Bruges And West Flanders Part 3

[Ill.u.s.tration: BRUGES. View of the Palais du Franc.]

It was not only the working cla.s.s which suffered. Many rich families sank into poverty, and their homes, some of which were more like palaces than private houses, had to be dismantled. The fate of one of these lordly mansions is connected with an episode which carries us back into the social life of Bruges in the middle of the seventeenth century. On the right side of the Rue Haute, as one goes from the Place du Bourg, there is a high block containing two large houses, Nos. 6 and 8, of that street. It is now a big, plain building without a trace of architectural distinction; but in the seventeenth century it was a single mansion, built about the year 1320, and was one of the many houses with towers which gave the Bruges of that time almost the appearance of an Oriental city. It was called the House of the Seven Towers, from the seven pinnacles which surmounted it; and at the back there was a large garden, which extended to the ca.n.a.l and Quai des Marbriers.

In April, 1656, the 'tall man above two yards high, with dark brown hair, scarcely to be distinguished from black,' for whom the Roundheads had searched all England after the Battle of Worcester, found his way to Bruges, with his brother Henry, Duke of Gloucester, and the train of Royalists who formed their Court. For nearly three years after Worcester, Charles II. had lived in France; but in July, 1654, the alliance between Cromwell and Mazarin drove him to Germany, where he remained till Don John of Austria became Governor of the Spanish Netherlands. Thereupon the prospect of recovering the English throne by the a.s.sistance of Spain led him to remove his Court, which had been established for some time at Cologne, to Flanders. He arrived at Bruges on April 22, 1656. His brother James, Duke of York, and afterwards King of England, held a commission in the French army, and Mazarin offered him a command in Italy.

Charles, however, requested him to leave the French army, and enter the service of Spain. At first James refused; but by the mediation of their sister, the Princess of Orange, he was persuaded to do as his brother wished, and join the Court at Bruges. The Irish Viscount Tarah received Charles, when he first arrived, in his house in the Rue du Vieux Bourg, and there gave him, we read in local history, 'une brillante hospitalite.' But in the beginning of June the Court took up its quarters in the House of the Seven Towers.

During his sojourn in Flanders, Charles was carefully watched by the secret service officers of the Commonwealth Government, who sent home reports of all he did. These reports, many of which are in the Thurloe State Papers and other collections, contain some curious details about the exiled Court.

There never was a more interesting 'English colony' at Bruges than at that time. Hyde, who received the Great Seal at Bruges, was there with Ormonde and the Earls of Bristol, Norwich, and Rochester.

Sir Edward Nicholas was Secretary of State; and we read of Colonel Sydenham, Sir Robert Murray, and 'Mr. Cairless', who sat on the tree with Charles Stewart after Worcester fight. Another of the exiles at Bruges was Sir James Turner, the soldier of fortune, who served under Gustavus Adolphus, persecuted the Covenanters in Scotland, and is usually supposed to have been the original of Dugald Dalgetty in Sir Walter Scott's _Legend of Montrose_.

A list of the royal household is still preserved at Bruges. It was prepared in order that the town council might fix the daily allowance of wine and beer which was to be given to the Court, and contains the names of about sixty persons, with a note of the supply granted to each family.

A 'Letter of Intelligence' (the report of a spy), dated from Bruges on September 29, 1656, mentions that Lilly, the astrologer of London, had written to say that the King would be restored to the throne next year, and that all the English at Bruges were delighted. But in the meantime they were very hard up for ready money. Ever since leaving England Charles and his followers had suffered from the most direful impecuniosity. We find Hyde declaring that he has 'neither shoes nor s.h.i.+rt.' The King himself was constantly running into debt for his meals, and his friends spent many a hungry day at Bruges. If by good luck they chanced to be in funds, one meal a day sufficed for a party of half a dozen courtiers. If it was cold they could not afford to purchase firewood. The Earl of Norwich writes, saying that he has to move about so as to get lodgings on credit, and avoid people to whom he owes money. Colonel Borthwick, who claims to have served the King most faithfully, complains that he is in prison at Bruges on suspicion of disloyalty, has not changed his clothes for three years, and is compelled by lack of cash to go without a fire in winter. Sir James Hamilton, a gentleman-in-waiting, gets drunk one day, and threatens to kill the Lord Chancellor. He is starving, and declares it is Hyde's fault that the King gives him no money. He will put on a clean s.h.i.+rt to be hanged in, and not run away, being without so much as a penny. Then we have the pet.i.tion of a poor fencing-master. 'Heaven,' he writes piteously, 'hears the groans of the lowest creatures, and therefore I trust that you, being a terrestrial deity, will not disdain my supplication.'

He had come from Cologne to Bruges to teach the royal household, and wanted his wages, for he and his family were starving.

[Ill.u.s.tration: BRUGES. Maison du Pelican (Almshouse).]

Don John of Austria visited Charles at Bruges, and an allowance from the King of Spain was promised, so that men might be levied for the operations against Cromwell; but the payments were few and irregular. 'The English Court,' says a letter of February, 1657, 'remains still at Bridges [Bruges], never in greater want, nor greater expectations of money, without which all their levies are like to be at a stand; for Englishmen cannot live on bread alone.'

A 'Letter of Intelligence' sent from Sluis says that Charles is 'much loocked upon, but littell respeckted.' And this is not wonderful if the reports sent home by the Commonwealth agents are to be trusted.

One of the spies who haunted the neighbourhood of Bruges was a Mr.

Butler, who writes in the winter of 1656-1657: 'This last week one of the richest churches in Bruges was plundered in the night.

The people of Bruges are fully persuaded that Charles Stewart's followers have done it. They spare no pains to find out the guilty, and if it happen to light upon any of Charles Stewart's train, it will mightily incense that people against them.... There is now a company of French comedians at Bruges, who are very punctually attended by Charles Stewart and his Court, and all the ladies there.

Their most solemn day of acting is the Lord's Day. I think I may truly say that greater abominations were never practised among people than at this day at Charles Stewart's Court. Fornication, drunkenness, and adultery are esteemed no sins amongst them; so I persuade myself G.o.d will never prosper any of their attempts.'[*]

In another letter we read that once, after a hunting expedition, Charles and a gentleman of the bedchamber were the only two who came back sober. Sir James Turner was mad when drunk, 'and that was pretty often,' says Bishop Burnet.

[Footnote *: Letter from Mr. J. Butler, Flus.h.i.+ng, December 2, 1656, Thurloe State Papers, V., 645.]

But, of course, it was the business of the spies to blacken the character of Charles; and there can be little doubt that, in spite of his poverty and loose morals, he was well liked by the citizens of Bruges, who, notwithstanding a great deal of outward decorum, have at no time been very strait-laced. 'Charles,' we learn from a local history, 'sut se rendre populaire en prenant part aux amus.e.m.e.nts de la population et en se pliant, sans effort comme sans affectation, aux usages du pays.' During his whole period of exile he contrived to amuse himself. Affairs of gallantry, dancing, tennis, billiards, and other frivolous pursuits, occupied as much of his attention as the grave affairs of State over which Hyde and Ormonde spent so many anxious hours. When on a visit to Brussels in the spring of 1657, he employed, we are told, most of his time with Don John dancing, or at 'long paume, a Spanish play with b.a.l.l.s filled with wire.' And, again: 'He pa.s.ses his time with shooting at Bruges, and such other obscure pastimes.'

This 'shooting' was the favourite Flemish sport of shooting with bow and arrows at an artificial bird fixed on a high pole, the prize being, on great occasions, a golden bird, which was hung by a chain of gold round the winner's neck. In the records of the Guilds of St. George and St. Sebastian at Bruges there are notices relating to Charles. The former was a society of cross-bowmen, the latter of archers. On June 11, 1656, Charles and the Duke of Gloucester were at the festival of the Society of St. George. Charles was the first to try his skill, and managed to hit the mark. After the Duke and many others had shot, Peter Pruyssenaere, a wine merchant in the Rue du Vieux Bourg, brought down the bird, and Charles hung the golden 'Bird of Honour' round his neck. On June 25 Charles visited the Society of St. Sebastian, when Michael Noe, a gardener, was the winner. The King and Gloucester both became members of the St. Sebastian, which is still a flouris.h.i.+ng society. Going along the Rue des Carmes, the traveller pa.s.ses the English convent on the left, and on the right, at the end of the street, comes to the Guild-house of St. Sebastian, with its slender tower and quiet garden, one of the pleasantest spots in Bruges. There the names of Charles and his brother are to be seen inscribed in a small volume bound in red morocco, the 'Bird of Honour' with its chain of gold, a silver arrow presented by the Duke of Gloucester, and some other interesting relics. On September 15, 1843, Queen Victoria, Prince Albert, King Leopold I., and the Queen of the Belgians, went to the Rue des Carmes and signed their names as members of this society, which now possesses two silver cups, presented by the Queen of England in 1845 and 1893. The Duke of York seems to have been successful as an archer, for in the Hotel de Ville at Bruges there is a picture by John van Meuninxhove, in which Charles is seen hanging the 'Bird of Honour' round his brother's neck.

In April, 1657, the English Government was informed that the Court of Charles was preparing to leave Bruges. 'Yesterday' (April 7) 'some of his servants went before to Brussels to make ready lodgings for Charles Stewart, the Duke of York, and the Duke of Gloucester.

All that have or can compa.s.s so much money go along with Charles Stewart on Monday morning. I do admire how people live here for want of money. Our number is not increased since my last. The most of them are begging again for want of money; and when any straggling persons come, we have not so much money as will take a single man to the quarters; yet we promise ourselves great matters.' They were hampered in all their movements by this want of hard cash, for Charles was in debt at Bruges, and could not remove his goods until he paid his creditors. It was sadly humiliating. 'The King,'

we read, 'will hardly live at Bruges any more, but he cannot remove his family and goods till we get money.' The dilemma seems to have been settled by Charles, his brothers, and most of the Court going off to Brussels, leaving their possessions behind them. The final move did not take place till February, 1658, and Clarendon says that Charles never lived at Bruges after that date. He may, however, have returned on a short visit, for Jesse, in his _Memoirs of the Court Of England under the Stuarts_, states that the King was playing tennis at Bruges when Sir Stephen Fox came to him with the great news, 'The devil is dead!' This would be in September, 1658, Cromwell having died on the third of that month. After the Restoration Charles sent to the citizens of Bruges a letter of thanks for the way in which they had received him. Nor did he forget, amidst the pleasures of the Court at Whitehall, the simple pastimes of the honest burghers, but presented to the archers of the Society of St. Sebastian the sum of 3,600 florins, which were expended on their hall of meeting.

More than a hundred years later, when the Stuart dynasty was a thing of the past and George III. was seated on the throne of England, the Rue Haute saw the arrival of some travellers who were very different from the roystering Cavaliers and frail beauties who had made it gay in the days of the Merry Monarch. The English Jesuits of St. Omer, when expelled from their college, came to Bruges in August, 1762, and took up their abode in the House of the Seven Towers, where they found 'nothing but naked walls and empty chambers.'

A miserable place it must have been. 'In one room a rough table of planks had been set up, and the famished travellers were rejoiced at the sight of three roast legs of mutton set on the primitive table. Knives, forks, and plates there were none. A Flemish servant divided the food with his pocket-knife. A farthing candle gave a Rembrandt-like effect to the scene. The boys slept that night on mattresses laid on the floor of one of the big empty rooms of the house. The first days at Bruges were cheerless enough.'[*]

The religious houses, however, came to the rescue. Flemish monks and the nuns of the English convent helped the pilgrims, and the Jesuits soon established themselves at Bruges, where they remained in peace for a few years, till the Austrian Government drove them out. The same fate overtook the inmates of many monasteries and convents at Bruges in the reign of Joseph II., whose reforming zeal led to that revolt of the Austrian Netherlands which was the prelude to the invasion of Flanders by the army of the French Revolution.

[Footnote *: Robinson, _Bruges, an Historical Sketch_, p. 291.]

After the conquest of Belgium by the French it looked as if all the churches in Bruges were doomed. The Chapel of St. Basil was laid in ruins. The Church of St. Donatian, which had stood since the days of Baldwin Bras-de-Fer, was pulled down and disappeared entirely. Notre Dame, St. Sauveur, and other places of wors.h.i.+p, narrowly escaped destruction; and it was not till the middle of the nineteenth century that the town recovered, in some measure, from these disasters.

Bruges has doubtless shared in the general prosperity which has spread over the country since Belgium became an independent kingdom after the revolution of 1830, but its progress has been slow. It has never lost its old-world a.s.sociations; and the names of the streets and squares, and the traditions connected with numberless houses which a stranger might pa.s.s without notice, are all so many links with the past. There is the Rue Espagnole, for example, where a vegetable market is held every Wednesday. This was the quarter where the Spanish merchants lived and did their business. There used to be a tall, dark, and, in fact, very dirty-looking old house in this street known by the Spanish name of the 'Casa Negra.' It was pulled down a few years ago; but lower down, at the foot of the street, the great cellars in which the Spaniards stored their goods remain; and on the Quai Espagnol was the Spanish Consulate, now a large dwelling-house. A few steps from the Quai Espagnol is the Place des Orientaux (Oosterlingen Plaats), where a minaret of tawny brick rises above the gables of what was once the Consulate of Smyrna, and on the north side of which, in the brave days of old, stood the splendid Maison des Orientaux, the headquarters of the Hanseatic League in Bruges, the finest house in Flanders, with turrets and soaring spire, and marvellous facade, and rooms inside all ablaze with gilding. The glory has departed; two modern dwelling-houses have taken the place of this commercial palace; but it must surely be a very dull imagination on which the sight of this spot, now so tranquil and commonplace, but once the centre of such important transactions, makes no impression. From the Place des Orientaux it is only a few minutes' stroll to the Rue Cour de Gand and the dark brown wooden front of the small house, now a lace shop, which tradition says was one of Memlinc's homes in Bruges, where we can fancy him, laboriously and with loving care, putting the last minute touches to some immortal painting.

Then there is the Rue Anglaise, off the Quai Spinola, where the English Merchant Adventurers met to discuss their affairs in houses with such names as 'Old England' or 'The Tower of London.' The head of the colony, 'Governor of the English Nation beyond the Seas' they called him, was a very busy man 400 years ago.[*] The Scottish merchants were settled in the same district, close to the Church of Ste. Walburge. They called their house 'Scotland,'

and doubtless made as good bargains as the 'auld enemy' in the next street. There is a building called the Parijssche Halle, or Halle de Paris, hidden away among the houses to the west of the Market-Place, with a cafe and a theatre where Flemish plays are acted now, which was formerly the Consulate of France; and subscription b.a.l.l.s and amateur theatricals are given by the English residents of to-day in the fourteenth-century house of the Genoese merchants in the Rue Flamande. The list of streets and houses with old-time a.s.sociations like these might be extended indefinitely, for in Bruges the past is ever present.

[Footnote *: In the _Flandria Ill.u.s.trata_ of Sanderus, vol. i., p. 275, there is a picture of the 'Domus Anglorum.']

[Ill.u.s.tration: BRUGES. Vegetable Market.]

Even the flat-fronted, plain houses with which poverty or the bad taste of the last century replaced many of the older buildings do not spoil the picturesque appearance of the town as a whole, because it is no larger now than it was 600 years ago, and these modern structures are quite lost amongst their venerable neighbours.

Thus Bruges retains its mediaeval character. In the midst, however, of all this wealth of architectural beauty and historical interest, the atmosphere of common everyday life seems to be so very dull and depressing that people living there are apt to be driven, by sheer boredom, into spending their lives in a round of small excitements and incessant, wearisome gossip, and into taking far more interest in the paltry squabbles of their neighbours over some storm in a teacup than in the more important topics which invigorate the minds of men and women in healthier and broader societies. Long before Rodenbach's romance was written this peculiarity of Bruges was proverbial throughout Belgium.

But it is possible that a change is at hand, and that Bruges may once again become, not the Venice of the North--the time for that is past--but an important town, for the spirit of commercial enterprise which has done so much for other parts of Belgium during the last seventy-five years is now invading even this quiet place, whose citizens have begun to dream of recovering some portion of their former prosperity. In 1895 the Belgian Parliament pa.s.sed a law providing for the construction, between Blankenberghe and Heyst, of a harbour connected with Bruges by a ca.n.a.l of large dimensions, and of an inner port at the town. The works at See-Brugge, as the outer port is called, are nearly completed, and will allow vessels drawing 26-1/2 feet of water to float at any state of the tide.

The jetty describes a large curve, and the bend is such that its extremity is parallel to the coast, and 930 yards distant from the low-water mark. The sheltered roadstead is about 272 acres in extent, and communication is made with the ca.n.a.l by a lock 66 feet wide and 282 yards in length. From this point the ca.n.a.l, which has a depth of 26-1/2 feet and is fed by sea-water, runs in a straight line to Bruges, and ends at the inner port, which is within a few hundred yards of where the Roya used to meet the Zwijn. It is capable of affording a minimum capacity of 1,000,000 tons per annum, and the whole equipment has been fitted up necessary for dealing with this amount of traffic.

The first s.h.i.+p, an English steamer, entered the new port at Bruges on the morning of May 29 in the present year (1905). The carillon rung from the Belfry, guns were fired, and a ceremony in honour of the event took place in the Hotel de Ville. It now remains to be seen whether any part of the trade which was lost 400 years ago can be recovered by the skill of modern engineers and the resources of modern capital.

THE PLAIN OF WEST FLANDERS--YPRES

CHAPTER VII

THE PLAIN OF WEST FLANDERS--YPRES

To the west of Bruges the wide plain of Flanders extends to the French frontier. Church spires and windmills are the most prominent objects in the landscape; but though the flatness of the scenery is monotonous, there is something pleasing to the eye in the endless succession of well-cultivated fields, interrupted at intervals by patches of rough bushland, ca.n.a.ls, or slow-moving streams winding between rows of pollards, country houses embowered in woods and pleasure-grounds, cottages with fruitful gardens, orchards, small villages, and compact little towns, in most of which the diligent antiquary will find something of interest--a modest belfry, perhaps, with a romance of its own; a parish church, whose foundations were laid long ago in ground dedicated, in the distant past, to the wors.h.i.+p of Thor or Woden; or the remains, it may be, of a mediaeval castle, from which some worthy knight, whose name is forgotten except in local traditions, rode away to the Crusades.

This part of West Flanders, which lies wedged in between the coast, with its populous bathing stations, and the better-known district immediately to the south of it, where Ghent, Tournai, Courtrai, and other important centres draw many travellers every year, is seldom visited by strangers, who are almost as much stared at in some of the villages as they would be in the streets of Pekin. It is, however, very accessible. The roads are certainly far from good, and anything in the shape of a walking tour is out of the question, for the strongest pedestrian would have all his pleasure spoilt by the hard-going of the long, straight causeway. The ideal way to see the Netherlands and study the life of the people is to travel on the ca.n.a.ls; but these are not so numerous here as in other parts of the country, and, besides, it is not very easy to arrange for a pa.s.sage on the barges. But, in addition to the main lines of the State Railway, there are the 'Chemins-de-fer Vicinaux,' or light district railways, which run through all parts of Belgium. The fares on these are very low, and there are so many stoppages that the traveller can see a great many places in the course of a single day. There are cycle tracks, too, alongside most of the roads, the cost of keeping them in order being paid out of the yearly tax paid by the owners of bicycles.[*]

[Footnote *: Bicycles entering Belgium pay an _ad valorem_ duty of 12 per cent.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE FLEMISH PLAIN]

This is the most purely Flemish part of Flanders. One very seldom notices that Spanish type of face which is so common elsewhere--at Antwerp, for instance. Here the race is almost unmixed, and the peasants speak nothing but Flemish to each other. Many of them do not understand a word of French, though in Belgium French is, as everyone knows, the language of public life and of literature.

The newspapers published in Flemish are small, and do not contain much beyond local news. The result is that the country people in West Flanders know very little of what is going on in the world beyond their own parishes. The standard of education is low, being to a great extent in the hands of the clergy, who have hitherto succeeded in defeating all proposals for making it universal and compulsory.

But, steeped as most of them are in ignorance and superst.i.tion, the agricultural labourers of West Flanders are, to all appearance, quite contented with their lot. Living is cheap, and their wants are few. Coffee, black bread, potatoes, and salted pork, are the chief articles of diet, and in some households even the pork is a treat for special occasions. They seldom taste b.u.t.ter, using lard instead; and the 'margarine' which is sold in the towns does not find its way into the cottages of the outlying country districts.

Sugar has for many years been much dearer than in England, and the price is steadily rising, but with this exception the food of the people is cheap. Tea enters Belgium duty free, but the peasants never use it. Many villagers smoke coa.r.s.e tobacco grown in their own gardens, and a 10-centimes cigar is the height of luxury. Tobacco being a State monopoly in France, the high price in that country makes smuggling common, and there is a good deal of contraband trading carried on in a quiet way on the frontiers of West Flanders.

The average wage paid for field labour is from 1 franc 50 centimes to 2 francs a day for married men--that is to say, from about 1s.

3d. to 1s. 8d. of English money. Bachelors generally receive 1 franc (10d.) a day and their food. The working hours are long, often from five in the morning till eight in the evening in summer, and in winter from sunrise till sunset, with one break at twelve o'clock for dinner, consisting of bread with pork and black coffee, and another about four in the afternoon, when what remains of the mid-day meal is consumed.

The Flemish farmhouse is generally a substantial building, with two large living-rooms, in which valuable old pieces of furniture are still occasionally to be found, though the curiosity dealers have, during the last quarter of a century, carried most of them away, polished them up, and sold them at a high profit. Carved chests, bearing the arms of ancient families, have been discovered lying full of rubbish in barns or stables, and handsome cabinets, with fine mouldings and bra.s.s fittings, have frequently been picked up for a few francs. The heavy beams of the ceilings, black with age, the long Flemish stoves, and the quaint window-seats deeply sunk in the thick walls, still remain, and make the interiors of many of these houses very picturesque; but the 'finds' of old furniture, curious bra.s.s or pewter dishes, and even stray bits of valuable tapestry, which used to rouse the cupidity of strangers, are now very rare. Almost all the bra.s.s work which is so eagerly bought by credulous tourists at Bruges in summer is bran-new stuff cleverly manufactured for sale--and sold it is at five or six times its real market value! There are no bargains to be picked up on the Dyver or in the shops of Bruges.

[Ill.u.s.tration: DUINHOEK. Interior of a Farmhouse.]

The country life is simple. A good deal of hard drinking goes on in most villages. More beer, probably, is consumed in Belgium per head of the population than in any other European country, Germany not excepted, and the system of swallowing 'little gla.s.ses' of fiery spirit on the top of beer brings forth its natural fruits. The drunken ways of the people are encouraged by the excessive number of public-houses. Practically anyone who can pay the Government fee and obtain a barrel of beer and a few tumblers may open a drinking-shop. It is not uncommon in a small country village with about 200 inhabitants to see the words 'Herberg' or 'Estaminet' over the doors of a dozen houses, in which beer is sold at a penny (or less) for a large gla.s.s, and where various throat-burning liquors of the _pet.i.t verre_ species can be had at the same price; and the result is that very often a great portion of the scanty wage paid on Sat.u.r.day evening is melted into beer or gin on Sunday and Monday. As a rule, the Flemish labourer, being a merry, light-hearted soul, is merely noisy and jovial in a brutal sort of way in his cups; but let a quarrel arise, out come the knives, and before the rural policeman saunters along there are nasty rows, ending in wounds and sometimes in murder. When the lots are drawn for military service, and crowds of country lads with their friends flock into the towns, the public-houses do good business. Those who have drawn lucky numbers, and so escaped the conscription, get drunk out of joy; while those who find they must serve in the army drown their sorrow, or celebrate the occasion if they are of a martial turn, by reeling about the streets arm in arm with their companions, shouting and singing. Whole families, old and young alike, often join in these performances, and they must be very drunk and very disorderly before the police think of making even the mildest remonstrance.

The gay character of the Flemings is best seen at the 'kermesse,'

or fair, which is held in almost every village during summer. At Bruges, Ypres, and Furnes, and still more in such large cities as Brussels or Antwerp, the kermesse has ceased to be typical of the country, and is supplanted by fairs such as may be seen in England or in almost any other country. 'Merry-go-rounds' driven by steam, elaborate circuses, menageries, waxwork exhibitions, movable theatres, and modern 'shows' of every kind travel about, and settle for a few days, perhaps even for a few weeks, in various towns. The countryfolk of the surrounding district are delighted, and the showmen reap a goodly harvest of francs and centimes; but these fairs are tiresome and commonplace, much less amusing and lively than, for example, St. Giles's Fair at Oxford, though very nearly as noisy. But the kermesse proper, which still survives in some places, shows the Flemings amusing themselves in something more like the old fas.h.i.+on than anything which can be seen in the Market-Place of Bruges or on the boulevards of Brussels or Antwerp.

Indeed, some of the village scenes, when the young people are dancing or shooting with bows and arrows at the mark, while the elders sit, with their mugs of beer and long pipes, watching and gossiping, are very like what took place in the times of the old painters who were so fond of producing pictures of the kermesses. The dress of the people, of course, is different, but the spirit of the scene, with its homely festivities, is wonderfully little changed.