THE "SALLE DES JEUX," IN THE KURSAAL OSTENDE 476 [Illustration: MAP OF BELGIUM AND THE NETHERLANDS, SHOWING THE OLD FLEMISH PRINCIPALITY] THE SPELL OF FLANDERS CHAPTER I INTRODUCING FLANDERS AND THE FOUR PILGRIMS "Flanders! Why, where is Flanders?" "There! I told you she'd ask that question. You'll have to start right at the beginning with her, and explain everything as you go along." We were planning our next vacation tour in Europe, which we had long before agreed to "do" together this year. That meant a party of four--the "Professor," as I always called him, and his charming young wife, my wife, and myself. Like the plays in which the characters appear on the stage in the order that their names are printed on the programme, the arrangement I have just given is significant. The Professor is always first, a born leader-of-the-way. And I am usually last, carrying the heavy bundles. Not that I am complaining. No doubt I was born to do it. Moreover, the Professor and I have been chums since boyhood. We worked our way through "prep" school and college together, came to New York together, and--in a modest way--have prospered together. At least, we felt prosperous enough to think of going to Europe. For some years he has been the head of the department of history in an important educational institution within the boundaries of the greater city, while I have devoted myself to journalism--and am therefore dubbed "the Editor," whenever he wishes to refer to me as a personage instead of a human being, which, happily, is not very often. Of the two ladies in the proposed party I do not need to speak--not because there is nothing to say, but because they can speak for themselves. In fact, one of them has just spoken, has asked a question, and it has not yet been answered. "Flanders, my dear," said the Professor, speaking in his most sententious manner--as if delivering a lecture in his classroom--"is the most interesting and the least visited corner of Europe. It has more battle-fields and more Gothic churches per square mile than can be found anywhere else. In other parts of Europe you can see mediæval houses, here and there--usually in charge of a smirking caretaker, with his little guidebook for sale, and hungrily anticipating his little fee. In Flanders there are whole streets of them, whole towns that date from the sixteenth century or earlier--but for the costumes of the people, you could easily imagine yourself transported by some enchantment back to the days of Charles the Bold, or even to the time of the Crusaders."