VAILS-GIVING.

Rider, fourteen guilders.

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Half rider, seven guilders. These are current through the provinces.

I would recommend the traveller to carry with him a sufficient number of guineas for his return to England, as they are scarce and very dear; for twelve guineas I paid an exchange of 35-4 agio 104 on 145, or 137. 4s. 6d.

COINS.

No alteration has taken place in the legends of the coins of Holland. Since the revolution there has been a copious silver coinage, but the florin has remained the same for more than a century. The old calendar is adhered to, with the slight alterations rendered necessary by a change in the name and spirit of the government.

The practice of vails-giving still continues in Holland. Previous to my going to dine with some acquaintances which I made at Rotterdam, I was particularly reminded by a friend who knew the habits of the country, not to forget to carry a few florins with me, as the servant who opened the door, upon my quitting the house, would expect either one or two of those pieces. This abominably mean practice existed in England in a higher degree, and still continues in part in the shape of card money.

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FRUIT AND VEGETABLE SELLERS.

If I remember correctly, we are indebted to Mr. Hanway

the philanthropist, whose life is given in a very entertaining manner by his pupil and protégé, Mr. Pugh, for the abolition of giving vails to servants; previous to which, a gentleman of moderate income could scarcely afford to dine with an opulent and fashionable friend.

In houses of great resort in Holland, servants are in the habits of purchasing their places of their masters free of wages, solely for the douceurs which custom rigidly exacts from the visitor. At one table a friend of mine, a thoughtless Englishman, was reminded of his having forgotten the usage, by having a quantity of soup poured over his new coat by accidental design.

In the streets I was much gratified by seeing the fruit and vegetable sellers: the fruit was abundant, very fresh, and fine, and such as is usually to be found at the same season in England: the vegetables are remarkably excellent, and are submitted to the eye in the cleanest and most attractive manner. The Dutch potatoes are small, and uncommonly good; I think they are, if possible, superior to those of Ireland.

The proximity of the houses to the canals enables the Dutch women to indulge to the full extent of their wishes,

SCRUBBING AND MOPPING.

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in scrubbing and mopping their passages and rooms, which they do from the first to the last blush of day; indeed, cleanliness in their houses is carried to a painful excess. All the strong features of an English Saturday evening, viz. mops, pails, scrubbing-brushes, dusters, fullers' earth, are in active use every hour of the day, in Holland; and a little hand-garden engine is in perpetual requisition, for washing the outside of the windows.

But the aqua-terrene nymphs to whose hands these right useful instruments are committed, appear to be so solicitous of removing every feculent impression of the foot in their white-tiled halls, of giving a brilliant polish to the brass knockers, and of preserving the furniture of the rooms unsullied, that they frequently neglect to purify their own persons; the charms of which are to be often seen mingled with, if not obscured by, the accretions of long neglect and inattention.

Some travellers have extended similar remarks to the higher classes of the female sex, but unquestionably with more spleen than truth.

I had the honor of being acquainted with many Dutch

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SINGULAR OFFENCE.

ladies of respectability, and found them to be very neat in their persons, but my first remark too powerfully applies to the lower orders of the sex: they have no leisure to attend to themselves to them, with a little transposition of the sentiment, may be applied the facetious lines that thus described a once celebrated opposition financier.

"It is said that his thoughts have been so long directed
"To the national debt that his own are neglected."

I remember at Amsterdam a servant was very angry because I would not suffer her to wash my bed-room every day. It might be supposed that in a climate which must be naturally very humid, the natives would prefer having dry rooms as long as possible.

Upon some of the canals I saw Rhine boats of extraordinary dimensions; they were principally laden with hardware, and their owners and families resided wholly on board, in a suite of cabins, generally raised upon the deck, which, in point of commodious arrangement, of neatness and comfort, cannot easily be surpassed on shore. Upon the fore and aft part of the deck their ware is exposed to sale, and below are prodigious depots of the same articles. These vessels are frequently six months in their voyage up and down the Rhine, in consequence of their

PRINTS OF LORD NELSON.

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stopping at those cities or towns situated on its banks, where the owners are likely to have a market for their merchandize.

The reader will be surprised to hear that in several shops I saw many prints of our illustrious Nelson, in which the artist, in order to prevent the beholder from doubting that he had lost the sight of one eye in the service of his country, had the optic completely removed from its socket, and left a large frightful hole, for the purpose of illustrating this part of his heroic history.

At an excellent table d'hote, at the Mareschal de Turenne, I had the happiness of meeting several of my countrymen, who were returning to England after a long and most unjust detention at Verdun; from them I learned that specie was abundant in France, and that Napoleon scarcely admitted any paper to be in circulation; that the roads were no longer farmed, but by the aid of a small additional duty on salt, were put into the finest condition, and that no toll whatever was taken in any part of the empire. They said, that in point of restriction, they were not rigidly treated, but that there were no bounds to the rapacity of those appointed to look after them, particularly of the d'armes. gens