green plain which has been reclaimed
from the water, converting the meer into a "polder." Our canal flowed
many feet above the level of the surrounding land, so that we looked
down upon men tilling, upon white-sailed boats cutting through miniature
waterways as if they navigated meadows, and upon cows grazing knee-deep
in mist, which rose like blowing silver spray, over the pale-green waves
of grass.

These black-and-white cattle, according to Miss Van Buren, form the
upper circles of the cow-world in Holland. Not only do they live up to
their traditions by being cleaner and sleeker than the cows of other
countries, but they know themselves to be better connected than the mere
red-and-white creatures with whom they are occasionally forced to share
a meadow. To show that they understand what is due to their dignity,
they refuse to talk with the common herd, and stand with their backs to
any red-and-white nonentity that may presume to graze near, conversing
among themselves in refined monotones with the air of saying, "Who _was_
she?"

There's little in the history of the Netherlands which Miss Van Buren
does not know, for she is proud of her Dutch blood, though she won't say
so before me. The others are frankly ignorant; but the Chaperon has read
a book of Rider Haggard's called "Lysbeth," and was deeply interested in
the Haarlemmer-meer, where the "treasure" of that story lay hid; but it
was news to her that the great inland sea had once sent a destructive
flood to the gates of Amsterdam, and that as punishment it had been
drained away. Miss Van Buren--whom I think of as "Nell"--knew all this,
including the very day in 1840 when the work was begun, and how many
months the pumps had taken to drink the monstrous cup dry; but the
mysterious little lady who rules us all, and is ruled by Tibe, expected
to find the Haarlemmer-meer still a lake, and was disappointed to learn
the meaning of "polder." She thought thirty-nine months too long for
draining it, and was sure that in America (where she quickly added that
she had "once been") they would have done the work in half the time.

Every one fell in love with the outskirts of Haarlem, as "Lorelei" swam
into the River Spaarne. Though the glory of the tulips was extinguished
(like fairy-lamps at dawn) three months ago, the flowers of summer
blazed in their stead, a brilliant mosaic of jewels.

"The Dutch don't seem a nation to have gone mad over a tulip; but
perhaps they wer