John Holland

“ SPECIMEN OF THE ENGLISH, DUTCH, AND GERMAN LANGUAGES. It is matter of surprise to the contemplative traveller to observe in a country apparently so mechanically moral and regular as Holland, the glaring defects of the most loose and meretricious government: in the hearts of the finest cities are to be found brothels surpassing in iniquity all such seats of impurity in any other nation, in which the horrible novelty of the most savage oppression is united to a public, licensed, and authorised display of vice and profligacy. ”

“ Holland was peculiarly desirous of participating in that commerce which the independence of the United States would open to the world: and, from the commencement of hostilities, her merchants, especially those of Amsterdam, watched the progress of the war with anxiety, and engaged in speculations which were profitable to themselves and beneficial to the United States. The remonstrances made by the British minister at the Hague against this conduct, were answered in the most amicable manner by the government, but the practice of individuals continued the same. ”

“ Holland will always find a congenial audience in the homes of culture and refinement. He does not affect the play of the darker and fiercer passions, but delights in the sweet images that cluster around the domestic hearth. He cherishes a strong fellow-feeling with the pure and tranquil life in the modest social circles of the American people, and has thus won his way to the companionship of many friendly hearts.”—The New York Tribune. ”

“ Holland is the only country I have been in, where the sound of bells was gratifying. The dismal tone of our own on solemn occasions, and the horrible indiscriminate clashing of the bells of the Greek church in Russia, are, at least to my ear, intolerable nuisances. I afterwards learnt that the carillons at Amsterdam have three octaves, with all the semi-tones complete on the manual, and two octaves in the pedals; each key for the natural sound projects near a foot, and those for the flats and sharps, which are played several inches higher, only half as much. ”

“ The stranger will find nothing to detain him in this melancholy town long. In Holland every traveller naturally becomes amphibious: the constant contemplation of so much water quickly engenders all the inclinations of a webfooted animal, and he soon feels out of his proper element when out of a canal. Right merrily did I follow my commissionary and his wheel barrow with my baggage through the whole town, until I reached the Hague gate, when my favourite conveyance, the treckschuyt, was ready to start. ”

“ Such is the celebrated Rondell of Amsterdam, which the Dutch who have never visited England contend is superior to our Vauxhall.
With a large and very agreeable party, I made an excursion into North Holland, where we visited Brock, one of the most curious, and one of the prettiest villages in Holland. The streets are divided by little rivulets; the houses and summer-houses, formed of wood painted green and white, are very handsome, though whimsical in their shape, and are all remarkably neat. They are like so many mausoleums, for the silence of death reigns throughout the place. ”

“ A Dutch merchant of the present day almost always calculates the chances for and against his success in any undertaking, which he will immediately relinquish unless they are very greatly in his favour, and as nearly reducible to certainty as possible: he very rarely over-trades himself, or extends his schemes beyond his capital: such was the foundation upon which the commerce of Amsterdam was raised.
The principal sources of commercial wealth to Holland arose from her herring and Greenland fisheries, which employed a great 182portion of her population. ”

“ Fortune seemed to smile on the heir of the Hollands. Could the future have been foreseen, however, no young peasant, laboring in the fields and struggling out of serfdom, would have envied the infant destined to a career so miserable and a catastrophe so melancholy. The life of Henry Holland opened brightly enough. At the age of seventeen he succeeded his father as third Duke of Exeter and Lord High Admiral of England, and espoused Anne Plantagenet, eldest daughter of the Duke of [Pg 364] York; and, at the time when the Roses were plucked, he appears to have favored the Yorkist cause. ”

“ The duke soon convinced the king of his innocence, and advised the friar's detention in Holland's custody. The night before the date fixed for the inquiry into the matter, Holland and Sir Henry Green caused the friar to be butchered in prison (Hist. Angl. ii. 113–14) .
During 1385 Holland was undoubtedly guilty of a crime which illustrates the violence of his temper. In that year he accompanied Richard on his way to Scotland. While the army was near York an archer of Ralph, eldest son of Hugh, earl Stafford, quarrelled with and slew one of Holland's esquires. ”

“ It is a matter of surprise, that after Holland submitted to the French arms, these exquisite productions should be permitted to remain, upon the walls which they have so long adorned.
In the great, or council of war chamber, there are some good paintings representing the ancient train-bands, and officers in their proper costume; many of which are portraits. In the secretary’s office, a handsome room, amongst other decorations, is a basso-relievo of Silence, which the Dutch are very fond of representing under the form of a woman. ”

“ After passing through a beautiful boulevard, and crossing some drawing bridges, I entered the elegant city of Leyden through the white gate, and proceeded to a very comfortable hotel in the principal street, called the Broad street, the length, spaciousness, and beauty of which entitles it to the highest admiration: there is no canal in it, and the buildings on each side are very handsome, many of them splendid mansions. This seat of learning is considered to be one of the handsomest in Holland, and next in size to Amsterdam ”

“ Holland, John (1766–1826) , nonconformist minister, son of Philip's younger brother, Thomas Holland, was educated for the ministry at Daventry academy, entering under Belsham in 1783. In 1789 he succeeded his uncle as minister of Bank Street Chapel, Bolton, Lancashire (ordained 13 May) . His ministry was marked by the establishment of a Sunday school (1789) , and by a system of catechetical instructions on historical and scientific as well as on religious topics. As a preacher he was less successful ”

“ THE EXCHANGE ... A DUTCH MERCHANT ... HERRING FISHERY. The laws in Holland against nocturnal disturbers of the peace are very severe. A few months before I was in Amsterdam, two young gentlemen of family and fortune had been condemned to pay ten thousand florins for having, when “flushed with the Tuscan grape,” rather rudely treated two women of the lower orders. The night police of Holland would form an excellent model for that of England. The watchmen are young, strong, resolute and well appointed, but annoying to a stranger; for they strike the quarter-hour with a mallet on a board ”

“ The French revolution found an unembarrassed introduction into Holland, and the feeble resistance which the Dutch troops opposed to the French armies, pretty clearly demonstrates the estimation in which the country held its unworthy ruler, and the desire they had of delivering themselves from him and the influence of England upon their councils. It is well known, that in the last war, the Dutch refused the sick and wounded of their allies, the British army, admission into Delft, and a body of burghers was formed at Amsterdam, to prevent the entrance of foreign troops ”

“ The fate of Holland is a memorable lesson to other nations. We wonder that the power of France rolls on with overwhelming fury: the military observer traces her resistless march to her brilliant improvements in modern warfare; the politician to the magnitude, energy, and endless reinforcements of her troops ”

“ An English gentleman who had just returned from Italy, where he had been accustomed for several years to the warm voluptuous brunettes of that beautiful country, was uncommonly delighted with the fair faces of the Dutch ladies; but female beauty does not begin to expand itself till after the imprisonment and regimen of the nursery are past. Pretty and healthy children are rarely to be seen in Holland: in general they look pale and squalid, owing to an abominable system followed in rearing them ”

“ In Holland the honours of funeral pomp are scarcely ever displayed: the spirit of economy, which seems to be the tutelar saint of these moist regions, seldom incurs a further expense than a plain coffin, which costs little, and some genuine tears or sighs, which cost nothing. To describe the numerous churches, 191chapels, and conventicles of the religions of all persuasions, who since the revolution live in cordial amity with each other, and with the government, under which they enjoy the rights of equal citizenship, would be a laborious and not a very interesting labour. ”

“ The Dutch manufacture their own woollens, and they are esteemed to be very good. The black cloth of Holland is very well known, which is infinitely of a deeper and superior colour than ours. The principal cloth manufactures are at Leyden and Tielburg. There are also very capital and flourishing manufactures of velvets, silk, and carpets, at Hilversom; and those of linen and table-cloths, which are exquisite, at Overyssel; and numerous paper-mills.
The population of Rotterdam is estimated at sixty thousand inhabitants. Upon the whole, it is a gloomy place to live in ”

“ His performances at Bristol, where he first appeared in 1767, won him the warm praise of Chatterton, who spoke of nature as but a copy of his art, and said, ‘No single part is thine, thou'rt all in all’ (‘To Mr. Holland,’ Works, i. 265, Boston, 1864) . Holland and Powell were of nearly the same age, were the closest of friends, and lived in the same house. Powell was introduced by Holland to Garrick. Their close friendship was derided by Foote, and many stories are current as to the shock caused to Holland by the death of Powell, whom he survived less than a year. ”

“ Each parish maintains its own poor, under the control of a council. They have also, as with us, outdoor poor. The sabbath is kept in Holland with the same solemnity as in England. The great number of noble charitable institutions in Amsterdam, in which the sick and the friendless of all persuasions are received and cherished, without any recommendation but that of affliction, cannot fail to impress a stranger with admiration, though to enumerate them here would not be very entertaining to the reader. ”

“ The fate of Barneveldt is related with great spirit by Voltaire, who says, But human affairs are ever chequered with good and evil. Mankind are so apt to deviate from their principles, that this republic (Holland) had nearly destroyed the liberty for which she had so bravely fought, and persecution boiled in the blood of a people, whose happiness and laws were founded on toleration. Two calvinistical doctors did what so many doctors have done in so many other places. Gomar and Arminius disputed most furiously at Leyden, about what neither of them understood. ”

“ The usual national spirit of economy used to display itself in the Dutch theatre, where, to prevent a useless consumption of tallow, whenever the musicians quitted 112the orchestra, they were bound by contract to extinguish the lights by which they read their music. In many tradesmen’s houses at this day in Holland, winter courtships are carried on in the dark, the union of warm love and rigid economy being considered a very laudable conjunction. ”

“ That the periodical renewal of the chief of the state will always in Holland be a source of dissensions, and out of it, a constant subject of agitation and discord between the powers either friends or enemies of Holland.
3. That an hereditary government alone can guarantee the quiet possession of all that is dear to the Dutch people, the free exercise of their religion, the preservation of their laws, their political independence, and their civil liberty. ”

“ The market-place is capacious, and abundantly supplied with every species of provision, which are here much cheaper than in the other parts of Holland. The streets of this city are enlivened by several handsome equipages, and throughout the place there is a considerable appearance of refinement and opulence. Here the Dutch language begins to lose itself in the German, a circumstance made manifest by a friend of mine, a native of Germany, who accompanied me on my return 215from that country to Holland, finding considerable difficulty in understanding the lower people in Arnheim. ”

“ Hooft, Vondel, and Antonides, are known in Holland, but not out of it; and we have heard but faintly of Huygens, Graveszande, and Vandoveron in physic; of Voet in jurisprudence, and Burman and Gronovius in the belles lettres.
It is certain, that if the Dutch poets are to be considered as favoured by Apollo, a condescension which those who are best acquainted with their productions much doubt, they have made more successful advances in the most difficult of poetical composition. I have heard of three epic writers ”

“ Holland is justly celebrated for its public charities. In Rotterdam, before the last war, there were many benevolent institutions, some of which have inevitably languished, and others expired, in consequence of the political convulsions of the country and the usually impoverishing effects of long hostility. ”