In England one can
easily be the first down in any hotel--save for a sleepy boots or
waiter. Not so in Holland. It was so early that I am able to say
nothing of the country between Groningen and Meppel, the capital of
the peat trade, save that it was peaty: heather and fir trees, shallow
lakes and men cutting peat, as far as eye could reach on either side.
Here in the peat country I might quote a very pretty Dutch proverb:
"There is no fuel more entertaining than wet wood and frozen peat:
the wood sings and the peat listens". The Dutch have no lack of folk
lore, but the casual visitor has not the opportunity of collecting very
much. When there is too much salt in the dish they say that the cook is
in love. When a three-cornered piece of peat is observed in the fire,
a visitor is coming. When bread has large holes in it, the baker is
said to have pursued his wife through the loaf. When a wedding morning
is rainy, it is because the bride has forgotten to feed the cat.
I tarried awhile at Zwolle on the Yssel (a branch of the Rhine),
because at Zwolle was born in 1617 Gerard Terburg, one of the greatest
of Dutch painters, of whom I have spoken in the chapter on Amsterdam's
pictures. Of his life we know very little; but he travelled to Spain
(where he was knighted and where he learned not a little of use in
his art), and also certainly to France, and possibly to England.
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