Rotterdam, Sept. 25th.
My journey from Wesel to Arnheim was tedious enough. The horses toiled slowly on, through a dull country, amid endless sands. There was nothing interesting to be seen but the great brick-kilns by the roadside, which I looked at attentively on account of their superiority to ours. The more agreeable, and really magical in its effect, is the contrast of the extensive garden which lies between Arnheim and Rotterdam. On a ‘chaussée’ constructed of clinkers, (very hard-baked tiles,) and covered with a surface of fine sand—a road which nothing can excel, and which never takes the slightest trace of a rut—the carriage rolled on with that soft unvarying murmur of the wheels so inviting to the play of the fancy.
Although there is neither rock nor mountain in the endless park I traversed, yet the lofty dams along which the road sometimes runs, the multitude of country-seats, buildings and churches grouped into masses, and the many colossal clumps of trees rising from meadows and plains, or on the banks of clear lakes, gave to the landscape as much diversity of surface as of picturesque objects of the most varied character; indeed its greatest peculiarity consists in this rapid succession of objects which incessantly attract the attention. Towns, villages, country-seats, surrounded by their rich enclosures; villas of every style of architecture, with the prettiest flower-gardens; interminable grassy plains, with thousands of grazing cattle; lakes which have gradually grown merely from turf-digging to an extent of twenty miles; countless islands, where the long reed, carefully cultivated for thatch, serves as a dwelling-place for myriads of water-birds;—all join in a gladsome dance, through which one is borne along as if by winged horses; while still new palaces and other towns appear in the horizon, and the towers of their high Gothic churches melt into the clouds in the misty distance.
And even in the near-ground the continually changing and often grotesque figures leave no room for monotony. Now it is a strange carriage, decorated with carved work and gilding, without a pole, and driven by a coachman in a blue jacket, short black breeches, black stockings, and shoes with enormous silver buckles, who sits perched on a narrow board; or women walking under the load of gold or silver ear-rings six inches long, and Chinese hats like roofs upon their heads: then yew-trees cut into dragons and all sorts of fabulous monsters; or lime-trees with trunks painted white, or many-coloured; chimneys decorated in an Oriental style, with numbers of little towers or pinnacles; houses built slanting for the nonce; gardens with marble statues as large as life, in the dress of the old French Court, peeping through the bushes; or a number of brass bottles or cans, polished like mirrors, standing on the grass by the roadside, glittering like pure gold, yet destined to the humble purpose of receiving the milk with which the lads and lasses are busily filling them. In short, a multitude of strange, unwonted and fantastic objects every moment present to the eye a fresh scene, and stamp the whole with a perfectly foreign character. Imagine such pictures set in the golden frame of the brightest sunshine, adorned with the richest vegetation, from giant oaks, elms, ashes and beeches, to the rarest hot-house plant, and you will have a tolerably perfect and by no means exaggerated idea of this magnificent part of Holland, and of the high enjoyment of my day’s ride.
There was only a part of it which, as to vegetation and variety, formed an exception; but in another point of view was, if not so pleasant, equally interesting. Between Arnheim and Utrecht you come upon a tract, four miles long,[7] of the sand of the Luneberg heath, as bad as the worst plains of the Mark; nevertheless—such is the power of intelligent cultivation—the finest plantations of oak, white and red beech, birch, poplar, &c., flourish by the side of the stunted thorns and heather, which are the only natural productions of the soil. Where the ground has too little strength to grow trees, it is planted with brushwood, which is lopped every five or six years. The magnificent road is skirted the whole way on each side with rows of well-kept flourishing trees; and to my surprise I found that, spite of the arid sand, oaks and beeches seemed to thrive better than birches and poplars. A number of the exquisitely neat Dutch houses and villas were built in the midst of the dreary heath: many were only begun, as well as the laying-out of pleasure-grounds around them. I could not understand how people could have pitched upon this inhospitable soil upon which to found expensive establishments: but learned that the Government had been wise enough to grant out the whole of this hitherto unprofitable tract of land to the neighbouring proprietors and other opulent persons, free of all charges for fifty years, with the sole condition that they must immediately either plant or otherwise cultivate it. Their heirs or successors are to pay a very moderate rent. I am persuaded, from what I here saw, that the greater part of our hungry heaths might in a century be converted by a similar process, and by continued cultivation, into thriving fields and woods, and the whole district thus change its character.
Utrecht is prettily built, and, like all Dutch towns, a model of cleanliness. The painted exterior of the houses and their various forms, the narrow winding streets, and the old-fashioned ‘ensemble,’ are much more pleasing to my eye than the so-called handsome towns, the streets of which, like mathematical figures, invariably intersect at right angles, and the whole weary line of each street is to be seen at a glance. The environs are charming, the air very healthful, Utrecht being the highest town in Holland, and, as I was assured, the society in winter and spring very lively and agreeable, as all the wealthiest nobles of the country make it their residence. The trade is inconsiderable, and the whole air of the town and its inhabitants rather aristocratical than commercial.
From thence I proceeded to Gouda, the cathedral of which place is celebrated for its painted glass. Eighty thousand gulden[8] was lately bidden in vain by an Englishman for one of these windows. In execution it is equal to a miniature picture, and the splendour of the colours is indescribable;—the gems and pearls in the garments of the priests emulate real ones. Another, half of which was lately shattered by lightning, was presented to the church by Philip II. There is a portrait of him in it, dressed in a mantle of genuine purple; not the usual reddish colour, but a lustrous violet, between the deepest blue and crimson, more beautiful than anything I ever saw in glass. A third contains a portrait of the Duke of Alva. All the windows are of extraordinary dimensions, and with few exceptions in exquisite preservation. They are all of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries except one, which was not painted till the seventeenth, and which betrays the decline of the art, both by the inferiority of the colours and of the conception and drawing.
He who has seen Gouda may spare himself the trouble of a journey to the leaning tower of Pisa, for here the whole town seems to have been built on the same principle. Though the Dutch, who have been on many accounts not inappropriately called the Chinese of Europe, might very fairly be believed capable of preferring so extraordinary a style of architecture, yet it is probable that the really alarming aspect of the buildings here is to be attributed chiefly to the unsteady boggy soil.[9]
Almost all the houses stand with their gable ends to the street, every one of which is differently ornamented. In very narrow lanes they almost meet, and form a triangle, under which one walks with some solicitude.
As it was Sunday I found the town extremely lively, though with a quiet and decent gaiety. Most of the people stood idle, gazing about. They took off their hats very politely as I passed.