helped Belgium through her trial b, tireD. And now We are in Antwery and are at the border town oi Esschen and in a scarce half-hour ws are in Roosendaal and bound for The Hague, Haarlen. and Amsterdam.
 For those who really enjoy trave' this particular day trip out of Paris to the commercial capital of Holland had a tremendous fascination. Tn lhe course of a morning and long after noon one passes through three coun- tries. three national personalities three varied and different landscapes There is. to those knew the France pf the great War, the passage from Paris to the border of Belgium through q country that in 1919 was an arid waste of desolation, now blooming with fertility and that pros perity which in these caustic days seems to be the particular property of the French. Then there is the passage into Belgium. country that oddly enough, even from the windows Of the train. differs from it's neigh. bor as does our own North and South, And there Is the transport into Hol- land. which Is sudden and decisive as though the border line had been cut with knife For on this low rainy. now sunny Sunday afternoon, We lock across the fields and the canals and the little cities here and there and We see the same clouds, the same canals, the same windmills and the same brick and stone that inspired Hobbema. Cuyp and Nermeer. Over there IS a rift in the clouds and the sun Is coming through in slanting diagonals. Here is an old lady with ! a cap feeding Cuyp-like COW. Here ' is the same church spire at Delft that 1 inspired Nermeer to one of the great. est of all landscapes and over it al there Is a peace and contentment alier to the conglomerate blood of our owr country. The Holland of our day i not so far removed from the Hollans Of the great Dutch painters. of Will .4. t. .l. .4s