254 THE STADT-HOUSE. · the bank, &c. open. This magnificent room and the surrounding galleries were seen to great advantage, on account of their having been cleaned previous to the coronation of the king, which was intended to have taken place in it about a month after I visited it. A great number of workmen had been employed in scraping, washing, and polishing their marble sides for several months, and their appearance was equally grand and beautiful: the bronze gates and railing which form the grand entrance of the hall are massy, yet exquisitely executed over this entrance is a colonnade of Corinthian pillars of red and white marble. At one end is a colossal figure of Atlas supporting on his shoulders the globe, attended by Vigilance and Wisdom. The roof is painted with allegorical figures. Upon the floor, the celestial and terrestrial globes are delineated in brass and various coloured marbles, arranged in three large circles, 22 feet diameter; the two external ones representing the hemispheres of the earth, and the center the planisphere of the heavens. The Burgomasters' Cabinet, as it is still called, is a handsome apartment, the entrance of which is adorned with some beautiful carving, emblematical of the use of the apartment. The chimney-piece in this room, representing the triumphs of Fabius Maximus, is worthy of notice. THE STADT-HOUSE. 255 To the left of the Burgomasters' chamber is a gallery, ten feet deep and thirty broad, where, after the ringing of a bell to give notice, all proclamations, law sentences, and municipal regulations, are promulgated. The chamber of the treasury ordinary contains a picture of Mary de Medicis as large as life; a chart of Amsterdam as it appeared when first walled round in 1482; and on the bookcases are some curious effigies of the antient Earls and Countesses of Holland. The Burgomasters' apartment is 45 feet broad and 30 deep, and is in my opinion the handsomest room in the Stadt-house. The marble chimney-pieces are enriched with many exquisitely sculptured basso-relievos by De Wit; but its chief ornament is two paintings; one by Ferdinand Bol, representing Curius at his rural repast ; and the other, Fabricius in the camp of Pyrrhus, by Flink. From this room there is passage to the Execution Chamber, or the Chamber of the last Prayers, where criminals condemned to death, take leave of their priest, and pass through a window, the lower part of which is of wood, to enable its being opened level with the floor to the scaffold, which is constructed on the outside, opposite to the weigh-house, and which is raised as high as this part of the building. There is nothing in this room worthy of 256 THE STADT-HOUSE. notice, except its melancholy appropriation. From this room we were conducted to the council chamber, which is 45 wide and 30 deep, where there is a very large painting by Jacob de Wilt, representing Moses and the seventy elders of Israel. Above the chimney-piece to the north is a very fine picture by Flink, the subject Solomon imploring heaven for wisdom. Above this is a scriptural subject, a noble production, from the pencil of Bronkhorst. Some of the basso-relievos which adorn various parts of this room, sculptured by De Wit, are exquisitely fine, particularly a hive of bees, a clock, a sieve and a lamp, a pen and ink-horn. It would puzzle a magician to interpret many of the allegorical devices, but they are all beautifully executed. In the chamber for marriages, and injuries, there is nothing to arrest the attention of a visitor one minute. In. Holland, marriage being a civil contract, when agreed upon in Amsterdam, it is always first performed before the magistrates in this room, without whose fiat the ceremony would be invalid; the clergyman, according to the religion of the parties, performs his functions afterwards. This room is also called, amongst the lower orders of people, the Scolding Chamber, on account of the irritability frequently displayed here by parties of that class, when they come to obtain redress for small offences. We were also led through the chamber for sea affairs, the mercers' hall, the painters' chamber, and the room but little suited to the treasures which it contains, is a very long picture by Vandyke, in which there is a grey head of an old man, of matchless excellence, which the observer cannot but retire from with regret. The burgomasters of Amsterdam were offered seven thousand florins for this head alone, to be cut out from the rest of the picture. There is also a large picture by Vanderhelst, representing a feast given by the burgomasters of Amsterdam to the embassadors of Spain, on account of the peace of Munster, which closed a war that had lain waste the Netherlands for eighty years; and many other large and fine paintings by Rubens, Jordaans, and Otho Venius. It is a matter of surprise, that after Holland submitted to the French arms, these exquisite productions should be permitted to remain upon the walls which they have so long adorned. In the great, or council of war chamber, there are some good paintings representing the antient train-bands, and officers in their proper costume; many of which are portraits. In the secretary's office, a handsome room, amongst other decorations, is a basso-relievo of Silence, which the Dutch are very fond of representing under the form of a woman. Upon my observing to a Dutchman, that in England such a compliment had never been paid to my own L L lovely country women, he replied-" Yes, but do you not "notice that the statuary has placed the finger of the lady upon her mouth, as if he thought that no one of "the sex, not even a Dutch female, could preserve silence "without keeping her lips forcibly together with her fin- · "ger." The convenience of having nearly all the principal public offices, and courts of justice under one roof, is very great; the size of the kingdom, and the simplicity of its public transactions, render such a concentration more easy of accomplishment in Holland than in England. Before we ascended to the dome, we were introduced into the great magazine of arms, which extends the whole length of the front and part of the sides of this vast pile: it contains a curious and valuable collection of antient and modern Dutch arms. Some colours which the French took from the Spaniards have been lately added, as a present from the king to this city, a donation which could not fail affording great gratification to a people, who to this hour hold the Spanish nation in abhorrence. The prospect from the tower, or dome, is very fine and extensive, commanding the whole of the city and its environs, crowded with windmills, the river Y filled with ships, the Zuyder Zee, the Amstel, the Haarlem lake, and the quarter containing the gardens, the admiralty, and ships of war on the stocks. From this elevated spot we were nearer the bronze figures |