They are high and wide, and the tops of some of them are
covered with buildings and trees. They have even fine public roads upon
them, from which horses may look down upon wayside cottages.
Often the keels of floating ships are higher than the roofs of the
dwellings. The stork, on the house-peak, may feel that her nest is
lifted far out of danger, but the croaking frog in the neighboring
bulrushes is nearer the stars than she.
Water-bugs dart backward and forward above the heads of the chimney
swallows; and willow-trees seem drooping with shame, because they can
not reach so high as the reeds near by.
Ditches, canals, ponds, rivers, and lakes are every-where to be seen.
High, but not dry, they shine in the sunlight, catching nearly all the
bustle and the business, quite scorning the tame fields, stretching
damply beside them. One is tempted to ask: "Which is Holland--the shores
or the water?"
The very verdure that should be confined to the land has made a mistake
and settled upon the fish ponds. In fact the entire country is a kind of
saturated sponge, or, as the English poet Butler called it--
"A land that rides at anchor, and is moored,
In which they do not live, but go aboard.
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