144 Hans Brinker

Just look at those men and women with their sugar-loaf hats,
and see this woman ahead of us with a straw bonnet like a
scoop-shovel, tapering to a point in the back. Did you ever
see anything so funny? And those tremendous wooden shoes
too. I declare she’s a beauty !”

“© Oh, they are only back-country folk!” said Lambert,
rather impatiently. “You might as well let old Boerhaave
drop, or else shut your eyes.” ;

“Ha, ha! Well, I was going to say, all the big men of his
day sought out this great professor. Even Peter the Great,
when he came over to Holland from Russia, to learn ship-
building, attended his lectures regularly. By that time Boer-
haave was professor of medicine and chemistry and botany in
the University of Leyden. He had grown to be very wealthy
as a practising physician; but he used to say that the poor
were his best patients, because God would be their paymaster.
All Europe learned to love and honor him. In short, he be-
came so famous that a certain mandarin of China addressed a
letter to‘ The illustrious Boerhaave, physician in Europe ;’
and the letter found its way to him without any difficulty.”

‘My goodness! That is what I call being a public charac-
ter. I say! Look at yonder couple in their pleasure-cart. It
would look like an ancient chariot, if it only were set lower.
Halloo! The boys have stopped. How now, Captain van
Holp, where next ?”

“We propose to move on,” said Van Holp: “there is
nothing to see at this season in the Bosch. ‘The Bosch is a’
noble wood, Benjamin, a grand park, where they have most
magnificent trees protected by law. Do you understand ? ”

“Ya!” nodded Ben, as the captain proceeded, —

“Unless you all desire to visit the Museum of Natural