Page:Letters from Abroad to Kindred at Home (Volume 1).djvu/126

Rh through an arched stone gateway, and were, for the first time in our lives, in a paved court, round three sides of which the house, in the common Continental fashion, is built. The mistress of the hotel, in pretty full dress, came out to receive us; and, after hearing our wants, we were conducted through a paved gallery to spacious and well-furnished apartments. Before the hotel is a little square, surrounded with three rows of dwarf elm-trees, and in honour of these, I presume, called La Place Verte (Green Place), for there is nothing else green about it. The ground is incessantly trodden by people crossing it, or seated about on the wooden benches in social squads. All the womankind wear a high lace cap, dropping low at the ears, short gowns, and very full petticoats in the Dutch fashion, with which we were familiar enough formerly at Albany. A better class wear a black shawl over the head hanging down to their feet—a remnant of the Spanish mantilla. It is curious to see this and other vestiges of Spanish occupation here, such as some very grand old Spanish houses.

We have been driving about the town in a comfortable carriage, six of us besides the coachman, after a fat, sleek Flemish horse, who seemed quite able to trot off double the number, if need were. I wish I could give you a glimpse of these streets thronging with human life, and seemingly happy human life too. The "honest Flemings" have a most contented look. I almost doubt my identity as I hear this din of a foreign tongue in my ear, and