All is peaceful and picturesque. Scattered groups of little black cottages with scarlet roofs, on mounds. Fishermen strolling about in baggy black knickerbockers, woollen stockings, and wooden shoes.
Women and girls all dressed alike, in crimson bodice and embroidered skirt; little cap with one long brown curl dangling coquettishly in front of each ear. Small children—miniature replicas of their elders—wander lovingly, hand in hand. A few urchins dart off at our approach, like startled fawns, and disappear amongst the cottages. Otherwise, our arrival attracts no attention.
The women go on with their outdoor work, cleaning their brilliant brass and copper, washing and hanging out their bright-hued cotton and linen garments, with no more than an occasional shy side-glance at us from under their tow-coloured fringes. "Perfectly unconscious," as Shirtliff observes, enthusiastically, "of how unique and picturesque they are!"
All the more wonderful, because excursion steamers run every day during the season from Amsterdam.
We walk up and down rough steps and along narrow, winding alleys. Shirtliff says he "feels such a bounder, going about staring at everything as if he was at Earl's Court." Thinks the Markeners must hate being treated like a show. We shouldn't like it ourselves!
That may be, but, as Pashley retorts, it's the Markeners' own fault. They shouldn't be so beastly picturesque.
Fine buxom girl approaches, carrying pail. On closer view, not precisely a girl—in fact, a matron of mature years. These long, brown side-curls deceptive at a distance; impression, as she passes, of a kind of Dutch "Little Toddlekins"; view of broad back and extensive tract of fat, bare neck under small cap. She turns round and intimates by expressive pantomime that her cottage is close by, and if we would care to inspect the interior, we are heartily welcome. Uncommonly friendly of her. Pashley and I are inclined to accept, but Shirtliff dubious—we may have misunderstood her. We really can't go crowding in like a parcel of trippers!
Little Toddlekins, however, quite keen about it; sees us hesitate, puts down pail and beckons us on round corner with crooked forefinger, like an elderly Siren. How different this simple, hearty hospitality from the sort of reception foreigners would get from an English fishwife! We can't refuse, or we shall hurt her feelings. "But whatever we do," urges Shirtliff, "we mustn't dream of offering her money. She'd be most tremendously insulted."