“Ik bid U—houd Uwen bek,” I said—“anders,”—and here I glanced round for a policeman, “anders—roep ik—de Openbare Macht.”
The man ran like a hare.
I pride myself that there was dignity and firmness, courtesy and local colour all in that one sentence.
And I find that it is still much admired.
[CHAPTER XII.]
DUTCH CORRESPONDENCE.
The gentleman from the Bevolkings Register Bureau had left his umbrella behind him in his hurried departure that Thursday morning, so I sent it back to him with a polite note. It would have been easy to write the polite note in English, but that would never do. After my success in carrying on a long conversation in Dutch I felt that a lapse into English would be a confession of weakness.
My reputation as a linguist could only be maintained by a real Dutch letter. Now the phrase book gave but little light on the vast subject of correspondence. Except a brief note acknowledging the arrival of a ton of coals, and a still briefer note accepting, in the third person, a formal invitation to dinner, there was nothing about letter-writing in the volume.