A DUTCH CITY.
It would take too long to mention all the sights seen and famous places
visited by the travellers in Gravenhaag.
They were admitted to the palace of the Prince of Orange, and saw his
famous collection of paintings and chalk drawings. They went over the
_Binnenhof_, which is a collection of ancient stone buildings, containing
a handsome Gothic hall, and the prison in which Grotius and Barneveldt
were confined, the churches, synagogues, and the royal library, and walked
on the _Voorhout_, a beautiful promenade, with a fine, wide road lined
with shade trees and furnished with benches, to the _Bosch_, a finely
wooded park belonging to the King of Holland. In its centre, reached by
winding walks among the trees and beautiful lakes, stands the _Huys in den
Bosch_--house in the wood--the king's summer palace.
After visiting all these places, and the printing establishments and iron
foundery, Mr. Hyde, finding he had another day before the steamer sailed,
took them all to Rotterdam. They went by railway to the city, and drove
around it in an open carriage, like a barouche, which was waiting at the
depot. Mr. Hyde, who had been there before, was quite familiar with the
place. He ordered the coachman to drive through the High Street; and soon
the children found themselves on a street considerably higher than the
others, lined with shops, and looking very pleasant and busy. Mr. Hyde
told them it was built upon the dam which prevented the Maas River from
overflowing.
"And this is the only street in Rotterdam," said he, "which has not a
canal in its centre."
[Illustration: The Queen of Holland.--Page 61.]
When they had gone the length of High Street, they came to street after
street, each having a canal in the middle, lined with trees on both sides,
and exhibiting a medley of high gable fronts of houses, trees, and masts
of shipping.
"Dear me!" cried Nettie; "I wouldn't live in such a place for the world.
It's pretty to look at; but think of having those ships going by right
under the drawing-room windows. They make me giddy."
"How many canals!" cried Allan. "They go lengthwise and crosswise through
every street but the High."
"And these clumsy bridges," said Nettie again, pointing to the drawbridges
of white painted wood which they saw at every little distance; they were
made of large, heavy beams overhead, and lifted by chains for the vessels
to pass through.
Under the trees, beside the canals, were yellow brick "sidewalks," as
Nettie called them; but they were really quays, for the landing of goods.
Between the trees and the houses, on a coarse, rough pavement, among
carts, drays, and carriages, walked the foot passengers quite frequently.
For though there were sidewalks close to the houses, little outbuildings
and flights of steps to doorways were continually in the way, and it was
"impossible for one to walk straight along, or at all fast, on any of
them," as the children said.
"Mamma," said Nettie, "I should think they would break their necks every
minute. Just look at those canals, right in the street, and nothing to
keep people from falling into them. What do they do in dark nights?"
"How do they light the streets, papa?" asked Eric.
"By oil lamps, hung on ropes from the houses to the trees," said Mr. Hyde.
"They have gas on the High Street."
Allan's attention had been attracted by some curious little structures
outside the lower windows of several of the houses.
"What are they?" he asked.
"Looking-glasses," said Mr. Hyde.
"Looking-glasses, papa! _Outside_ their windows?" exclaimed Nettie.
"Yes, dear; they are hung so as to reflect the passing objects to the
people inside."
"Then they can see whatever is going on in the streets below, without
coming to the windows," said Eric.
"What a funny custom!" exclaimed Nettie, again.
The only building they visited was the Church of St. Lawrence, where they
saw the famous great organ, a splendid structure, larger than the great
organs of Haarlem and Boston. It is one hundred and fifty feet high,
mounted upon a colonnade fifty feet high, and has five thousand five
hundred pipes.
In the market-place they saw a statue of the great scholar Erasmus, and
"the house where he was born," which is now, alas! a gin-shop. From the
_Boomptjes_, a fine quay, planted with rows of beautiful trees, and
surrounded by elegant, dark brick mansions, our party chartered a little
sail boat, and went out upon the Maas.
The beautiful, quiet Maas, with Rotterdam's green, woody banks in view;
the blue, blue sky, seen clearly in the limpid waters; the steamers coming
and going, and birds flying around, adding their sweet notes to nature's
harmony--this beautiful picture was one remembered by the children all
their lives. To-morrow's parting hung its shadow over them, and softened
their hearts to the true beauty everywhere expressed.
The sun had set when they reached the Vyverberg for the last time.
"Mamma," said Eric, regretfully, "I almost wish I was going home with you
all."
"Uncle Charlie may come to-night," said his mother, cheerfully. "At any
rate, he will soon come. You would then wish you had staid."
"Yes, I know," said Eric. "But it is very hard to let you all go home
without me, for all that."
Very careful directions were given to Eric, and he was placed under the
care of the landlord until he should hear from his uncle.
The evening was very short to Eric, who lingered by his mother, and could
not bear to leave her side, knowing he should see her no more for a long,
long year.
Long after Nettie and Allan had left them, he staid with his parents,
listening to their last kind advice, and sending little loving messages to
his cousins and schoolmates.
In the morning he saw them off with a heavy heart. His father's last kind
words, Allan's affectionate greeting, Nettie's tears, and his promise to
his mother that he would remember his prayers and daily chapter in the
Bible, and would try to make his travels a useful, profitable study, and
to keep himself truthful, honest, and kind, were mixed up with a hearty,
homesick longing to go after them. His eyes filled with tears as the
stretch of water between him and his dear ones rapidly widened; he turned
from the wharf with a sorrowful face, slowly and sadly retracing his steps
to the hotel.
"How dismal it will be! how lonely and dismal without them!" He thought
and murmured sorrowfully,--
"Alone, alone, all, all alone!"