The little girl laughed. She was very fond of listening to what Aunt Famie did when she was little; and they went to call upon some curious old people who kept to the Dutch ways and wore the old costume. Some of them had wooden clogs for rainy weather. When they talked real Dutch, Hanny found it was quite different from German. They had a picture of some old ancestor's house with the windmill in the front yard.
The drives about were beautiful then, and so many places had queer old legends. Dr. Hoffman was very much interested, and it seemed to Hanny as if she had strayed over into Holland. She resolved when she went home to ask Ben to get her a history of Holland, so she and her father might read it together. Her mother never had any time.
Margaret was much surprised at her gifts, and thanked the cousins with warmest gratitude. Even Grandmother Van Kortlandt had hinted "that she wasn't going to save up everything for Haneran." But the elder people in those days were fond of holding on to their possessions until the very last.
Uncle David came up for them and took them to White Plains, where they had a nice visit; and grandmother selected some articles from her store for the prospective bride.
Hanny remembered what Cousin Archer had said about the mittens, and asked Uncle David. He found his hook, and, sure enough, it was something like a crochet-needle. He took what the little girls called single stitch. But he admitted that Hanny's pretty edgings and tidies were quite wonderful.
"I thought the Germans must have brought the knowledge to the country," she said. "How long have you known it?"
"Oh, since my boyhood," and he gave a smile. "I heard a very old man say once that Noah set his sons to work in the Ark making fishing-nets. Perhaps Mrs. Noah set her daughter-in-laws to crocheting, as you call it. Forty days was a pretty long spell of rainy weather, when they had no books or papers to read, and couldn't go out to work in the garden."
"Didn't they have any books?" Hanny's eyes opened wide.
"All their writing was done on stone tablets, and very little of that."
"I think I wouldn't have liked living then. Books are so splendid. And you get to know about so many people. But there was the Bible," and the child's voice dropped to a reverent tone.