LEYDENTHE FAT OF THE LAND 303 



wind, from which his garden, however, was protected by 

 the lines of overarching elm-trees, and the sand-dunes 

 piled high beyond the water-meadows stocked with black- 

 and-white cattle. Carl, though he had a carriage and four 

 horses at his command, I dare say went oftenest to and 

 fro between Hartecamp and Leyden by the barge, in the 

 canals narrowed by the rapidly growing sedges, water- 

 flags, and lilies ; where the labour is ever going on of 

 dredging black mud into boats, then filling it into 

 trough-shaped carts, or else plastering it upon the 

 banks the canals covered with white water-lilies ex- 

 panding their unsullied flowers to the morning sun, and 

 intermixed with the yellow-fringed water-lily, which is 

 very uncommon in England. The silence that accom- 

 panies the Dutch (canal-boat) mode of travelling, so 

 different from the grating of a turnpike road, increases 

 in no small degree the pleasure of a journey. 1 



One can now go to Hartecamp from Leyden by train 

 to Vogelenzang, and then inquire the way to Benne- 

 brock. It is best to follow the peasant girls who get 

 out at the station ; they are most likely going to pass 

 the Hartecamp, as it lies on the main road to Haarlem. 

 From what I had read I expected to find Hartecamp a 

 pair of iron gates, a swamp, and perhaps an avenue ; 

 but it is by no means the howling wilderness that writers 

 represent it. The ground at Vogelenzang rises in pleas- 

 ing undulations, chiefly of reclaimed sandhills clothed 

 with fir trees, which wave refreshing scent beneath 

 1 Smith. 



