t it had
been in 1847, when it was still exactly as in the Middle Age, but
fearfully decayed, and, like Ferrara, literary with grass-grown streets.
_Und noch weiter_--to Ostend, where for three weeks I took lessons in
Flemish or Dutch from a young professor, reading "Vondel" and
"Bilderdijk," who, if not in the world of letters known, deserves to be.
I had no dictionary all this time, and the teacher marvelled that I
always knew the meaning of the words, which will not seem marvellous to
any one who understands German and has studied Anglo-Saxon and read
"Middle or Early English." Then back to Spa to meet Mr. and Mrs. Trubner
and her father Octave Delepierre, who was a great scholar in _rariora_,
_curiosa_, and old French, and _facile princeps_ the greatest expert in
Macaronic poetry who ever wrote. May I here venture to mention that he
always declared that my later poem of "Breitmann and the Pope" was the
best Macaronic poem which he had ever read? His reason for this was that
it was the most reckless and heedless or extravagant combination of Latin
and modern languages known to him. I had, however, been much indebted to
Mr. Oscar Browning for revising it. And so the truth, which long in
darkness lay, now comes full clearly to the light of day.

Thence to Liege, Amsterdam, the Hague, Haarlem, and Leyden, visiting all
the great galleries and many private collections. At Amsterdam we saw
the last grand kermess or annual fair ever held there. It was a Dutch
carnival, so wild and extravagant that few can comprehend now to what
extremes "spreeing" can be carried. The Dutch, like the Swedes, have or
had the strange habit of bottling up their hilarity and letting it out on
stated occasions in uproarious frolics. I saw _carmagnoles_ in which men
and women, seized by a wild impulse, whirled along the street in a
frantic dance to any chance music, compelling every bystander to join. I
heard of a Prince from Capua, who, having been thus _carmagnoled_,
returned home in rags.

In Leyden I visited the Archaeological Museum, where I by chance became
acquainted with the chief or director, who was then engaged in
rearranging his collections, and who, without knowing my name, kindly
expressed the wish that I would remain a week to aid him in preparing the
catalogue. As there are few works on prehistoric relics which I do not
know, and as I had for many years studied with zeal innumerable
collections of the kind, I venture to