Chapter Chapter 27 · Through the Hague
. Through the Hague
The picture gallery in the Maurits Huis, *{A building erected by Prince
Maurice of Nassau.} one of the finest in the world, seemed to have only
flashed by the boys during a two-hour visit, so much was there to
admire and examine. As for the royal cabinet of curiosities in the same
building, they felt that they had but glanced at it, though they were
there nearly half a day. It seemed to them that Japan had poured all her
treasures within its walls. For a long period Holland, always foremost
in commerce, was the only nation allowed to have any intercourse with
Japan. One can well forego a journey to that country if he can but visit
the museum at The Hague.
Room after room is filled with collections from the Hermit
Empire--costumes peculiar to various ranks and pursuits, articles of
ornament, household utensils, weapons, armor, and surgical instruments.
There is also an ingenious Japanese model of the Island of Desina, the
Dutch factory in Japan. It appears almost as the island itself would if
seen through a reversed opera glass and makes one feel like a Gulliver
coming unexpectedly upon a Japanese Lilliput. There you see hundreds of
people in native costumes, standing, kneeling, stooping, reaching--all
at work, or pretending to be--and their dwellings, even their very
furniture, spread out before you, plain as day. In another room a huge
tortoiseshell dollhouse, fitted up in Dutch style and inhabited by
dignified Dutch dolls, stands ready to tell you at a glance how people
live in Holland.
Gretel, Hilda, Katrinka, even the proud Rychie Korbes would have been
delighted with this, but Peter and his gallant band passed it by without
a glance. The war implements had the honor of detaining them for an
hour; such clubs, such murderous krits, or daggers, such firearms, and,
above all, such wonderful Japanese swords, quite capable of performing
the accredited Japanese feat of cutting a man in two at a single stroke!
There were Chinese and other Oriental curiosities in the collection.
Native historical relics, too, upon which our young Dutchmen gazed very
soberly, though they were secretly proud to show them to Ben.
There was a model of the cabin at Saardam in which Peter the Great lived
during his short career as ship-builder. Also, wallets and bowls--once
carried by the “Beggar” Confederates, who, uniting under the Prince
of Orange, had freed Holland from the tyranny of Spain; the sword
of Admiral van Speyk, who about ten years before had perished in
voluntarily blowing up his own ship; and Van Tromp’s armor with the
marks of bullets upon it. Jacob looked around, hoping to see the broom
which the plucky admiral fastened to his masthead, but it was not there.
The waistcoat which William Third *{William, Prince of Orange, who
became king of England, was a great-grandson of William the Silent,
Prince of Orange, who was murdered by Geraerts (or Gerard) July 10,
1584.} of England wore during the last days of his life, possessed great
interest for Ben, and one and all gazed with a mixture of reverence
and horror-worship at the identical clothing worn by William the Silent
*{see above} when he was murdered at Delft by Balthazar Geraerts. A
tawny leather doublet and plain surcoat of gray cloth, a soft felt hat,
and a high neck-ruff from which hung one of the “Beggars’” medals--these
were not in themselves very princely objects, though the doublet had a
tragic interest from its dark stains and bullet holes. Ben could readily
believe, as he looked upon the garments, that the Silent Prince, true to
his greatness of character, had been exceedingly simple in his attire.
His aristocratic prejudices were, however, decidedly shocked when
Lambert told him of the way in which William’s bride first entered The
Hague.
“The beautiful Louisa de Coligny, whose father and former husband both
had fallen at the massacre of St. Bartholomew, was coming to be fourth
wife to the Prince, and of course,” said Lambert, “we Hollanders were
too gallant to allow the lady to enter the town on foot. No, sir, we
sent--or rather my ancestors did--a clean, open post-wagon to meet her,
with a plank across it for her to sit upon!”
“Very gallant indeed!” exclaimed Ben, with almost a sneer in his polite
laugh. “And she the daughter of an admiral of France.”
“Was she? Upon my word, I had nearly forgotten that. But, you see,
Holland had very plain ways in the good old time; in fact, we are a
very simple, frugal people to this day. The Van Gend establishment is a
decided exception, you know.”
“A very agreeable exception, I think,” said Ben.
“Certainly, certainly. But, between you and me, Mynheer van Gend, though
he has wrought his own fortunes, can afford to be magnificent and yet be
frugal.”
“Exactly so,” said Ben profoundly, at the same time stroking his upper
lip and chin, which latterly he believed had been showing delightful and
unmistakable signs of coming dignities.
While tramping on foot through the city, Ben often longed for a good
English sidewalk. Here, as in the other towns, there was no curb, no
raised pavement for foot travelers, but the streets were clean and even,
and all vehicles were kept scrupulously within a certain tract. Strange
to say, there were nearly as many sleds as wagons to be seen, though
there was not a particle of snow. The sleds went scraping over the
bricks or cobblestones, some provided with an apparatus in front for
sprinkling water, to diminish the friction, and some rendered less
musical by means of a dripping oil rag, which the driver occasionally
applied to the runners.
Ben was surprised at the noiseless way in which Dutch laborers do their
work. Even around the warehouses and docks there was no bustle, no
shouting from one to another. A certain twitch of the pipe, or turn
of the head, or, at most, a raising of the hand, seemed to be all the
signal necessary. Entire loads of cheeses or herrings are pitched from
cart or canalboat into the warehouses without a word; but the passerby
must take his chance of being pelted, for a Dutchman seldom looks before
or behind him while engaged at work.
Poor Jacob Poot, who seemed destined to bear all the mishaps of the
journey, was knocked nearly breathless by a great cheese, which a fat
Dutchman was throwing to a fellow laborer, but he recovered himself, and
passed on without evincing the least indignation. Ben professed great
sympathy upon the occasion, but Jacob insisted that it was “notting.”
“Then why did you screw your face so when it hit you?”
“What for screw mine face?” repeated Jacob soberly. “Vy, it vash
de--de--”
“That what?” insisted Ben maliciously.
“Vy, de-de-vat you call dis, vat you taste mit de nose?”
Ben laughed. “Oh, you mean the smell.”
“Yesh. Dat ish it,” said Jacob eagerly. “It wash de shmell. I draw mine
face for dat!”
“Ha! ha!” roared Ben. “That’s a good one. A Dutch boy smell a cheese!
You can never make me believe THAT!”
“Vell, it ish no matter,” replied Jacob, trudging on beside Ben in
perfect good humor. “Vait till you hit mit cheese--dat ish all.”
Soon he added pathetically, “Penchamin, I no likes to be call Tuch--dat
ish no goot. I bees a Hollander.”
Just as Ben was apologizing, Lambert hailed him.
“Hold up! Ben, here is the fish market. There is not much to be seen at
this season. But we can take a look at the storks if you wish.”
Ben knew that storks were held in peculiar reverence in Holland and
that the bird figured upon the arms of the capital. He had noticed
cart wheels placed upon the roofs of Dutch cottages to entice storks to
settle upon them; he had seen their huge nests, too, on many a thatched
gable roof from Broek to The Hague. But it was winter now. The nests
were empty. No greedy birdlings opened their mouths--or rather their
heads--at the approach of a great white-winged thing, with outstretched
neck and legs, bearing a dangling something for their breakfast. The
long-bills were far away, picking up food on African shores, and before
they would return in the spring, Ben’s visit to the land of dikes would
be over.
Therefore he pressed eagerly forward, as Van Mounen led the way through
the fish market, anxious to see if storks in Holland were anything
like the melancholy specimens he had seen in the Zoological Gardens of
London.
It was the same old story. A tamed bird is a sad bird, say what you
will. These storks lived in a sort of kennel, chained by the feet
like felons, though supposed to be honored by being kept at the public
expense. In summer they were allowed to walk about the market, where
the fish stalls were like so many free dining saloons to them. Untasted
delicacies in the form of raw fish and butcher’s offal lay about their
kennels now, but the city guests preferred to stand upon one leg,
curving back their long necks and leaning their heads sidewise, in a
blinking reverie. How gladly they would have changed their petted state
for the busy life of some hardworking stork mother or father, bringing
up a troublesome family on the roof of a rickety old building where
flapping wind-mills frightened them half to death every time they
ventured forth on a frolic!
Ben soon made up his mind, and rightly, too, that The Hague with its
fine streets and public parks shaded with elms, was a magnificent city.
The prevailing costume was like that of London or Paris, and his British
ears were many a time cheered by the music of British words. The shops
were different in many respects from those on Oxford Street and the
Strand, but they often were illumined by a printed announcement that
English was “spoken within.” Others proclaimed themselves to have London
stout for sale, and one actually promised to regale its customers with
English roast beef.
Over every possible shop door was the never-failing placard, TABAK
TE KOOP (tobacco to be sold). Instead of colored glass globes in the
windows, or high jars of leeches, the drugstores had a gaping Turk’s
head at the entrance--or, if the establishment was particularly fine, a
wooden mandarin entire, indulging in a full yawn.
Some of these queer faces amused Ben exceedingly; they seemed to have
just swallowed a dose of physic, but Van Mounen declared he could not
see anything funny about them. A druggist showed his sense by putting
a Gaper before his door, so that his place would be known at once as an
apotheek and that was all there was to it.
Another thing attracted Ben--the milkmen’s carts. These were small
affairs, filled with shiny brass kettles, or stone jars, and drawn by
dogs. The milkman walked meekly beside his cart, keeping his dog in
order, and delivering the milk to customers. Certain fish dealers had
dogcarts, also, and when a herring dog chanced to meet a milk dog, he
invariably put on airs and growled as he passed him. Sometimes a milk
dog would recognize an acquaintance before another milk cart across the
street, and then how the kettles would rattle, especially if they were
empty! Each dog would give a bound and, never caring for his master’s
whistle, insist upon meeting the other halfway. Sometimes they contented
themselves with an inquisitive sniff, but generally the smaller dog made
an affectionate snap snap at the larger one’s ear, or a friendly tussle
was engaged in by way of exercise. Then woe to the milk kettles, and woe
to the dogs!
The whipping over, each dog, expressing his feelings as best as he
could, would trot demurely back to his work.
If some of these animals were eccentric in their ways, others were
remarkably well behaved. In fact, there was a school for dogs in the
city, established expressly for training them. Ben probably saw some of
its graduates. Many a time he noticed a span of barkers trotting along
the street with all the dignity of horses, obeying the slightest hint
of the man walking briskly beside them. Sometimes, when their load was
delivered, the dealer would jump in the cart and have a fine drive to
his home beyond the gates of the city; and sometimes, I regret to say,
a patient vrouw would trudge beside the cart with a fish basket upon her
head and a child in her arms--while her lord enjoyed his drive, carrying
no heavier burden than a stumpy clay pipe, the smoke of which mounted
lovingly into her face.