ont. They wore red sleeves, white aprons, and a cap like
a bishop's mitre over their golden hair.

The children often were as quaint and odd-looking as their elders. In
short, one-third of the crowd seemed to have stepped bodily from a
collection of Dutch paintings.

Everywhere could be seen tall women and stumpy men, lively-faced
girls, and youths whose expressions never changed from sunrise to
sunset.

There seemed to be at least one specimen from every known town in
Holland. There were Utrecht water-bearers, Gouda cheese-makers, Delft
pottery-men, Schiedam distillers, Amsterdam diamond-cutters, Rotterdam
merchants, dried-up herring-packers, and two sleepy-eyed shepherds
from Texel. Every man of them had his pipe and tobacco pouch. Some
carried what might be called the smoker's complete outfit,--a pipe,
tobacco, a pricker with which to clean the tube, a silver net for
protecting the bowl, and a box of the strongest of brimstone matches.

A true Dutchman, you must remember, is rarely without his pipe on any
possible occasion. He may for a moment neglect to breathe; but when
the pipe is forgotten, he must be dying indeed. There were no such sad
cases here. Wreaths of smoke were rising from every possible quarter.
The more fantastic the smoke-wreath, the more placid and solemn the
smoker.

Look at those boys and girls on stilts! That is a good idea. They can
look over the heads of the tallest. It is strange to see those little
bodies high in the air, carried about on mysterious legs. They have
such a resolute look on their round faces, what wonder that nervous
old gentlemen with tender feet wince and tremble while the long-legged
little monsters stride past them!

You will read in certain books that the Dutch are a quiet people. So
they are, generally. But listen! did you ever hear such a din? All
made up of human voices--no, the horses are helping somewhat, and the
fiddles are squeaking pitifully; (how it must pain fiddles to be
tuned!) but the mass of the sound comes from the great _vox humana_
that belongs to a crowd.

That queer little dwarf, going about with a heavy basket, winding in
and out among the people, helps not a little. You can hear his shrill
cry above all other sounds, "Pypen en tabac! Pypen en tabac!"

Another, his big brother, though evidently some years younger, is
selling doughnuts and bonbons. He is calling on all pretty children,
far and near, to come quickly or the cakes will be gone.