EEN STREEPJE DOOR.
“Mijnheer,” I explained, “niet zwavel hier; zwavel niet. Ik heb een streepje door het.” Well, would you believe me, that was the most successful remark I had made as yet? I expected that he would be irritated by my mistake and apology. No such thing. He received my statement with unbounded delight. “Ja, ja,” he said, “dat geloof ik ook; dat geloof ik ook.”
“Wel zeker,” I continued pleasantly, glad to see him take it in such good part. “Een streepje door.”
With that they all turned to one another and smiled and nodded to me quite merrily, as if I had said something clever. It shows what a literary people the Dutch are, that they are pleased beyond measure when a foreigner in conversation refers to any small technicality out of the grammar. Indeed so encouraged was I by all this enthusiasm that I boldly made use of my remaining words.
“Mynheer! wilt u mij toestaan U te vragen..... verkoopt gy snavels?”
“Snavels,” I repeated as he stared,—“of snaveltjes”.
He gasped a moment, as if taken utterly by surprise; then ran behind the counter into a little dark room, where I could hear him make a succession of curious muffled sounds. The noise subsided, and he seemed to tell the story to somebody. A white face peered out from behind the lace curtains—and the chuckling was renewed. Now this was all very puzzling—but it was quite clear that ‘snavel’ was not the usual term for ‘pen’.
HOENDERHOK WAS ALWAYS DOUBTFUL.
Here the little errand-boy entered with a package which he thrust into my hand.
Sulphur!