XXI.
Rotterdam, August 30, 1841.
Well, at last I am in Rotterdam, and I assure you I was heartily glad to reach this city, as one may rest quietly for a few days without seeing extraordinary sights. Rotterdam is a fine commercial city, with a population of seventy-four thousand, and exceedingly novel and interesting to a stranger who has just arrived in the country; but to one who has made the tour of Holland it possesses none of those extraordinary sights which a traveller is in duty bound to see. The remark may appear strange that one becomes tired and exhausted with sights; but in a long line of travel, in visiting cities in rapid succession, where a sort of obligation is imposed upon every good traveller to see all that is remarkable, it becomes laborious.
During the time we tarried at Amsterdam, we made an excursion to Broeck, celebrated as the cleanest village in the world. It has a population of eight hundred persons. In making this excursion we passed through a part of the great ship canal, which is one hundred and twenty-five feet wide, twenty-one feet deep, and fifty miles long. Two ships can enter side by side. After leaving this we took a conveyance which runs by the side of a lateral canal, on which are seen men and women, harnessed like horses, trailing the canal boats to market. On arriving at this extraordinary village our carriage was left outside, as neither horse nor wheel is permitted within the precincts. Our valet leading the way, we proceeded, in pattens, through the various passages or lanes, which are paved with brick or little stones, the paths being composed of shells. I had formed an idea of the extraordinary neatness of the place from the accounts I had heard of it, but the fantastical arrangement and construction of the houses exceeded my expectation. The houses are mostly wood with tile roofs, painted and varnished, which glitter in the sun. The buildings are most scrupulously painted with different colors, many representing different temples, and all sorts of architecture. We were taken to the garden of the rich clergyman of the village, and the guide-book describes it as surpassing all the others in its absurdities, and in the miscellaneous nature of its contents, beating the “groves of Blarney” all to nothing. Here are pavilions, arbors, summer-houses, pagodas, temples, bridges, &c., the small canals running through the garden, and indeed through every part of the village. Most of the front doors are closed during the week until the housewife opens the door, takes down the shutters, dusts the china and the furniture, and arranges everything, then closes it for another week, unless in case of a marriage, a funeral, or christening. The residents are mostly retired merchants, landed proprietors, stockbrokers, or other persons who have made fortunes. In one part of the village are made many Dutch cheeses. We went into the apartments of the cows in one house, the animals being absent from home in the fields. The pavement was of Dutch tiles, the walls and partitions of boards, scrubbed as clean as a dining table. We were permitted to enter the front door of one of the sanctums after having placed our feet in list slippers to avoid soiling the floor, and it is said that the Emperor Alexander, on visiting Broeck, was compelled to comply with this usage!
Having finished our excursion, we next went to Saardam, a place with a population of nine thousand, and remarkable for its four hundred windmills, which are applied to all uses. Some of them are of immense size, with wings eighty feet in diameter, and have houses attached to them. One street of windmills is five miles in length. The next remarkable object for a stranger is the hut of Peter the Great, in which he lived while working as a ship-carpenter, in 1696. The building is of rough plank, and consists of two rooms; in one is a cupboard, used as his sleeping-place, above a loft entered by a ladder. The property was bought by the sister of the Emperor Alexander, and is now inclosed in a case of brick-work, with shutters to close in bad weather. Here you find registers filled with names, and the walls of the hut are so completely covered that it is almost impossible to register another name.
On quitting Amsterdam we took the railroad to Haarlem, which route is accomplished in thirty minutes. It has a population of twenty-four thousand, and its environs are very pretty. The main attraction here is the great organ, which is celebrated over the world. Its size is immense, filling up the whole end of the Cathedral; it has five thousand pipes, the largest fifteen inches in diameter; two of them are thirty-two feet, and eight sixteen feet long. Its power is wonderful when played on by the organist in private, with all the variety of mutations which it is capable of. The charge for a private performance is thirteen guilders, for one person or a party, equal to five dollars and fifty cents. An English gentleman had just employed the organist and finished when our party applied for his services. The imitation of the flute, fife, and piano, followed by the loud charge of the trumpet, was an admirable performance; after which came the tinkling of bells, which one could scarce believe came from the pipes, and then came “the storm,” grand and terrific beyond description, the mimic thunder roared frightfully, and the walls of the building fairly seemed to tremble. The great diapason produced a sound like the whizzing of the machinery of a cotton factory. All these efforts are to show the strength and power of the instrument. An ordinary performance is of the most rich and melodious character.
Our next city to visit on the route was Leyden, celebrated in the annals of Holland as having resisted the siege of the Spanish army in 1573–4 for four months, and displayed the most resolute patriotism. At a period of extreme exhaustion, when bread had not been seen for seven weeks, and pestilence had followed famine and carried off six thousand inhabitants, and when the people were subsisting on horses, dogs, cats, and other foul animals, then it was they came to the resolution to open the dykes and inundate their country to overwhelm the cruel enemy, sooner than submit. History records that the expedient had not an immediate effect, but as if Providence soon and directly interfered, the wind suddenly changed and brought in the sea to the walls of the city, drowning thousands of the Spaniards; and when that was accomplished, veered as suddenly about and carried most of the flood back again so as to enable them to repair the dykes. Among all the collections of Dutch paintings are some portraying the horrors of that dreadful siege.
Leyden has a population of thirty-five thousand, and differs but little from other Dutch cities, being intersected by canals in every direction, most of them bordered by rows of trees; the suburbs are beautiful, with many pretty villas and flower gardens. There are several collections of Chinese and Japanese articles, as the Dutch carry on a great trade with the East. I cannot enumerate the objects of interest further in Leyden, as I must bear in mind the Hague, the next city which we visited, and which is the residence of the Court.
The population of the Hague is about fifty-five thousand. It is situated about three miles from the sea-shore, intersected by canals in every direction, the waters of which present less activity that those of any other city in Holland. We visited Scheveningen, a small fishing town near the sea shore, riding through an avenue of fine shade trees. The bathing establishments are much resorted to by the nobility and persons of distinction on the Continent, who take up their residence here during the summer. The “Dunes,” so called here, are immense banks of sand, thrown up by the wind, and forming a natural barrier against the encroachments of the sea. The sand being very light is scattered by the wind, but in order to preserve the ridges or embankments from injury they are secured by being planted with rushes, or matted over with straw and reeds. Here are also windmills which pump up the water from the ocean, which runs down the Hague, and displaces the stagnant water from the canals, forcing it into another canal which leads it to the river Meuse. The Hague possesses the finest picture gallery in Holland, and the Royal Cabinet is highly interesting and instructive. The Japanese collection is the largest in Europe. Among a thousand other relics I saw the armor of Admiral Von Tromp, bearing marks of several bullets. He was engaged in no less than thirty-two sea fights, conquered the English under Blake in 1652, and afterwards sailed through the British Channel with a broom at his masthead, signifying that he would sweep the ocean of all foes.
Since our arrival at the Hague we have made an excursion to Schiedam, famous for its fine gin, of which there are one hundred and seventy-two distilleries in that small town. Thirty thousand pigs are fed on the refuse grain. It is a neat, pretty village, surrounded by comfort and cheerfulness. Throughout Holland I find the people are more moral, cleanly, temperate, industrious, and strict in their observance of the Sabbath, than in any other part of the Continent that I have visited. It is a country of comfort and extortion—the latter because the taxes are high and the necessaries of life dear.