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Twisting northward as the details of the city were sketched upon the sky, we turned into the canal which leads to Zaandam of the self-satisfied, painted houses.
Among the historical relics are the armor worn by the admirals De Ruiter and Van Tromp; the portrait and sword of Van Speyk, who blew up his vessel on the Scheldt; a part of the bed of Czar Peter the Great, on which he slept while working at ship-building; the last shirt and waistcoat worn by William III. of England; the dress in which the Prince of Orange was murdered; the pistol of the assassin, with two of the bullets; a model of Peter's cabin at Zaandam, or Sardam, and many other objects of interest which seemed to bring the distant past before the eye of the beholders.
It is well known how Peter in 1696 visited Holland to learn the art of ship-building and himself toiled as a workman at Zaandam. As a result of this visit he carried back with him to Russia an admiration for all things Dutch. He not only favoured Dutch commerce, but he employed numbers of Hollanders in the building and training of his fleet and in the construction of waterways and roads.
On the banks of the river Zaan, about five miles from Amsterdam, lies the picturesque little town of Zaandam, with its cottages of blue, green, and pink, half hidden among the trees, while a multitude of windmills surround the town like so many monuments to thrift and enterprise.
He worked at the forge, in the rope-walks, at the sawing mills, and in the manufactures for wire drawing, making paper and extracting oil. While at Zaandam, Peter finished a sixty gun ship, upon which he had worked diligently from the laying of the keel. As the Russians then had no harbor in the Baltic, this ship was sent to Archangel, on the shores of the White Sea.
The burgomaster and other high officials begged him to come, but the most he could be got to do was to thrust his head out of the door and observe the situation. The next day was Sunday, and all Amsterdam seemed to have come to Zaandam to see its distinguished guest. He escaped them by fleeing to Amsterdam.
The children remained at the pool until called to dinner; and after that meal, they went back again and stayed until it was time to return to Zaandam, so fascinated were they with sailing their vessels. These changed hands so often that it was sometimes difficult to tell who had charge of any particular boat, and a good deal of confusion was the result.
In the evening I went with M. Pels to Zaandam, in a boat placed on a sleigh and impelled by a sail. It was an extraordinary, but at the same time an amusing and agreeable, mode of travelling. The wind was strong, and we did fifteen miles an hour; we seemed to pass through the air as swiftly as an arrow.
Then he set out for Zaandam on his yacht to fetch his tools, and the next day, August 30, presented himself as a workman at the East India Company's wharf. For more than four months, with occasional breaks, Peter worked diligently as a ship-carpenter, ten of his Russian companions probably much against their will working at the wharf with him.
To view five Lucas van Leydens in one gallery is not an everyday event. His engravings are rare enough that is, in good states; "ghosts" are aplenty and his paintings rarer. Here they are chiefly portraits. Rachel Ruysch, the flower painter, has a superior in Judith Lyster, a pupil of Frans Hals. She was born at Haarlem, or Zaandam, about 1600, and died 1660. She married the painter Jan Molener.
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