He offered us shrimps, one by one, first peeling them
with kindly fingers of extraordinary blackness, and we ate enough to
satisfy him that we meant well: and then just as we reached Middelburg,
he gave me a cigar and walked all the way to the Abbey with me,
watching me smoke it. It was an ordeal; but I hope, for the honour
of England, that I carried it through successfully and convinced him
that an Englishman knows what to do with courtesy when he finds it.
In the same tram and on the very next seat to us was the pleasantest
little boy that I think I ever saw: a perfect miniature Dutchman,
with wide black trousers terminating in a point, pearl buttons,
a tight black coat, a black hat, and golden neck links after the
Zeeland habit. He was perhaps four, plump and red and merry, and his
mother, who nursed his baby sister, was immensely proud of him. Some
one pressed a twopenny bit into his hand as he left the car, and I
watched him telling the great news to half a dozen of the women who
were waiting by the side of the road, while his face shone like the
setting sun.
They got off at Souburg, the little village between Flushing and
Middelburg where Charles V. was living in 1556, after his abdication,
before he sailed for his last home.
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