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MODE OF ENCREASING ANIMAL WARMTH.

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gence, take care to fumigate themselves below, by placing, in the proper season, these ignited stoves under their petticoats, and resemble the glow-worm, which carries his fire in his tail: the cats and kittens, from the genial warmth of the climate, are glad to take shelter in this warm mysterious sanctuary. The ladies and the lower classes of females are always remarkably neat about the feet: the petticoats of the latter are in general very short, display a well-proportioned leg, clean blue stockings, and a slipper without any heel-piece, or a sabot.

In my way to the palace in the Wood, near this square, I passed by a vast triumphal arch made of wood, painted to imitate stone, and adorned with a number of complimentary inscriptions in latin, in honor of the king and queen, who passed through it on the 23d of June last, when they made their public entry and in a vast field adjoining to the wood was a lofty temporary obelisk of the same materials, which formed one of the principal objects of a magnificent fête recently given by the French commander in chief in honor of their majesties, which was conducted in the highest style of Parisian taste. The day when I visited the wood was remarkably fine-this spot, so dear to the Dutch, is nearly two English miles long, about threequarters of a mile broad, and contains a fine display of

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magnificent oaks growing in native luxuriance. Antony Waterloo made the greatest part of his studies from this spot and its environs. The ground upon which it grows, and the country about it, undulate a little, a circumstance of agreeable novelty, and the whole is a truly delightful walk, more romantic and umbrageous than our mall of St. James's, and surpassed only by the garden of the Thuilleries. This wood has been held sacred with more than pagan piety. War and national want, that seldom spare in their progress, committed no violations here. Although the favorite place of royal recreation, yet, in the fury of the revolution, not a leaf trembled but in the wind. Phillip II. in the great war with Spain, issued his mandate for preserving it: hostile armies have marched through it without offering it a wound, and the axe of the woodman has never resounded in it. Even children are taught or whipt into veneration for it, so that their mischievous hands never strip it of a bough. Once, however, it is recorded, that at a period of great state necessity, in 1576, their high mightinesses sat in judgment upon its noble growth, and doomed it to fall, the moment their decree was known, the citizens flew to the meeting, remonstrated with a degree of feeling which did honor to their taste ; and upon learning that the object of its doom was to raise a certain sum to assist in replenishing the nearly ex

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hausted coffers of the republic, they immediately entered into a contribution, and presented the amount to the high and mighty masters" of the sacred grove.

It has been asserted by some travellers, that the Dutch treasure this spot more from national pride than feeling, and that they are more disposed to preserve than to enjoy it. To this remark I have only to offer, that I saw a considerable number of equestrian and pedestrian groupes, who appeared to relish its shaded roads, and sequestered walks with great delight. The royal residence is to the right at the end of the wood. Upon my asking a Dutchman which path led to the "house in the wood," the only appellation by which, in the time of the Stadtholder, it was known, he sharply replied, "I presume you mean the

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palace in the wood." This building is merely fit for the residence of a country gentleman, and has nothing princely about it, except the centry boxes at the foot of the flight of stairs ascending to the grand entrance: two tall and not very perpendicular poles, from the tops of which is stretched a cord, suspending in the centre a large lamp, stand on each side of the house in front of the palace; on the left are the coach-houses and stablings, which are perfectly plain, and are just separated from the court road by a small stunted plantation: there was a very handsome carriage of the king's in the coach-house,

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without arms or cyphers, of a pale blue colour, which, with silver lace, is the colour of the new royal livery. The carriage had every appearance of having been built in England. Excepting this, I never before saw a carriage, unless appropriated for state occasions, belonging to any crowned head on the continent, that an Englishman of taste and opulence would be satisfied with. Even the carriages of Napoleon, built in a city so celebrated for its taste in design, and beauty of workmanship, as Paris, are clumsy and unpleasant to the eye. Although it was Sunday, the sound of workmen, actively engaged in modernizing the palace after the Parisian taste, issued from almost every window. Some Dutchmen who were contemplating the front of the house, shook their heads at this incroachment of the sabbath. In consequence of the internal arrangement not being finished, strangers were not admitted: the walks on the outside of the gardens are formal and insipid. The gardens themselves are handsomely disposed, and kept in great order, and the whole of the premises is insulated by stagnant canals crossed with draw-bridges.

In this palace, amongst many other precious works of art, was the celebrated picture of King William the Third, who appointed the famous Godfrey Scalken, when he was in London, to paint his portrait by candle-light the painter placed a taper in the hands of his majesty, to hold

ANECDOTE OF KING WILLIAM THE THIRD.

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it în a situation inost favourable to the designs of the artist, during which the tallow melted and dropped on the fingers of the monarch, who endured it with great composure, for fear of embarrassing the painter, who very tranquilly continued his work, without offering to pause for a minute: it is not much to the credit of the prince of the country to record, that this blunt enthusiasm for his art lost poor Scalken the favor of the court, and of persons of fashion, and he retired to the Hague, where he had a prodigious demand for his small paintings.

The furniture of this, which, as well as of the other palaces, was superb, but old fashioned, was sold by the French, upon the pretence that their arms were directed against the Prince of Orange personally. In this palace the Stadtholder and his family used to indulge his subjects in that ridiculous custom of eating before them on certain days: a custom which was a fit appendage to another, that of keeping dwarfs and fools about the royal person. How this stupid usage came to be adopted at first I know not, for one would naturally think that the situation least calculated to inspire awe and veneration, those great supports of royalty, amongst subjects towards their rulers, would be that in which a mere animal appetite is gratified. In England such splendid folly has been long discon

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