CHAPTER IV
STREETS AND BYWAYS

NLY an hours ride on the railroad

  
   
  
 

\. from Broek to Amsterdam—and yet
M\ how.different are the two! Here,
as in the other large Dutch cities,
you see a brisk business look on
the men’s faces. They are slighter
in build than the rustic folk; and,
a not having such broad backs and short
legs, not wearing leather breeches and wide jackets and
big waist-buckles as the countrymen do, they quite make
you forget that they are Dutch. In fact they look like
New-Yorkers. Nowadays, the fashions and the stiff mas-
culine costume of Paris and London tend to make nearly
all city folk of the Christian world look alike.

Still, often in Dutch cities you see something distinctive
in costume,—huge coal-scuttle bonnets on the women;
and wooden shoes, that clatter-clatter at every step.
Some of the women and girls have their hair cropped short
and wear close-fitting caps; and these caps and head-
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