Page:Hans Brinker, Or, The Silver Skates- A Story of Life in Holland (IA hansbrinkerorsi00dodggoog).pdf/32



earned a scant support for her family by raising vegetables, spinning, and knitting. Once she had worked on board the barges plying up and down the canal and had occasionally been harnessed with other women to the towing rope of a pakschuyt plying between Broek and Amsterdam. But when Hans had grown strong and large, he had insisted on doing all such drudgery in her place. Besides, her husband had become so very helpless of late that he required her constant care. Although not having as much intelligence as a little child, he was yet strong of arm and very hearty, and Dame Brinker had sometimes great trouble in controlling him.

"Ah! children, he was so good and steady," she would sometimes say, "and as wise as a lawyer. Even the burgomaster would stop to ask him a question, and now, alack! he don't know his wife and little ones. You remember the father, Hans, when he was himself—a great brave man—Don't you?"

"Yes, indeed, Mother, he knew everything and could do anything under the sun—and how he would sing! Why, you used to laugh and say it was enough to set the windmills dancing."