s. Daniel Stern (Comtesse
d'Agoult), who as a woman speaks with particular authority on this
subject, says the women of Holland are noble, loyal, active, and
chaste. A few authors venture to doubt their much-talked-of calmness
in affection. "They are still waters," wrote Esquiros, and all know
what is said of still waters. Heine said they were frozen volcanoes,
and that when they thaw--But, of all the opinions I have read, the
most remarkable seems to me that of Saint Evremont--namely, that Dutch
women are not lively enough to disturb the repose of the men, that
some of them are certainly amiable, and that prudence or the coldness
of their nature stands them in stead of virtue.

One day, in a group of young men at the Hague, I quoted this opinion
of Saint Evremont, and bluntly demanded: "Is it true?" They smiled,
looked at each other, and one answered, "It is:" another, "I think
so;" and a third, "It may be." In short, they all admitted its truth.
On another occasion I collected evidence proving that matters stand
just as they were at the time of the French writer. A group of people
were discussing an odd character. "Yet," said one, "that little man
who seems so quiet in his manner is a great ladies' man." "Does he
disturb the repose of families?" I asked. They all began to laugh, and
one answered: "What! Disturb the repose of families in Holland? It
would be one of the twelve labors of Hercules."--"We Hollanders," a
friend once said to me, "do not take the ladies by storm; we cannot do
so, because we have no school of this art. Nothing is so false in
Holland as the famous definition, matrimony is like a besieged
fortress; those who are outside wish to enter, while those who are
inside wish they were out. Here those who are inside are very happy,
and those who are outside do not think of entering." Another said to
me, "The Dutch woman does not marry the man; she espouses matrimony."
This, which is true of the Hague, an elegant city to which there comes
a great influx of French civilization, is even truer of the other
towns, where the ancient customs have been more strictly adhered to.
Yet gallant travellers write that the Hollanders are a sleepy people,
and that their domestic happiness is "_un bonheur un peu gros_." The
woman who seldom goes out, who dances little and laughs less, who
occupies herself only with her children, her husband, and her flowers,
who reads her books on theology, and surveys the street with the