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LEYDENTHE FAT OF THE LAND 307 



than Darwin's earth-worm works. This pavement would 

 be buried and grass-grown in a year. 



A deer, the Harte of the Hartecamp, points the vane 

 above the clock on the top of the house. The enamelled 

 white furniture of the villa is partially the same as in 

 Clifford's time. It is about four miles to Haarlem, and 

 we proposed to walk there. Seeing a baker's cartlet drive 

 up to the house, I rushed to buy bans and fancy bread 

 for luncheon, but the housekeeper, wife of the gardener, 

 waved a teacup at us, beckoning us into the basement, 

 which I had supposed to be cellars. Here was a range 

 of low-roofed but most comfortable kitchens, unaltered 

 since Linnaeus lived here ; the brick-paved floors, skirted 

 with white tiles, had raised wooden movable floors laid 

 on the bricks, and at the doors large mats of thick 

 basketwork or fine hurdle work : and many hints and 

 contrivances for comfort, showing how they successfully 

 resist the subsoil dampness of even humid Holland ; and 

 showing how comfortable daily life was in Holland, over 

 a century ago, when we had far fewer of the minor 

 luxuries. The good woman gave us bowls of coffee and 

 milk, and then unlocked a side gate beyond the wood to 

 show us the ' kooter way to loopen na Haarlem.' l 



It is a pleasant walk through the pretty woodland, 

 on a good road lined with country houses and closely 

 paved with small bricks, nice to ' loop ' on, as is usual 

 in the main country roads hereabout. These roads 

 must have been made at a frightful expense, but they 

 1 Not pure Dutch, I fancy, but as it sounded to us. 



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