ask the fleet,
That, in London's fire and plague years,
With De Ruyter yards could mete:
Ask Prince Robert and d'Estrees,
Ask your Solebay and the Boyne,
Ask the Duke, whose iron valour
With our chivalry did join,
Ask your Wellington, oh ask him,
Of our Prince of Orange bold,
And a tale of nobler spirit
Will to wond'ring ears be told;
And if ever foul invaders
Threaten your King William's throne,
If dark Papacy be running,
Or if Chartists want your own,
Or whatever may betide you,
That needs rid of foreign will,
Only ask of your Dutch neighbours,
And you'll _see_ Dutch courage still.

Chapter III

Dordrecht and Utrecht

By water to Dordrecht--Her four rivers--The milkmaid
and the coat of arms--The Staple of Dort--Overhanging
houses--Albert Cuyp--Nicolas Maes--Ferdinand Bol--Ary
Scheffer--G.H. Breitner--A Dort carver--The Synod of
Dort--"The exquisite rancour of theologians"--_La Tulipe
Noire_--Bernard Mandeville--The exclusive Englishman--The
Castle of Loevenstein--The escape of Grotius--Gorcum's taste
outraged--By rail to Utrecht--A free church--The great storm
of 1674--Utrecht Cathedral--Jan van Scorel--Paul Moreelse--A
too hospitable museum.

Dordrecht must be approached by water, because then one sees her as
she was seen so often, and painted so often, by her great son Albert
Cuyp, and by countless artists since.

I steamed from Rotterdam to Dordrecht on a grey windy morning, on a
passenger boat bound ultimately for Nymwegen. We carried a very mixed
cargo. In a cage at the bows was a Friesland mare, while the whole
of the deck at the stern was piled high with motor spirit. Between
came myriad barrels of beer and other merchandise.

The course to Dordrecht (which it is simpler to call Dort) is up the
Maas for some miles; past shipbuilding yards, at Sylverdyk (where is
a great heronry) and Kinderdyk; past fishermen dropping their nets
for salmon, which they may take only on certain days, to give their
German brethren, higher up the river, a chance; past meadows golden
with marsh marigolds; past every kind of craft, most attractive of
all being the tjalcks with their brown or black sails and green-lined
hulls, not unlike those from Rochester which swim so steadily in the
reaches of the Thames about Greenwich. The journey takes an hour and
a half, the last half-hour bei