fpecies of amusement, took place; all the public roads were filled with carriages, paffing and repaffing, and the streets were crouded with puppet-fhews, mountebanks, and wild beafts. What amufed me beyond other novelties, was the fingular dress of the Dutch girls. Any one would have imagined, that the figures which appeared on thefe occafions were mafques, or defigned as caricatures; but the numbers which crouded all the public ways, and the winning airs they affected, convinced me, that nothing but my want of tafte refifted the influence of such fingular attractions. Imagine a fhort figure, with more breadth than goes to the proportion of elegance, and with very little alteration in the width downwards to the waift, the petticoats defcending half way only below the knee.Imagine further, a round face, usually small, covered with a hat of near three feet in diameter, perfectly circular, and applied to the head in a part contiguous to the circumference.

3

cumference.

You will readily perceive, that the hat, thus difpofed, will project before the face, nearly the space of the whole diameter, touching the head, agreeably to the property of spheres, only in one point. Now you have nothing to do but to conceive a number of thefe figures in motion, brandishing their horizontal hats, rolling their diminutive eyes, and affecting a thoufand ridiculous graces, under cover of this extenfive canopy. The tout enfemble brought to my recollection those sculptural vagaries, in which a human figure is often made the prop of a cathedral feat, the fupport of a wainscot pulpit, or the ftand of a mahogany table. If you deem my obfervations fomewhat fatirical, I muft, in my own vindication, say, that this is a country in which few objects are to be found for panegyric or applaufe. The fingularity of its fituation, and the extent of its commerce, are almoft the only topics on which curiofity would dwell, without terminating in cenfure: and

our daily observation evinces, that a nation, great in the arts of commerce, and poffeffed of all the refources of fplendor and affluence, may yet be ignorant of the arts of refinement, and yield to nations lefs important, and lefs opulent, in the more fascinating attainments of elegance and good taste.

T

LETTER XIX.

HE paffage by water from the Hague to Amfterdam exhibits fome pleasant fcenery, and the boats are under fo dextrous management, that you never travel flower than four miles an hour. They will pretend to greater fpeed, but I never found the motion exceed this. People are usually counselled to engage the ruffle, which is the name diftinguishing the best cabbin; and for those who are averse to mixing with a promiscuous society, and have a decided antipathy to fmoke, it is certainl y a very

wife

precau

precaution. Motives of curiofity always determined us to prefer the oppofite measure and we had many opportunities, by this means, of commenting upon the manners of this fingular people.

Every man who enters the boat, whatever be his condition, either brings a pipe in his mouth or his hand. A flight touch of the hat, upon entering the cabbin, franks him for the whole time of his ftay; and the laws of etiquette allow him to smoke in filence to the end of the paffage. We fee, as at a meeting of quakers, fixed features and changeless postures; the whole vifage mysterious, and folemn, but betraying, it must be confeffed, more of abfence than intelligence. Hours will pafs, and no mouth expand, but to whiff the smoke: nor any limb be put

in

motion, except to rekindle the pipe. The coutume of those focieties, in the liberal use of the crachoir, does not preferve that attention to delicacy which fome conftitutions would require,

On our way to Amfterdam we had an opportunity of taking a tranfient view of Leyden, and of Haerlem. The Dutch towns have fo close a resemblance to each other, in their canals, their bridges, and their buildings, that a traveller's curiofity is soon fatiated. The univerfity of Leyden owes its celebrity more to the talents of its profeffors, than the splendor or magnitude of its edifices. The oil painting by Jean de Leyde, is the only attraction which the Hotel-de-Ville poffeffes. Haerlem boafts Laurentius Cofter, one of the inventors of printing, as a native. The great church, and the superb organ which it contains, are known throughout Europe,

A fhort time fuffices to examine all the objects of curiofity in those towns, which are a perpetual repetition of the first impres fion. The banks of the canals are ornamented with various gardens and pleasure grounds, which the mafters of the veffels are induftrious to difplay. I fhall fufpend

my