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person to deliver up all the uncoined gold and silver, or plate (spoons and forks excepted) for the use of the state, there appeared to be no reluctance to obey it, and as these state offerings exceeded the estimate required, it is likely that none were concealed.

Amsterdam has no noble squares, which add so much to the splendour of London, nor is there any bridge worthy of being noticed, except that which crosses the river Amstel, which is built of brick, has thirteen arches, and is tolerably handsome on the river looking towards this bridge, there is a fine view of the city, which I preferred sketching, to a more expanded one on the coast immediately opposite to the city, in the north of Holland. The only association throughout Holland, which resembles a monastic one, is that of the Berguines, who reside in a large house appropriated to their order, which is surrounded with a wall and ditch, has a church within, and resembles a little town; this sisterhood is perfectly secular, the members of which wear no particular dress, mingle with the inhabitants of the city, quit the convent, and marry when they please: but they are obliged, as long as they belong to the order, to attend prayers at stated periods, and to be within the convent at a certain hour every evening.

The ladies of Holland, if I may judge from those with whom I had the honour and happiness of associat ing in Amsterdam, are very amiable, thoroughly well bred, well educated, speak English, French and German, and they are very polite and courteous to strangers: they are also remarkable for their attention to decorum, and modesty. They are much attached to English country dances, in which the most graceful Parisian belle seldom appears to any adi antage.

The interior of the houses belong us classes in Amsterdam is very elegant, and furniture of their rooms is very

to the nigher he decoration ach in the

French style: they are also very fud of having a s

series

of landscapes, painted in oil colours, upon the sides of

9187

the rooms, instead of stucco or paper, or of ornamenting them with pictures and engravings. The average Tent of respectable houses, independent of taxes, is from one thousand to twelve hundred florins. The dinner hour, on account of the exchange," is about four o'clock in this city, and their modes of cooking unite those of England and France: immediately after dinner the whole company adjourn to coffee in the drawing-room.

..

The water in this part of Holland is so brackish and feculent, that it is not drank even by the common people. There are water-merchants, who are constantly occupied in supplying the city with drinkable water, which they bring in boats from Utrecht and Germany, in large stone bottles the price of one of these bottles, containing a gallon, is about eightpefice English. The poor, who cannot afford to buy it, substitute rain-water. The wines drank are principally claret and from the Rhine. The vintage of Portugal has no more admirers here then at Rotterdam, exc except amongst young Dutchmen, who have either been much in England, or are fond of the taste and fashions of our country.

The laws in Holland against nocturnal disturbers of the peace are very severe. A few months" before I gentlemen of family

was in Amsterdam, two young pay ten thousand

and fortune had been condemned

florins for having, when flushed with the Tuscan grape," rather rudely treated two woinen 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 strangers; for they strike the quarter with a mallet on a board, and will haunt his repose night, unless he is fortunate enough to sleep backwards, or until he becomes accustomed to the clatter Midnight robberies and fires very seldom occur. to guard against the spreading of the latter, there are Persons appointed, whose office it is to refifin all day and all

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night in the towers or steeples
es of the highest churches
and as soon as they discern the flame, to suspend, if it
be in n the day, a flag; if in the night, a lanthorn towards
the quarter of the city in which it rises, accompanied
by the blowing of a trumpet.
trumpet. This vigilance, and the
facility of procuring water in summer, the natural
caution of the people, and their dread of such an accio
dent, conspire to render it a very rare visitor obse9dt
Although, owing to the great frugality and industry
of the people, an insolvent debtor is rather a rare
character, consequently held in more odium in Hol-
land than in most other countries, yet the laws of ar-
rest are milder there than in England. If the debtor
be a citizen or registered burgher, he is not subject to
have his person seized at the suit of the creditor, until
three regular summonses have been duly served upon
him, to appear in the proper court, and resist the claim
preferred against him, which process is completed in
about a month; after which, if he does not obey it,
his person is subject to arrest, but only when he has
quitted his house; for in Holland a man's dwelling is
held even more sacred than in England, and no civil
process whatever is capable of being served upon him,
if he stands but on the threshold of his home. In thiso
sanctuary he may set at defiance every claimant; if,s
however, he has the hardihood to appear abroad,
without having satisfied or compromised his debt, he
is then pretty sure, from the vigilance and activity of
the proper officers, to be seized; in which case he is
sent to a house of restriction, not a prison for felons,
where he is maintained with liberal humanity, the ex
penses of which, as well as of all the proceedings,
must be defrayed by the creditor. Under these quali
fications, every debtor is liable to arrest, let the amount
of the debt be ever so small. The bankrupts laws of
Holland differ from ours in this respect, that all thes
creditors must sign the debtor's certificate, or agreem
ment of liberation; but if any refuse, the ground of
their refusal is submitted to arbitrators, who decide

whether the bankrupt shall, notwithstanding, have his certificate or not.

A passenger can seldom pass a street without seeing one or more public functionaries, I believe peculiar to this country; they are called aanspreeker, and their office is to inform the friends and acquaintances of any one who dies, of the melancholy event. The dress of these death-messengers is a black gown, a band, a low cocked hat with a long crape depending behind. To pass from the shade of death to the light of love: a singular custom obtains upon the celebration of marriage amongst genteel persons, for the bride and bridegroom to send each a bottle of wine, generally fine hock, spiced and sugared, and decorated with all sorts of ribands, to the house of every acquaintance; a custom which is frequently very expensive. The Dutch have a singular mode of airing linen and beds, by means of a trokenkorb, or fire-basket, which is about the size and shape of a magpie's cage, within which is a pan filled with burning turf, and the linen is spread over its wicker frame, or to air the bed, the whole machine is placed between the sheets. With an exception of the streets I have mentioned, and some others in that quarter of the city, they are not able either for beauty or cleanliness. They paved with brick, and none of them have any divided Bagstone foot-path for foot-passengers: however, the pavement is more handsome and comfortable than that of Paris; although in both cities the pedestrian has no walk that he can call his own, yet in Amsterdam is he mote secure than in the French capital, on account of the few carriages, and the skill and caution of the drivers. In no capital in the world, not even excepting Petersburg, is the foot-passenger so nobly accommodated as in London. Most of the streets in Amsterdam are narrow; and many in which very opulent merchants reside, and great traffic is carried on, are not more than sixteen or seventeen feet wide.

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The canals of this city are very convenient, But

Canal

many of them most offensively impure, the uniform greenness of which is chequered only by dead cats dogs, offal, and vegetable substances of every kind, which are left to putrify at the top, until the scavengers, who are employed to clean the canals, remove them: the barges which are used on these occasions, and the persons employed in them, present a yery disgusting appearance; the mud which is raised by them forms most excellent manure, aud the De sum it fetches in Brabant, is calculated to be equal to the expenses of the voyage, Some of the most eminent Dutch physicians maintain that the effluvia arising from the floating animal and vegetable matter of these canals is not injurious, and in proof, during a contagious fever which ravaged this city, it was observed, that the inhabitants who resided nearest to the foulest canals were not infected, whilst those who lived near purer water only in few instances, escaped; but this by no means confirms the assertion, because those inhabitants who lived adjoining to foul canals were inured to contagion from its habitual application, for the same reason that medical men and nurses generally escape infection, from being so constantly exposed to it.

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The water of these canals is in general about eight or nine feet deep, and the mud at the bottom about six more. Except in very foggy nights, few deaths by 'drowning, considering the amount of the population, occur in these canals, and fewer would still happen, if they were guarded against by a railing, which is rarely erected in any part of the city. At night, as the city is well lighted, a passenger, unless he is blind, or very much inebriated, a disgraceful condition, which, as I have before observed, is not often displayed in Holland, is not very likely to experience a watery death.

However, to guard as much as possible against the gloomy consequence of these casualties, the keepers of all inns and taverns, and all apothecaries in Amster