From Vlaerding I went to Schiedam, a small Town abounding in Fishery; and where Abundance of Busses, Cord, and Network is made. Here entring a House, the first Thing (as in other Houses) I encounter’d was a Looking-Glass and next other Utensils of a Family, marshalled about the Room like so many Watch-men. Were the Knacks of all their Houses set together, they would far exceed the Trumpery of Deard’s Toyshop in Fleet-street, or the Court of Requests; and if you want to speak Dutch, you may learn a great deal from their Signs, for what they are they always write under them. Coaches and Carts are as rare as Comets; and all their Merchandize they draw through the Streets on Sledges, as we do our Traytors on Hurdles to Tyburn. Their Rooms being but as so many Sand-Boxes, you must either go out to spit, or blush when you see the Mop brought. As their Beds require a Ladder or Stairs to get into ’em, you are in Danger of breaking your Neck if you tumble out; and as they keep their Houses cleaner than their Bodies, so do they take Care to have their Bodies cleaner than their Souls. They are not so nice-conscioned, but that they can turn out Religion to let in Policy; and a Dutch Woman, being the Head of the Husband, she takes the Horn to her own Charge, which she often multiplies, and bestows the Increase on her Man. The People are generally boorish, therefore their Country is the God they Worship, War is their Heaven, Peace is their Hell, and the Spaniard, the Devil they hate.
From Schiedam I went to Rotterdam, the second great Emporium of this trading People, situated on the Side and Banks of the Maes, and fitted for all Conveniency of Transport and Importation. Here, as in other Places, I found I might sooner convert a Jew, than make a Dutchman yield to Arguments that cross him, because his Spirits are generated from English Beer; and his Body is built of pickled Herring, which makes him testy. If you see him fat, he hath been rooting in a Cabbage Ground, and that bladder’d him; he is as churlish as his Breeder Neptune; and the Love of Gain is as natural to him, as Water to a Goose, or Carrion to any Kite. Truth and Honesty is as scarce here as Hedges; they are seldom deceiv’d, because they trust no Body; and Complement is an Idleness they were never train’d in. They shall abuse a Stranger for nothing; and after a few base Terms scotch one another to a Carbanado. All that help them not, they hold popish; and take it for an Argument of much Honesty, to rail bitterly against the King of Spain. Every thing is so made to swim among them, that it is a Question if Elijah’s Ax were now floating there, whether it would be taken for a Miracle. The Shipping is the Babel which they boast on for the Glory of their Nation; and they are in a manner all Aquatiles, and therefore the Spaniards call them Water-Dogs. A Turkish Man of War is as dreadful to them as a Falcon to a Mallard, from whom their best Remedy is to steal away; and Sailors among ’em, are as common as Beggars with us, besides the Dutch Tarpaulins will drink, rail, swear, niggle, steal, and be lousie alike. Slime, humid Air, Water, and wet Diet, have so bagg’d their Cheeks, that some would take their Paunches to be gotten above their Chins; and bring under a democratical Government, tell them of a King in Jest, and they will cut your Throat in Earnest; for they hate the Name of Majesty more than a Jew doth Images, a Woman pure Virtue, or a Nonconformist a Surplice; and it is reported that there is but a Sheet of Paper betwixt Rotterdam and Hell, which is a nearer Way to old Nick than by Rochester.
From Rotterdam I went to Delf, where I observ’d that every Mynheer shall walk the Streets as Usurers go to Bawdy-Houses, all alone and melancholly; and their Apparel is civil enough, but very uncomely, as having usually more Stuff than Shape. Holland is the Fair of all Sects, where all the Pedlars of Heresies have Leave to vent their Toys, their Ribbands, and fanatick Rattles. They will admit of all Religions but the true one; and whosoever disturbs the civil Government shall be liable to Punishment, but the Decrees of Heaven and Sanctions of Deity, any one may break uncheck’d, by professing what false Religion he pleases. The Men are cladded tolerably well, unless he inclines to the Sea-Fashion; and then are his Breeches yawning at the Knees, as if they were about to swallow up his Legs. The Dutch Women have much more Forehead than Face; and they are starch’d so blue, that if they once grow old, you would verily believe you saw Winter walking up to the Neck in Indigo; They are far from going naked, for of a whole Woman you can see but half a Face; her Hand shews her to be a sore Labourer; and if you look lower, she’s like a Monkey chain’d about the Middle, and had rather want it in Diet, than not have Silver Hooks to hang her Keys in. Their Smocks are ever whiter than their Skin; and their Gowns are fit to hide great Bellies; but they make them shew so unhandsome, that Englishmen don’t care for getting them. Where the Women lies in, the Ringle or Knocker of the Door does Pennance, for it is lapped round about with Linnen, either to show you that loud Knocking may wake the Child, or else that for a Month her Ring is not to be run at. For their Diet they eat much and spend little; and when they send out a Fleet to the East-Indies, it shall live 3 Months on the Offals, which we fear would surfeit our Swine; yet they feed on’t, and are still the same Dutchmen. In their Houses, Roots and Stockfish are staple Commodities; and if they make a Feast, and add Flesh, they have an Art to keep it hot more Days, than a dirty, dingy, greasie Cook a Pig’s Head in Pye-Corner.
The Dutch Women are delivered, together with their Children, of a Sooterkin, not unlike to a Rat, which some imagine to be the Offspring of the Stoves they have betwixt their Legs in Winter. Their Fairs are more frequented on Sundays in the Afternoon, than their Churches in the Forenoon; and they are furnish’d with such a wonderful Plenty of Corn by their Neighbours; that they have not only enough for their own Use, but also to export sufficiently to other Countries, by selling them at an extravagant Price a Pig of their own Sow. There is no Nation in the World whose Seas yield the like constant and general Benefit as our Seas do; wherefore the Sloth of the English may very well be blam’d, for suffering the Dutch under their Noses, to rob them of that Wealth, which would be theirs at the small Rate of an easie Industry. But tho’ all the Commodities they have either domestick or foreign, their fishing in our Seas brings them in the greatest Profit, yet have they another Commodity which is very profitable to them, and that is War; for whereas other Nations are undone by it, they have the Secret to thrive, and grow exceeding rich by it. The Innholders paying as much for the Excise of Victuals and Drink, as they did at first for the Thing, it makes the Entrata or Revenue of those High and Mighty States (who, when they implor’d Queen Elizabeth’s Aid, writ themselves the poor, distressed States of Holland) very considerable. This free State entertaining all Renegadoes, it is the common Sink of Villany; each Faction calls itself a Church; and every new-fangled, giddy-headed, enthusiastical Botcher, Cobler, or Tinker, is able enough to sow Sedition: But the general Religion here is Calvanism, the Profession whereof, tho’ fatal to Monarchical Government, agrees well enough with the Parity of free States, where the People have so much Voice and Authority.
Holland, with the 16 other Provinces is call’d the Low-Countries, and the Netherlands, from their low Situation. Here live almost as many, if not more, Jews, Anabaptists, Socinians, and Papists, as Calvanists; so that a Traveller who comes hither, need not want a Religion to choose which shall best please him. Whilst I was in Rotterdam, being one Night in Company with some of the Dutch Boors, who were extolling Erasmus, who was born in that Town, for the greatest Scholar the World ever bred, my Blood broil’d at their Insolence, as knowing England, and other Nations have produc’d Men of better Learning, but they being too many for me to resent it, I had no other Way to vent my Resentment, but by writing the following Lines, which I privately stuck upon his Effigies cast in Brass, and erected not far from the House where he was born.
Thou great Colossus! if you stood astride,
Betwixt thy Legs the Dutchmen post might ride
To tell, Erasmus is the only Boor,
Whom they for Learning brag of and adore.
Great were thy nat’ral and acquired Parts,