Mr. Parkman seemed extremely unwilling to allow Mr. George to pay any thing at all; but Mr. George insisted upon it, and so the bill was paid by a joint contribution.
All this time the carriage was ready at the door, and the gentlemen, attended by two or three waiters, conducted Mrs. Parkman down to the door. The party then drove, in succession, to the various places which the commissioner had enumerated. There were museums consisting of a great many rooms filled with paintings, and palaces, where they were shown up grand staircases, and through long corridors, and into suites of elegant apartments, and churches, and beautiful parks and gardens, and a bazaar filled with curiosities from China and Japan, and a great many other similar places. Mr. George paid very particular attention to Mrs. Parkman during the whole time, and made every effort to anticipate and comply with her wishes in all respects. In one case, indeed, I think he went too far in this compliance, and the result was to mortify her not a little. It was in one of the museums of paintings. Mrs. Parkman, like other ladies of a similar character to hers, always wanted to go where she could not go, and to see what she could not see. If, when she came into a town, she heard of any place to which, for any reason, it was difficult to obtain admission, that was the very place of all others that she wished most to see; and if, in any museum, or palace, or library that she went into, there were two doors open and one shut, she would neglect the open ones, and make directly to the one that was shut, and ask to know what there was there. I do not know as there was any thing particularly blameworthy in this. On the contrary, such a feeling may be considered, in some respects, a very natural one in a lady. But, nevertheless, when it manifests itself in a decided form, it makes the lady a very uncomfortable and vexatious companion to the gentleman who has her under his care.
In one of the rooms where our party went in the museum of paintings, there was a door near one corner that was shut. All the other doors-those which communicated with the several apartments where the pictures were hung-were open. As soon as Mrs. Parkman came in sight of the closed door, she pointed to it and said,-
"I wonder what there is in that room. I suppose it is something very choice. I wish we could get in."
Mr. Parkman paid, at first, no attention to this request, but continued to look at the pictures around him.
"I wish you would ask some of the attendants," she continued, "whether we cannot go into that room."
"O, no," replied her husband. "If it was any thing that it was intended we should see, the door would be open. The fact that the door is shut is notice enough that, we are not to go in there."
"I'm convinced there are some choice pictures in there," said Mrs. Parkman; "something that they do not show to every body. Mr. George, I wish you would see if you can't find out some way to get in."
"Certainly," said Mr. George, "I will try."
So Mr. George walked along towards one of the attendants, whom he saw in another part of the room,-putting his hand in his pocket as he went, to feel for a piece of money. He put the piece of money into the attendant's hand, and then began to talk with him, asking various indifferent questions about the building; and finally he asked him where that closed door led to.
"O, that is only a closet," said the attendant, "where we keep our brooms and dusters."
"I wish you would just let us look into it," said Mr. George. "Here's half a guilder for you."
The man looked a little surprised, but he took the half guilder, saying,-
"Certainly, if it will afford you any satisfaction."
Mr. George then went back to where he had left the rest of his party, and said to Mrs. Parkman,-
"This man is going to admit us to that room. Follow Him. I will come in a moment."
So Mr. George stopped to look at a large painting on the wall, while Mrs. Parkman, with high anticipations of the pleasure she was to enjoy in seeing what people in general were excluded from, walked in a proud and stately manner to the door, and when the man opened it, saw only a small, dark room, with nothing in it but brooms, dust pans, and lamp fillers. She was exceedingly abashed by this adventure, and for the rest of that day she did not once ask to see any thing that was not voluntarily shown to her.
After visiting all the places of note in the town, the coachman was ordered to drive to the watering place on the sea shore. It was a very pleasant drive of about three miles. Just before reaching the shore of the sea, the road came to a region of sand hills, called dunes, formed by the drifting sands blown in from the beach by the winds. Among these dunes, and close to the sea shore, was an immense hotel, with long wings stretching a hundred feet on each side, and a row of bath vans on the margin of the beach before it. The beach was low and shelving, and it could be traced for miles in either direction along the coast, whitened by the surf that was rolling in from the German Ocean.
After looking at this prospect for a time, and watching to see one or two of the bathing vans drive down into the surf, in order to allow ladies who had got into them to bathe, the party returned to the carriage, and the coachman drove them through the village, which was very quaint and queer, and inhabited by fishermen. The fishing boats were drawn up on the shore in great numbers, very near the houses. Rollo desired very much to go and see these boats and the fishermen, and learn, if he could, what kind of fish they caught in them, and how they caught them. But Mrs. Parkman thought that they had better not stop. They were nothing but common fishing boats, she said.
The carriage returned to the Hague by a different road from the one in which it came. It was a road that led through a beautiful wood, where there were many pleasant walks, with curious looking Dutch women going and coming. As the party approached the town, they passed through a region of parks, and palaces, and splendid mansions of all kinds. Mrs. Parkman was curious to know who lived in each house, and Mr. George contrived to communicate her inquiries to the coachman, by making signs, and by asking questions partly in English and partly in German. But though the coachman understood the questions, Mrs. Parkman could not understand the answers that he gave, for they were Dutch names,-sometimes long and sometimes short; but whether they were long or short, the sounds were so uncouth and strange that Mrs. Parkman looked terribly distressed in trying to make them out.
At length the carriage arrived at the hotel again; and there the porters put on the baggage belonging both to Mr. and Mrs. Parkman, and to Mr. George and Rollo. It then proceeded to the station. Mr. George and Rollo waited there until the train for Amsterdam arrived, and then took leave of Mr. and Mrs. Parkman as they went to their seats in the carriage. Mrs. Parkman shook hands with Mr. George very cordially, and said,-
"We are very much obliged to you, Mr. George, for your company to-day. We have had a very pleasant time. I wish that we could have you to travel with us all the time."
* * * * *
"I think she ought to be obliged to you," said Rollo, as soon as the train had gone.
"Not at all," said Mr. George.
"Not at all?" repeated Rollo. "Why not? You have done a great deal for her to-day."
"No," said Mr. George. "All that I have done has not been for her sake, but for William's. William is an excellent good friend of mine, and I am very sorry that he has not got a more agreeable travelling companion."
[Illustration]
CHAPTER VII. CORRESPONDENCE.
One day, when Mr. George and Rollo were at the town of Leyden, it began to rain while they were eating their breakfast.
"Never mind," said Rollo. "We can walk about the town if it does rain."
"Yes," said Mr. George, "we can; but we shall get tired of walking about much sooner if it rains, than if it were pleasant weather. However, I am not very sorry, for I should like to write some letters."