Gorcum. While on his journey he had the shuddering experience of
hearing some one remark that the box was heavy enough to have a man
in it; but it was his only danger. A Gorcum friend extricated him;
and, disguised as a carpenter armed with a footrule, he set forth
on his travels to Antwerp. Once certain that Grotius was safe, his
wife informed the guard, and the hue and cry was raised. But it was
raised in vain. At first there was a suggestion that the lady should
be retained in his stead, but all Holland applauded her deed and she
was permitted to go free.

The river, as I have said, must be still much the same as in Grotius's
day; while the two towns Gorcum and Worcum cluster about their noble
church towers as of old. Worcum is hardly altered; but Gorcum's railway
and factories have enlarged her borders. She has now twelve thousand
inhabitants, some eleven thousand of whom were in the streets when,
the tub having at length crawled back with us, we walked through them
to the station.

Odd how one nation's prettiness is another's grotesque. My companion
was wearing one of those comely straw hats trimmed with roses which
we call Early Victorian, and which the hot summer of 1904 brought
into fashion again on account of their peculiar suitability to keep
off the sun. In England we think them becoming; upon certain heads
they are charming. But no head must wear such a hat at Gorcum unless
it would court disaster. The town is gay and spruce, bright as a new
pin; the people are outrageous. I suppose that the hat turned down at
the precise point at which, according to Gorcum's canons of taste,
it should have turned up. Whatever it did was unpardonable, and
we had to be informed of the solecism. We were informed in various
ways; the men whistled, the women sniggered, the girls laughed, the