LIFE IN HOLLAND.
DUTCH SCENES AS THEY STRIKE AN AMERICAN VISITOR.

The following interesting account of Dutch life
was witten by an American girl enjoying her first
trip abroad:
Geneva, Switzerland, July 16.
From Holland dyke tot the mountains of La Suisse
is a wide jump, and I have succeeded in accom-
plishing the gymnastic feat only by taking it
piecemeal. From The Hague to Paris, from Paris
to Lausanne, from Lausanne to Begnins is the way
I did it.
It is an astonishing leap, though, when you think
of it. The geographical differences between the
two countries could scarcely be greater, and natur-
ally one expects tot find social conditions equally
unlike. To a degree I suppose they are. Yet I
have found several points of resemblanea besides
those emphasized in the similar plaster walls and
red roofs of the houses, the aprons of the women
and the blue blouses of the small boys.
In the main, however, there is little here to sug-
gest that quaintest of quaint Dutch towns Dor-
drecht. And, first, let me say, we did not go to
Dordrecht because Mr. Hopkinson-Smith recom-
mended it in "Scribner's". In fact, though at the
time we all read that captivating sketch, we had
had the bad taste completely to forget it til Herr
Boudir [Boudier] himself proudly showed it to us, I state
this explicitly because I do not wish any one to
labor under the impression that our arrival was at
all due to the judicious advertising of anybody. At
the same time I am prepared to back up all of Mr.
Smis's statements as to the desirability of Dor-
drecht as a summer or fall resort and painters'
paradise.
We went to it from Antwerp, and while trailing
along behind what seem to American minds most
insufficient little engines we never dreamed that
we were approaching a veritable Dutch Venice. We
did nt! suspect it even after we reached the neat lit-
tle station. It was only when the bobtail tram, with
its cheerful dinner bell announcing our approach
at every few steps, had whirled us round a corner
to a style to suggest the Broadway cable, that we
suddenly realized 'where we were at." We were
at a canal. A most entrancing, sluggish, greenish
brown canal filled with stubby boats alike before
and behind, and bordered by leaning, sloping, tipsy
houses, whose yellow walls and red roofs outshone
the sun, in and out and around corners and cross-
ing streets and rubbing up against the sides of the
buildinps the canal went on its torpid way. The
beautiful green slime and the slow, dragging cur-
rent might suggest typhus and malaria to the over
doctored American, but such things are not dis-
cussed fey the corpulent mynheers and square built
vrows. They leave the germs alone, and ap-
parently the germs appreciate the situation and
return the compliment. It is a state of affairs I
would commend to the attention of some of our
microbe specialists.
Indeed, though, the Dortians [= Dordtenaren] do well to trust
their beloved canal. It Is their only highway, their
chief means of communication with the far-reach
ing- ends of their own town and with their near or
distant neighbors. Instead of rumbling, rattling,
explosive express wagons, there are the steady,
slow, noiseless canal boats. Or, if mynheer can
afford the expense and is in a hurry, there, are the
steamers that dash through the water with a speed
suggestive of Virginia railroads, and with as many
accommodating stops. The people apparently own
the boats here, and one day I wished that some
of our railroad officials were with me. It was on
cur way to Rotterdam, and we were steaming gayly
along, with no known stop ahead for some time.
Suddenly the bell jangled sharply, and we began
to kick up the water about us preparatory to one
of those double scuffle sort of stops — where the
prow becomes the stern and you finally are uncer-
tain where or whether you are going or coming.
We looked in vain for any wharf or landing. There
was nothing of the sort. At length, as we came to
a full pause, we saw a small rowboat just by our
side. Then we dropped down some steps and a
buxom, white cotton glove damsel was helped up
by a youth who gave his assistance as long as
possible. The bell clanged sharply again, the ladder
was drawn up, we whirled into the stream and the
rowboat with the waving swain was left far be-
hind. Such is what I call "popular administration."
But if the Dutchman had not unlimited rights on
his water paths, he would be hardly off. Horses
they, don't own, or so few of then; that they are
ts uncommon as automobiles yet are with us. It
is only by his water trade that he lives, moves and
has his being.

DUTCH CLEANLINESS.
What the rivers and canals are to the man of the
family, scrubbing is to his better half. There is
one thing in which we need never hope to "beat
the Dutch." That is cleanliness. Of course it is
so old story of the Dutch housewife who runs about
with a cloth after every footstep on her speckless
floors. But only by actually living with them can
one fully comprehend the extent of their neatness.
In a hotel one does not expect to find quite the
scrupulous care of a private house. Yet at the
Bellevue one of the sturdy maids spent auch after-
noon from 5 to 9 o'clock in washing every door,
lintel, mopboard and glass transom of the cham-
bers. Think of that, you housekeepers who pride
yourselves upon your weekly cleaning day! No
Dutch vrow however, is satisfied with the mere
internal spick and spanness of her home. With
long handled brush, pails of water and a ladder she
ccrubs the blinds, the windows and all the walls
of the building. And she has done it so well and
for so long that the houses dating back to 1600 are
as freshly colored as their new born neighbors.
Only the leaning lines betray the age of the shin-
ing domicile. The walls finished the sidewalk is
the next point of attack. Down on her knees she
drops, and with a huge rag and unlimited buckets
of water she goes at the flagging as if she were
cleaning a silver floor. That is not enough, either,
for there are always more buckets of water which
she pours over the cobblestones beyond the pale of
her own walk. I have even seen her wiping and
scaping the!r edges.
So far as my observation goes, it is the woman
of the family who is busy. The work of the world
is doubtless carried on by the man, but in Holland
you don't believe it. From morning to night the
streets are filled with slot mocing, apparently pur-
poseless men, stolidly gossiping in groups or drink-
ing their verlasting beer in the outdoor cafés.
Therse street restaurants are crowded every hour
of the day, and as much of the night as I have
waited up to see. Either the towns are much more
populous than the census declares, or else every
Dutchman spends hour after hour seated at those
tittle iron-legged tables, slowly swallowing his beer
and puffing a big pipe. Thif is beyond question, for
at no time of the day does one ever see many
vavant chairs. No, it is the woman in Holland
who does the work, assisted by the dog.
After this year I beiieve there is to be a law
against using dogs as beasts of burden. No one
who has seen the tugging, struggling, faithful
creatures tied beneath the the crowded cart they are
dragging can fall to hope the law will take effect.
I saw Newfoundlands pulling, unaided, carts as
big as our so-caled "dog carts", which were piled
two feet high with vegetables and fruit. Their thin
legs sprawled all over the ground in their frantic
efforts, and their eyes fairly bulged out of their
cadaverous heads. It is an epitome of the whole
subject to say — and it is a fact — that the dog is the
only thin animal human or dumb, that one sees in
Holland.
When mynheer has a load too heavy even, in his
consideration, for his patient dog, he gives a handle
of the cart to his spouse. Then, walking freely be
side them, he urges one with words and the other
with the lash to better their pace. Perhaps, when
he can no longer use the dog, he will rely wholly
upon the well covered bone and sinew of his long
suffering vrow. It must be acknowledged, how
ever that these vrows do not look as if their labors
weight heavily upon them. Perhaps some of our
neurotic overstrung, feeble women might gain
under a similar regime. Who knows but we may
yet return to such aboriginal idea as to what con-
stitutes woman's true sphere?
Like her larger sister cities, Dordrecht has her
eyes open for the tourist, and her antique shops
are a standing menace to even very thin pocket-
books. The flatulent variety are always easy prey!
I have visited antique shops in plenty since we
landed at that beehive of them, Antwerp, but I've
never had to quard my lamentably inadequate sil-
ver so carefully as at Dordrecht. The proprietors
of these dim old shops have learned well the tastes
of their artist visitors, and only absolute penury
can prevent one falling victim to the charms dis-
played so prodigally. I am not writing a catalogue
nor a Sunday paper page advertisement, or I could
make many a brother collector's eyes shine over
descriptions of the Louis XV furniture, the old
lace, the Empire silver, the fifteenth century
tapestries that that one little town can show.

IN THE DORDRECHT MARKETS.
Almost more charming than these shops was the
open air market. As I have never been abroad be-
fore (being the one American in that condition
since Lilian Bell finished her first foreign tour)
these markets have been perpetual delights to me.
If I had not already seen much the same in Quebee,
nothing less powerful than a derrick could
ever drag me from them. As it is, I have crawled
out of bed at unearthly hours and foregone
hungrily desired dejeuners dor the sake of watching
the queer crowds and the queerer merchandise.
Dordrecht's market was the best of all, because
there the country people appeared in all the glory
of their Sunday-go-to-meeting bibs and tuckers.
That means marvellous white lace and muslin caps,
pinned on with startling gold arrangements like
miniature bedsprings, the cleanest of blue ging-
ham aprons and the stoutest of sabots, curling up
sharply at the toes. One doesn't see too many of
these sabots, even in Dordrecht. The children of
the people generally waer them, but many of their
elders have been graduated into the carpet slip-
per. This is made with bilkier sole than we see at
home, but the idea is the same. The more be-
flowered and variegated the better the Dutchman
loves them. No simple, sober base for him! He
prefers to be reminded at every step of exotic
landscape gardening. To a spectator a crowd of
these beslipperd citizens is like a bewildering
kaleidoscope.
At the markets you can buy not only all kinds
of fruit and vegetables, but pretty nearly every-
thing else. They are natives' department store,
county fair, Washington Market and curiosity
shop all rolled into one. The great joy in it, too,
is that if collars or cabbages are too dear at one
corner you may do much better at the booth next
but one. Many of these booths, by the way, are
no booths at all. Often sitting in his heels, the
merchant is surrounded by his wares in baskets
and trays that have only the ground to rest upon.
Sometimes, however, he has a table; sometimes she
(for it is frequently a she) displays the goods under
a more or less elaborate canopy. Whatever it is, I
never ceased tot be surprised at the rapidity with
which the whole concourse could disappear. At 10
o'clock in hte morning the city square would be
packed jammed with a howling mob. At 3 o'clock
in the afternoon there would not be so much as a
flying scrap of paper to hint of those morning
hours. How they do it I don't understand. Quick-
ness of motion is not a Dutch characteristic, yet
no Arab ever folded his tent more expeditiously
than the pack up and away woth themselves and
their wares.
The market is a great place for the camera, I
had taken both surreptitiously and openly many
different views at Dordrecht, and no one seemed
to object to being used as a subject. In fact, I
felt quite sure they were like most people internally
extremely well pleased to be put into any

kind of a picture. Once, however, I was ginven
distinctly tot understand that much was an entirely
erroneous impression. She wore a close muslin
cap, with the bog curled knobs over her ears, a
a gold locket, and with her tight, short sleeves
and her skirt gathered voluminously about her
waist, she was quite the most picturesque model
I thought, and with great care I rested the camera
on a barrel near by and proceeded to focus.
"Na! na!" shrieked a voice suddenly; and, looking
up in amaze, l saw my model making a flying
leap over het vegetables and waving her hands
frantically in front of the lens. In short, thick.
gruttural jerks of words and much hand pantomime
she made me understand that pose she would— but
only with a cash payment in advance! And pose
she did, with pride and determination, tot the full
value of the 10 cents she received.

ADVERTISING THEIR WARES.
I have often wished for a phonograph as well as
a camera at these markets. Every merchant has
his own particular vocal style for attracting your
attention to his most superior articles. There was
one woman in Dordrecht, a pretty, bright brunette,
with the sharpest of black eyes and reddest of
full lips who called her greengroceries in a shrill,
high chant like a priestess. Another emphasized
the enduring virtues of his stoves and kettles by
pounding their sides with iron pokers. Others
stood by their tables or baskets and in menacing
shrieks demanded your complete attention. But
of the whole pushing, eager crowd one man suc-
ceeded in impressing me beyond all others. His
booth was an elaborate affair, the sides as well
as the top being covered with gay red and white
curtains. His counter table was wide and long and
piled high with vivid calico shirts and collars.
He looked more like a Yankee farmer than a Dutch
vendor, and when I heard his voice I almost be
lieved he was a Yankee. In loud, full, not un-
musical tones he sang the beauty and merit of his
goods to the tune of "Ta-ra-ra-boom-de-ay. Ta-ra
ra-boom-de-ay." It is several years since I have
heard that once popular dance song, and at first
I could only place it as being strangely familiar.
How in the world that air ever got to Holland, und
to that shirt dealer at that, I don't pretend to say.
Suffice it, there it was as good as new and twice
as natural. It brought the Boston Tremont Theatre
and the New-York Casino vividly before my
eyes, and I felt as if I ought to purchase one of
the patchwork quilt shirts in payment thereof.
Mr. Smith says that to him all Holland is just
Dordrecht. With the exception of Rijsoord. I quite
agree with him. This latter is only a very small
hamlet, a short drive from Dort, which it regards
as a very grand city. It is Dutch, however, to a
degree that almost put its bigger city to shame.
You never see anything but sabots there. Even
the carpet slipper's reign has not begun. And no
young girl puts on a gayly flowered hat over her
muslin cap, as she often does in Dordrecht. Caps
and metal bands and brass pompoms are worn
wholly unobscured from view. There are not even
the few horses one sees in Dort. The citizen makes
his way on his own sabots or poles it along in his
dumpy boat on the narrow canals and ditches.
The frenzy of cleaning reaches high water mark in
Rijsoord. Apparently all the women spend all
their time emptying the contents of their houses
outdoors and vigorously subjecting every article to
a scrubbing process that ought shortly to put it
out of existence.
There is an inn at Rijsoord, known to a few
painters and others, whose wide, smiling landlady
is a guarantee in itself. The general status of her
usuai visitor ia easily guessed, for she proudly tells
every stranger on his first arrival that upstairs
there is a fine studio. And so there is, with a
beautiful cross-light coming into dormer windows
that throw out into strong relief the rafters and
bars walls of a big room, where old sketches and
abandoned paint boxes tell of struggles undergone
and given up. Back of the white stuccoed walls is
a stream, bordered by high green grass and
dwarfed, leaning willows; and here are several
rowboats, which the vrou grandly states are free
for her visitors' use. How they suggest long days
under arching trees, with book or palette in hand,
while one works or idles, as the mood deciders! All
about, the tempting marshes are dotted with the
sweeping arms of the gray windmills, under the
wonderful sky of the Dutch heavens; and over all
is the delicious atmosphere that invites to laziness
or retrospection, whichever one calls that state to
one's conscience.

A DRIVE TO RIJSOORD.
The drive from Dordrecht to Rijsoord is through
an avenue bordered on each side by a single row of
straight, slender poplars, extending without inter
ruption for two miles. Halfway there, looking for
ward or back, it seems as if one must be in the
middle of a double ended bright green telescope.
They are the trees Monet loves to paint, and they
always seem strangely human to me. One of our
party called them widows, draped in close, clinging
weeds. I think them more like the shrinking, gen-
tle, swaying, prim old maidens that New-England
is fast forgetting how to perpetuate.
Our drive to Rijsoord was the last of our stay
in Dort. It was with unbounded regret we took
our leave of Herr Boudrer [Boudier] and of the equally
charming host of Aux Armes de Hollande, Mr.
Pennock. We had been first commended to his
care, but his lack of rooms sent us to the rival but
generous neighbor. We shall never forget that
little, bright hued town, and we hope to see it
again for a longer stay.
From there we went to Amsterdam, with hours
at the great Rijks Museum, and still more at
the Municipal, where is the wonderful collection
of modern Dutch paintings. To half tell of that
one tilery would take a letter by itself. All
the promise of the Dutch exhibit at tho World's
Fair is more than realized, and one wonders and
admires and worships.
Then to The Hague, and more ecstasy over that
gem of museums, where there is hardly a poor
work. From there trips to Scheveningen, with the
marvellous ride through the heart of a beautiful
forest for two miles. Then the long beach, where
the ocean roars unobstructed, and one looks
straight out on the Atlantic and sees the hig liners
on their way across the world. Scheveningen,
with its Kursaal as big as a dozen Newport Ca-
sinos, its hundreds of wind chairs, its bath houses
on wheels (in which one is drawn out to any spot
in the surf), its hands and its fireworks, its cara-
vansaries of hotels, its crowds of all nationalities —
Scheveningen is the Newport and the Coney Island
combined of The Hague.
But The Hague and Amsterdam and Rotterdam
are all too cosmopolitan to be Holland. To me as
to our noted painter-author-bridge builder, Holland
still remains just Dordrecht.
After Holland, as I've said already came
Switzerland, with a break in Paris. Switzerland
with its vineyards, its delectable valleys, its busy
energy. Its respectable socialism, its glorious mountains
— and, over and above all, like a white robed
guardian angel, its Mont Blanc.
But all that is another story, and it must wait.
For anothor telling, too, is my visit to the noted
"Faiencerie de Carouge"— where we saw china
in the making, from its first powdered state to the
finishing touches of the painter's brush. That was
a great treat, for visitors are no longer admitted
to the factory, and it was as a special favor that
the owner himself took us all over the place. But
— Bientot, as they say here, without the slightest
intention of hastening their measured tread.