ne walks along it
seems as though the road must lead to some royal palace surrounded by
a large garden or a wide park. The luxuriant vegetation, the shadow
and silence, call to mind the forests of Andalusia and Granada. One no
longer remembers Scheveningen and forgets that he is in Holland.

[Illustration: On the Road to Scheveningen.]

When the end of the road is reached the change of scene is so
sudden that it seems unreal. The vegetation, the shade, the likeness
to Granada,--all have disappeared, and one stands in the midst of
dunes, sand, and desert; one feels the salt wind blow and hears its
dull confused sound. From the summit of one of the dunes one may see
the North Sea.

One who has seen only the Mediterranean is impressed by a new and
profound feeling at sight of that sea and shore. The beach is formed
of very fine, light-colored sand, over which the outermost edges of
the waves flow up and down like a carpet which is being continually
folded and unfolded. This sandy sea-shore extends to the foot of the
first dunes, which are steep, broken, corroded mounds deformed by the
eternal beating of the waves. Such is the Dutch coast from the mouth
of the Meuse to the Helder. There are no mollusks, no star-fish, no
shells or crabs; there is not a single bush or blade of grass. Nothing
is seen but sand, waste, and solitude.

The sea is no less mournful than the coast. It corresponds closely to
one's ideas of the North Sea, formed by reading about the superstitious
terrors of the ancients, who believed it to be driven by eternal winds and
peopled by gigantic monsters. Near the shore its color is yellowish,
farther out a pale green, and still farther out a dreary blue. The horizon
is usually veiled by the mist, which often descends even to the shore and
hides all the waters with its thick curtain, which is raised to show only
the waves that come to die on the sand and some shadowy fisherman's boat
close to land. The sky is almost always gray, overcast with great clouds
which throw dense changeable shadows on the waters: in places these are as
black as night, and bring to mind images of tempests and horrible
shipwrecks; in other parts the sky is lighted up by patches and wavy
streaks of bright light, which seem like motionless lightning or an
illumination from mysterious stars. The ceaseless waves gnaw the shore in
wild fury, with a prolonged roar which seems like a cry of defiance or the
wailing of an infinite crowd.