354 Hans Brinker

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only appears so. There are grandfather and grandmother,
whom you met at the St. Nicholas féte. All the children are
with them. It is so mild, they have brought even the baby.
The poor little creature is swaddled very much after the man-
ner of an Egyptian mummy ; but it can crow with delight, and,
when the band is playing, open and shut its animated mittens
in perfect time to the music.

Grandfather, with his pipe and spectacles and fur cap, makes
quite a picture as he holds baby upon his knee. Perched high
upon their canopied platforms, the party can see all that is
going on, No wonder the ladies look complacently at the
glassy ice: with a stove for a footstool, one might sit cosily
beside the north pole.

There is a gentleman with them who somewhat resembles
St. Nicholas as he appeared to the young Van Glecks, on the
5th of December. But the saint had a flowing white beard ;
and this face is as smooth as a pippin. His saintship was
larger around the body, too, and (between ourselves) he had a
pair of thimbles in his mouth, which this gentleman certainly
has not. It cannot be St. Nicholas, after all.

Near by, in the next pavilion, sit the Van Holps, with their
son and daughter (the Van Gends) from the Hague. Peter’s
sister is not one to-forget her promises. She has brought bou-
quets of exquisite hot-house flowers for the winners.

These pavilions, and there are others beside, have all been
erected since daylight. That semicircular one, containing
Mynheer Korbes’ family, is very pretty, and proves that the
Hollanders are quite skilled at tent-making ; but I like the Van
Glecks’ best, — the centre eos red and white, and
hung with evergreens.

The one with the. blue Aage.c contains the musicians. Those