dence. I said we had a motor-boat,
and wanted to go to a hotel as near it as possible. I then showed the
precious paper with the "i's" and "j's" dotted about, and he nodded so
much that his tall hat, which looked like a bit cut out of a rusty
stove-pipe, almost fell off on my nose.

"You get on my carriage, and I drive you to where you want," he replied
reassuringly, making of our luggage a resting-place for his honest
boots, and climbing into his seat.

Magnetized by his manner, we obeyed, and it was not until we had
started, rattling over the stone-paved street, that Phil bethought
herself of an important detail.

"Wait a moment. Ask him if it's a nice hotel where he's taking us."

I stood up, seized the railing of the driver's seat to steady myself,
and shrieked the question above the noise of the wheels.

"I take you right place," he returned; and I repeated the sentence to
Phyllis.

"That's no answer. Ask him if it's respectable; we can't go if it isn't.
Ask him if it's expensive; we can't go if it is."

I yelled the message.

"I take you hotel by-and-by. You see Rotterdam a little first."

"But we don't want to see Rotterdam first. We want breakfast. Rotterdam
by-and-by."

A sudden bump flung me down onto the hard seat. I half rose to do battle
again; then, as I gazed up at that implacable Dutch back, I began dimly
to understand how Holland, though a dot of a nation, tired out and
defeated fiery Spain. I knew that no good would be accomplished by
resisting that back. Short of hurling ourselves out on the stones, we
would have to see Rotterdam, so we might as well make the best of it.
And this I urged upon Phil, with reproaches for her niggardliness in
not buying Baedeker, who would have put stars to tell us the names of
hotels, and given us crisp maps to show where they were situated in
connection with other things.

I should think few people who have lived in Rotterdam for years have
really seen as much of the town as we saw on this clear blue morning.

At first the information bestowed upon us by the owner of the back
seemed an adding of insult to injury. How dared he explain what he was
forcing us to see in spite of ourselves? But, by-and-by, even Phyllis
fell to laughing, and her dimples are to her temper what rainbows are to
thunder-showers--once they are out there can be no more storm.

"I feel as if we'd seen samples of all Holland, and were ready to go to
our peaceful home again," said Phil