136 HORTICULTURAL TOUR. 



houses are generally high, and that the upper part of the 

 front walls of many of them, particularly in the narrow 

 and older lanes, projects so much, that it is not at first easy 

 lor a stranger to divest himself of the apprehension of their 

 being ready to fall forward into the street. Modern houses 

 seem to be built by the plumb-line, and they afford a crite- 

 rion by which to estimate the deviation from the perpendi- 

 cular in the neighbouring tenements of earlier date. This 

 projection above, we were told, was not only intentional, 

 but was enjoined by a municipal regulation, being calcu- 

 lated to throw the eaves-drop from off the wall, and so to 

 prevent damp. It is to be observed, that the strength of 

 Dutch houses depends much on the timber-work ; and of 

 so little importance is the front-wall of brick, that it is in 

 some cases not filled in till after the house has been other- 

 wise completed. Of this fact we met with an instance in 

 the course of our walk through the city, in the only new 

 or unfinished building which we recollect to have observed. 



At Rotterdam, as at Antwerp, the public lamps are sus- 

 pended by ropes, which pass across the street ; but an im- 

 provement introduced by King Louis still continues to be 

 adopted : glass lenses containing water are so disposed in 

 the lamp, as greatly to increase the quantity of light shed 

 abroad. 



In the evening;, Mr Macdonald and I visited the Schouw- 



O 7 



burg. The inscription on this place of amusement struck 

 us as peculiarly characteristic of a plodding commercial peo- 

 ple : Door yver vrugt vaar, " Through diligence riches/' 

 Certainly nowhere but in Rotterdam would such a motto 

 be considered as appropriate to a theatre. Of the perform- 

 ances we can say little : they were chiefly pantomimic, and 

 to us they were entirely so. The convenient arrangements 

 of the parterre; seemed characteristic of the people: there 



