"If we had time, Benjamin," said Lambert van Mounen in English, "I should like to take you to the City Hall or Stadhuis. There are building-piles for you! It is built on nearly fourteen thousand of them, driven seventy feet into the ground. But what I wish you to see there is the big picture of Van Speyk blowing up his ship—great picture."
"Van who?" asked Ben.
"Van Speyk. Don't you remember? He was in the height of an engagement with the Belgians, and when he found that they had the better of him and would capture his ship, he blew it up, and himself too, rather than yield to the enemy."
"Wasn't that Van Tromp?"
"Oh, no. Van Tromp was another brave fellow. They've a monument to him down at Delft Haven—the place where the Pilgrims took ship for America."
"Well, what about Van Tromp? He was a great Dutch Admiral; wasn't he?"
"Yes, he was in more than thirty sea-fights. He beat the Spanish fleet and an English one, and then fastened a broom to his masthead to show that he had swept the English from the sea. Takes the Dutch to beat, my boy!"
"Hold up!" cried Ben, "broom or no broom, the English conquered him at last. I remember all about it now. He was killed somewhere on the Dutch coast, in an engagement in which the British fleet was victorious. Too bad," he added maliciously, "wasn't it?"
"Ahem! where are we?" exclaimed Lambert changing the subject. "Hollo! the others are way ahead of us—all but Jacob. Whew! how fat he is! He'll break down before we're half-way."
Ben of course enjoyed skating beside Lambert, who though a staunch Hollander, had been educated near London, and could speak English as fluently as Dutch; but he was not sorry when Captain van Holp called out: