THROUGH HOLLAND. 9 



to rattle through the watery flats of the 

 Netherlands (glorious haunts for the wild 

 fowler, I should fancy, in the winter), our tram 

 seeming to be the only thing that was in a 

 hurry in steady-going Holland, where the whole 

 country side looks like one huge home farm, 

 so trim and neat is it, with its lono; straio:ht 

 avenues of poplars, its very plough horses in 

 fly-cloths, neat and trim as a parlour-maid's 

 apron, and everything in art and nature sug- 

 gestive of restful prosperity. It was a change 

 too for me, and not a pleasant one, to carry 

 with me across the Channel those leaden skies 

 which many years of wanderings had taught 

 me to resrard as the special attribute of an 



O J. 



English landscape. 



"Wherever we went my companion twitted 

 me with the cloudy skies so different from 

 those I had prophesied at starting. All the 

 rivers were turbid ; even the Rhine was red 

 with mud, and the whole country rain- 



