en at sea; for Vanderdecken only wishes to write
home and comfort his friends."

To which the chaplain replied, "Your letters, I fear, would be of no
use in Amsterdam, even if they were delivered, for the persons to whom
they are addressed are probably no longer to be found there, except
under very ancient green turf in the churchyard."

The unwelcome stranger then wrung his hands and appeared to weep, and
replied: "It is impossible. We cannot believe you. We have been long
driving about here, but country nor relations cannot be so easily
forgotten. There is not a raindrop in the air but feels itself kindred
to all the rest, and they fall back into the sea to meet with each
other again. How then can kindred blood be made to forget where it
came from? Even our bodies are part of the ground of Holland; and
Vanderdecken says, if he once were come to Amsterdam, he would rather
be changed into a stone post, well fixed into the ground, than leave
it again, if that were to die elsewhere. But in the mean time, we only
ask you to take these letters."

The chaplain, looking at him with astonishment, said, "This is the
insanity of natural affection, which rebels against all measures of
time and distance."

The stranger continued, "Here is a letter from our second mate, to his
dear and only remaining friend, his uncle, the merchant who lives in
the second house on Stuncken Yacht Quay."

He held forth the letter, but no one would approach to take it.

Tom Willis raised his voice and said, "One of our men, here, says that
he was in Amsterdam last summer, and he knows for certain that the
street called Stuncken Yacht Quay was pulled down sixty years ago,
and now there is only a large church at that place."

The man from the Flying Dutchman said: "It is impossible, we cannot
believe you. Here is another letter from myself, in which I have sent
a bank-note to my dear sister, to buy some gallant lace, to make her a
high head-dress."

Tom Willis hearing this said: "It is most likely that her head now
lies under a tombstone, which will outlast all the changes of the
fashion. But on what house is your bank-note?"

The stranger replied, "On the house of Vanderbrucker and Company."

The man, of whom Tom Willis had spoken, said: "I guess there will now
be some discount upon it, for that banking-house was gone to
destruction forty years ago; and Vanderbrucker was afterwards
amissing.--But to remember these things is like raking up t