Jacob Abbott

“ It is thus so easy to make canals in Holland, that the people have been making them for hundreds of years, until now almost the whole country is intersected every where with canals, as other countries are with roads. Almost all the traffic, and, until lately, almost all the travel of the country, has been upon the canals. There are private canals, too, as well as public. A farmer brings home his hay and grain from his fields by water, and when he buys a new piece of land he makes a canal to it, as a Vermont farmer would make a road to a new pasture or wood lot that he had been buying. ”

“ George.
"Why, uncle George," said Rollo. "It is plainly a great deal better to have the sidewalk raised a little, for that keeps the wheels of the carts and carriages from coming upon them. Besides, there ought to be a gutter."
"People that have never been away from home before," said Mr. George, "are very apt, when they first land in any strange country, and observe any strange or unusual way of doing things, or of making things, to condemn it at once, and say how much better the thing is in their country. ”

“ We all know from the books of geography which we study at school, that Holland is a very low country—lower in many places than the ocean; and that the water of the ocean is kept from overflowing it by dikes, which the people built ages ago, along the shores. I always used to suppose that it was only from the sea that people had any danger to fear of inundations ”

“ George.
The great canal of which James here spoke is the grandest work of the kind in Holland, and perhaps in the world. If you look at the map you will see that Amsterdam stands somewhat in the interior of the country, and that the only approach to it, by sea, is through a great gulf called the Zuyder Zee. Now, the water in the Zuyder Zee is shallow. There are channels, it is true, that are tolerably deep; but they are very winding and intricate, and they are so surrounded with shoals and sand banks as to make the navigation very difficult, especially for ships of large size. ”

“ But then it would be pleasanter to go in a little larger party. Two people are apt to get tired of each other, when there is nobody else that they can speak a single word to for a whole fortnight. I don't think that I should get tired of you. What I am afraid of is, that you would get tired of me."
There was a lurking smile on Mr. George's face as he said this.
"O, uncle George!" said Rollo, "that is only your politeness. But then if you really think that we ought to have some more company, perhaps the Parkmans are going to Holland, and we might go with them." ”

“ The view of these teams, walking along the tow path, with the immense ship following them in the canal, presented a very imposing spectacle.
The trekschuyt started before the Helder steamer; but it had not gone far before Rollo, who had now ascended to the deck again, saw her coming up behind very rapidly.
"I tell you what it is, uncle George," said he, "I wish you and I were on board that steamer, and were going along the whole length of the canal."
"So do I," said Mr. George.
"Could not we get on board?" asked Rollo.
"No," said Mr. George. "We cannot change our plan to-day very well. ”

“ I advise all the readers of this book, whether old or young, if they have not yet had an opportunity to learn wisdom by actual experience in travelling, to remember the lesson that Rollo learned on this occasion; and whenever, in their future travels, they find any thing that appears unusual or strange, not to condemn it too soon, simply because it is different from what they have been accustomed to at home, but to wait till they have learned whether there may not be some good cause for the difference. ”

“ George, "for a thousand years, for aught I know, the people have been living from generation to generation with no other employment than taking care of the cows that feed on the polders around, and making the milk into cheese. That is a business which requires neatness. Every kind of dairy business does. So that here is a place where a current was set towards neatness a thousand years ago, and it has been running ever since, and this is what it has come to."
Talking in this manner of what they had seen, Mr. George and Rollo returned to the inn, and there they found an excellent breakfast. ”

“ For water, in Holland, tends to spread and to destroy life and property, just as fire does in other countries. The lakes and rivers, where they are higher than the land, are liable to burst their barriers after heavy rains falling in the country, or great floods coming down the rivers, or high tides rise from the sea, and so run into each other; and the people have continually to contend against this danger, just as in other countries they do against spreading conflagrations. ”

“ Parkman, "we can take a Hansom cab, and drive down through the streets, or we can walk down to the river side, and there take a boat. The boats are a great deal the cheapest, and the most amusing; but the cab will be the most easy and comfortable, and the most genteel. We shall have to walk nearly half a mile before we get to the landing of the boats." ”

“ Rollo and Mr. George went into Holland by the railway. It was a long time before Rollo learned that in travelling from one European country to another, he was not to expect any visible line of demarcation to show the frontier. Boys at school, in studying the shape and conformation of different countries on the map, and seeing them marked by distinct colored boundaries, are very apt to imagine that they will see something, when travelling from one country to another, to show them by visible signs when they pass the frontier. ”

“ There was a time, two or three hundred years ago, when all the wind mills that the people could make, seem not to have been enough to do the work; and there was one place, in the centre of the country, where the water continued to spread more and more—breaking through as it spread from one polder to another—until, at last, it swallowed up such an extent of country as to form a lake thirty miles in circumference. This lake at last extended very near to the gates of Haarlem, and it was called the Holland Lake. ”

“ The harbor of California is such a harbor as this. Accordingly, in case a steamer arrives there when the tide is down, there is no other way but for her to anchor in the offing until it rises again; and the passengers, if they wish to go ashore, must clamber down the side of the vessel into a small boat, and be pulled ashore by the oarsmen. In smooth weather this is very easily done. But in rough weather, when both steamer and boat are pitching and tossing violently up and down upon the waves, it is not very easy or agreeable, especially for timid ladies. ”

“ This would not answer at all for a cotton mill, but it does very well for pumping up water from a great reservoir into which drains and canals discharge themselves to keep a country dry.
And this reminds me of one great advantage which the people of Holland enjoy on account of the low and level condition of their country; and that is, it is extremely easy to make canals there. There are not only no mountains or rocks in the way to impede the digging of them, but, what is perhaps a still more important advantage, there is no difficulty in filling them with water. ”

“ Now, since the advantages of wind mills are so great over steam engines, in respect especially to cheapness, perhaps you will ask why steam is employed at all to turn machinery, instead of always using the wind. The reason is, because the wind is so unsteady. Some days a wind mill will work, and some days it will lie still; and thus in regard to the time when it will do what is required of it, no reliance can be placed upon it. This is of very little consequence in the work of pumping up water from the sunken country in Holland ”

“ George beckoned to James to come to him, and asked him whether they should enter the canal through the lock.
"No," said James. "The ferry boat does not go into the canal at all. We go into a little dock or harbor by the side of it, and the passengers walk over the dike, and down to the canal, where they find the boats ready for them that they are to take."
"Why don't they pass from those boats through the locks, and let them come across to Amsterdam?" asked Rollo, "and then we might get on board them there, and so not have to change from one boat to the other." ”

“ Besides, contrary to Rollo's hastily formed opinion, there ought not to be any gutters in such a town as this, as far as the streets are perfectly level, from end to end; if gutters were made the water would not run in them. The only way to have the rain water carried off, is to form a gentle slope from the houses straight across the quay to the margin of the canal, and this requires that the connection between the sidewalk and the road way should be continuous and even. So that on every account the plan adopted in Rotterdam is the best for that town. ”

“ After walking down the passage way that led by the side of cribs, and examining all these things in detail, the party returned to the door where they had come in, and then, turning to the left, went into the rooms of the house. The first room was the bedroom. The second was the parlor. These rooms were both completely crowded with antique looking furniture, among which were cabinets of Chinese ware, and ornaments of every kind; and all was in such a brilliant condition of nicety and polish, as made the spectacle wonderful to behold. ”

“ At first you do not perceive that this beautiful country that you see spreading in every direction on one side of the road is below the level of the water that you see on the other side; but on a careful comparison you find that it is so. When the tide is high the difference is very great, and were it not for the dikes the people would be inundated. ”

“ The cheapest is to take a steamer, by which means you go down the Thames, and thence pass directly across the German Ocean to the coast of Holland. But that makes quite a little voyage by sea, during which almost all persons are subject to a very disagreeable kind of sickness, on account of the small size of the steamers, and the short tossing motion of the sea that almost always prevails in the waters that lie around Great Britain. [Pg 37]
So Mr. George and Rollo, who neither of them liked to be seasick, determined to go another way. ”

“ The people have to defend themselves from inundations, not only on the side towards the sea, but also quite as much, if not more, on the side towards the land, from the waters of the River [Pg 143] Rhine. The River Rhine rises in Switzerland, and flows through various countries of Europe until it comes to the borders of Holland, and there it spreads out into innumerable branches, and runs every where, all over the country. ”

“ The carriage road lay along the top of the dike, which was very broad, and the slopes of it, towards the water on one side, and towards the low meadow lands on the other, were very gradual. Men were at work every where along these slopes, cutting the second crop of grass, and making it into hay. Where the hay was ready to be got in, the men were at work loading it into boats that lay in the little canals that extend along the sides of the dike at the foot of the slopes.
Wind mills were to be seen every where, all about the horizon. ”

“ George that he could have it if he chose. There was another which was much less elegant, but it was more open.
"Let us take the open one," said Rollo. "We can see so much better."
So they decided upon the open one; and then, while the hostlers were harnessing the horses, Mr. George and Rollo went forward to the bridge.
The bridge led over a branch canal, which here comes into the main canal. The road to it lay along the dike, and formed the street of a little village. It was paved with bricks placed edgewise, and was as neat as a parlor floor. The houses were all on one side. ”

“ George.
"I thought it must be something like that," replied Rollo.
"The old nobility of those Russian countries are called boyars," said Mr. George; "but I don't know why. Most of the common people are slaves to them."
"Well, at any rate," said Rollo, "he made a law that every one of them, or at least all that were rich enough, should build or buy him a ship; [Pg 208] but they did not know how to build ships themselves, and so they were obliged to send to Holland for ship builders. They built more and better ships in Holland in those days than in any country in the world." ”

“ They might be worked by steam engines; but steam engines are much more expensive than wind mills. It not only costs much more to make them, but the expense of working them from day to day is very great, on account of the fuel which they require. The necessary attendance on a steam engine, too, is very expensive. There must be engineers, with high pay, to watch the engine and to keep it always in order, and firemen to feed the fires, and ashmen to carry away the ashes and cinders. Whereas a wind mill takes care of itself. ”

“ The water is all smooth and still in all the canals, (except when the wind blows,) and so there must be excellent skating every where in the winter.
"I wish it was winter here now, for one day, so that uncle George and I could have some Dutch skating.
"There must be good skating every where here in the winter, for there is water every where, and it is all good water for skating. In the fields, instead of brooks running in crooked ways and tumbling over rocks, there are only long and narrow channels of smooth water, just about wide enough to skate upon, and reaching as far as you can see. ”