Nijmegen

“ Amsterdam recalls Rembrandt; Antwerp calls to mind Rubens, and with the town of Nuremberg, the student of painting associates its illustrious native, Albert Durer.
The craftsmen of this town were among the most skilful of any European nation during mediæval times. Goldworkers, armourers, clock-makers, and artists in stained glass worked here in the days of the trade guilds. Brass was founded in this city at an early date. Nuremberg was famed, too, for its metalworkers and goldsmiths. It is still a town of industrious artificers.
The architecture of the churches is of the highest Gothic order ”

“ The institution of this society was hailed with transport throughout the whole extent of the New-Netherlands; being considered a secret foothold gained in New-Amsterdam, and a flattering presage of future triumph. Whenever that society holds its annual feast, a sympathetic hilarity prevails throughout the land; ancient Pavonia sends over its contributions of cabbages and oysters; the House of the Four Chimneys is splendidly illuminated, and the traditional song of St. Nicholas, the mystic bond of union and conspiracy, is chaunted with closed doors, in every genuine Dutch family. ”

“ The complicated reasons can scarcely be unraveled. The king sent his son, the dauphin, at the head of one hundred thousand men, to invade Holland. Situated upon both sides of the Rhine there was a territory called the Palatinate. It embraced one thousand five hundred and ninety square miles, being not quite so large as the State of Delaware. It contained an intelligent, industrious, and prosperous population of a little over three hundred thousand. The beautiful city of Manheim was the capital of the province. ”

“ Wellington is in France and we have not risen en masse to drive him back! All my allies have deserted—the Bavarian has betrayed me. No peace until we have burned Munich! I demand a levy of 300,000 men—with this and what I already have, I shall see a million in arms. [376] I will form a camp of 100,000 at Bordeaux; another at Mentz; a third at Lyons. But I must have grown men: these boys only serve to incumber the hospitals and the road-sides. Abandon Holland! ”

“ At Heidelberg, after looking over the University, which seemed to me dull and out of date, and the Tun, which was certainly large, and the Schloss, a most beautiful and impressive ruin, we climbed the mountain which rises from the Neckar in order that we might get a view of the Valley of the Rhine and the Neckar and the Taunus mountains. On the way up we overtook Catharine Grimm, a woman of about forty, who twice a week carried upon her head all of the supplies needed for the inn at the crest from the city below. She wanted us to take her home with us, poor woman, and little wonder. ”

“ An English, an American, town which should have such a monument, such a square, as this, would be a place of great pretensions; but like so many little villes de province in the country of which I write, Nimes is easily ornamental. What nobler ornament can there be than the Roman baths at the foot of Mont Cavalier, and the delightful old garden that surrounds them? All that quarter of Nimes has every reason to be proud of itself; it has been revealed to the world at large by copious photography. ”

“ And, as is the habit with many of the towns in this section of Holland, Groningen has made the most of the site of her old ramparts and city fortifications by transforming it into a public park.
Without the least savor of favoritism, Groningen might easily capture the palm for supporting about the most uninteresting market in Holland. Held in the great square that serves the town as a center for outdoor business transactions and trolley service, it is a market of everything and a market of nothing. ”

“ There are other artists who do honour to this their native city, but I have mentioned those of the first order, in number and reputation perfectly sufficient to establish the pretensions of Utrecht to high rank in the roll of renowned cities. I quitted this beautiful place, the prosperity of which has suffered much by the war with England, about four o’clock on a beautiful autumnal morning, and proceeded to Arnheim, which and Nimeguen, are the capital cities of Guelderland. This beautiful and valuable province contains twenty-two considerable towns, and upwards of three hundred villages. ”

“ He went to enormous expense, got everything outside boycot limits, put up temporary buildings on his place for workmen from Rotterdam, fed them and himself from Rotterdam, and so in the end his house was built. But things are different in Gelderland now. People who were rich then are poor, and glad of any one's money. Arnhem is as cosmopolitan as The Hague, though it has the same curious Indian-Dutch set you find there, keeping quite to itself. ”

“ The great hills out of which the Neckar flows, infold the town in a sweet security; and yet there is no sense of imprisonment, for the view is always wide open to the great plains where the Neckar goes to join the Rhine, and where the Rhine runs for many a league through a rich and smiling land. One could settle down here to study, without a desire to go farther, nor any wish to change the dingy, shabby old buildings of the university for anything newer and smarter. What the students can find to fight their little duels about I cannot see; but fight they do, as many a scarred cheek attests. ”

“ On my arrival at Hamburg, I found the river Elbe, upon which it stands, blockaded by the Danes, and the merchants complaining bitterly. This city is eighty miles from the mouth of the river, and is divided in many places by canals and crossed by bridges; and in the old town, the houses, bridges, and quays reminded me of Amsterdam. The city has a population of some one hundred and forty thousand, and possesses an immense amount of commerce. ”

“ Instead of proceeding to besiege Nymegen, Maurice marched away as suddenly and quickly as before, and captured Hulst, on the borders of Zeeland and Brabant, a dozen miles only from Antwerp, and then turning again was, in three days, back at Nymegen, and had placed sixty-eight pieces of artillery in position. He opened fire on the 20th of October, and the next day the important city of Nymegen surrendered. This series of brilliant successes greatly raised the spirits of the Netherlanders, and proportionately depressed those of the Spaniards and their adherents. ”

“ Nevertheless, I was exceedingly delighted with the appearance of the city of Nuremberg. It carries one back to the mediaeval times! The architecture, even of the ordinary houses, is excellent. St. Lawrence, St. Sebald's, and the Frauenkirche, are splendid specimens of Gothic design. The city is surrounded by old walls and turrets, by ramparts and bastions, enclosed by a ditch faced with masonry. Very few cities have so well escaped the storm of war and sieges in the Middle Ages, and even in modern times. ”

“ The Yssel, still another mouth of the Rhine, which I saw at Kampen on its way into the Zuyder Zee, breaks away from the parent river just below Arnheim. As a matter of fact all Holland is on the Rhine, but the word must be used with care.
If one would study Dutch romantic scenery I think Nymwegen on the whole a better town to stay in than Arnheim. It is simpler in itself, richer in historic associations, and the country in the immediate east is very well worth exploring—hill and valley and pine woods, with quaint villages here and there ”

“ TOWN LIFE
The earlier towns in New Netherland gathered usually closely around a fort, both for protection and companionship. In New Amsterdam, as in Albany, this fort was an intended refuge against possible Indian attacks, and also in New Amsterdam the established quarters in the new world of the Dutch West India Company. As the settlement increased, roads were laid out in the little settlement leading from the fort to any other desired point on the lower part of the island. Thus Heere Straat, the Breede Weg, or Broadway, led from the fort of New Amsterdam to the common pasture-lands. ”

“ The Society for the Public Welfare, or, in Dutch, Maatschappij tot Nut van’t Algemeen, with headquarters in Amsterdam, was founded in 1784 and has made its influence felt throughout the entire kingdom.
Katwyk and Noordwyk, three miles apart, the particular seashore resorts that cater especially to the people of Leyden and Haarlem, are both connected by steam tram with Leyden. Both are insignificant and expensive, and neither is so attractive as Domburg nor so gay as Scheveningen. Their wide beaches of fine sand would seem to us their only assets. ”

“ Owing to Dutch, occupation during half a century of intense agitation, civil war and revolution, New Netherland had escaped being drawn into the maelstrom of English hates and rivalries. Indeed the Dutch settlements, and New Amsterdam in particular, had derived advantage from the troubles of the English colonies, and among the immigrants who sought an asylum from Puritan intolerance within New Netherland jurisdiction were many who proved valuable additions to the population of the province, and who helped to build up its trade and commerce, and to develop agriculture. ”

“ Economic, educational, and political improvements gave the Netherlands modern statehood. Most striking was the new system of popular education. The public schools were separated from the Church, though much of the teaching was still doctrinal or religious.
The Van Rensselaer tomb in Nijkerk ChurchNijkerk was a typical Dutch town. What went on here was accomplished, sooner or later, in every community in the Republic. We thus learn what habits and ideas the emigrants brought to New Netherland, better than from any modern authors or after-dinner speeches. ”

“ The town of Manheim is large, neat, and populous; containing 20,000 souls. The streets run generally at right angles, and are sufficiently airy and wide. But, compared with the domestic architecture of Augsburg, Munich, and Vienna, the houses are low, small, and unornamented. The whole place has much the appearance of a handsome provincial town in England. There are gardens and public walks; but the chief of these is connected with the old red-stone palace of the former Elector Palatine. The Rhine terminates these walks on one side ”

“ In “Mary of Nimmegen” the everyday life of Netherlands burghers is astir on the stage. We get a glimpse of the simple household of a village priest, who, not unknown to his niece, dabbles in necromancy, we are introduced into the low life of Antwerp and hear the drawer’s call to the tapster repeating an order, “A first, ho, a first! Draw of the best and fill to the brim!”, we watch with the good people of Nimmegen the performance of a mystery on a pageant-wain in the market-place, and see women take a passionate part in the political factions of the day. ”

“ Of its population of quite a hundred thousand souls, one-third, at least, are of the Catholic profession, which is an astonishing proportion for a city of Holland. For this reason, perhaps, the city remains the metropolis of the Catholic religion in the Netherlands.
The environs of the city are exceedingly picturesque. The Rhine again divides into two branches, the Oud Rijn continuing to the North Sea, through Leyden, and the other branch, known thenceforth as the Vecht, flowing into the Zuyder Zee. ”

“ I believe, that excepting Amsterdam, there is not a Town in Europe where there are so many Sects; but few of 'em are allow'd a Church. The Neighbourhood of this Town to Hambourg, and its Situation moreover upon the Elbe, does great Prejudice to that City. 'Tis now several years since Altena was burnt by the Swedes, under the Command of the Count de Steinbock; when they scarce allow'd Time to the Inhabitants to make their Escape; so that they had the Grief to be Eye-Witnesses of the burning of their Houses and Goods, and several Old Men, and a number of Infants perish'd in the Flames. ”

“ The duties and powers of the Nine Men were proclaimed by the Council, much against Stuyvesant’s wishes. “Nothing is more desirable than that New Netherland and principally New Amsterdam our capital and residence might continue and increase in good order, justice, police, population, prosperity and mutual harmony, and be provided with strong fortifications, a church, a school, trading place, harbor and similar necessary public edifices and improvements.” ”

“ Nothing contributed more to advance the prosperity of the city than the arrival of the industrious Dutch people, who brought with them arts before unknown in this land.
For centuries the action of government in reference to trade was simply in the way of protection, creating monopolies under charters, and sometimes for subsidies. This was especially the case in Norwich, which was made one of the royal cities of England, and had a market every day in the week, as well as annual marts for all sorts of merchandise. ”

“ In the reign of Henry II., Nuremberg was already a place of some importance, and its prosperity advanced until it became one of the chief markets of Europe. The castle was the residence of many rulers of the country, and it was one of the favourite palaces of Henry IV.
In the thirteenth century, Nuremberg had a large number of Jews among its population, who enjoyed all the rights of citizens. But under Karl IV. a policy of oppression was adopted, and at a later period, the Jewish inhabitants were bitterly persecuted. ”