Across what must have been the castle moat and connected with the Valkhof grounds by an iron bridge, a tower of the seventeenth century affords the people of Nymwegen an attractive view of which they are justly proud, embracing as it does the fertile farming districts as far as Cleve, to the southeast, as far as Arnhem, to the north, and, upon a clear day, as many as four rivers: the Rhine, the Maas, the Waal, and the Yssel. The old Church of St. Stephen and the brick gateway that leads to it from the market square, the weigh-house with its red and black shutters, the Town Hall, and a number of other old buildings in the vicinity of the Groote Markt are all essentially Dutch, but for which the visitor might easily imagine himself in a German city. [Illustration: A feature of Arnhem is the Eusibiusbinnensingel, a park-like place with a lake in the center, surrounded by great shade trees] With those of Arnhem, however, Nymwegen’s environs can scarcely hope to compete. The steam tram that rattles around the Keiser-Karelplein eventually escapes the city limits and climbs the long hill to the Hotel Berg en Dal, from the vicinity of which one may look out upon a much vaunted “panorama” that might at least be worth while under certain conditions. But what with the blatant strummings of an automatic piano that considers itself of valuable assistance to the complete enjoyment of the view, and the petty vibrations of a more or less popular photographer intent upon making likenesses of visitors in the unusual and startling act of looking from the top of a hill in Holland, the view is rendered more of a bore than a diversion. The Dutch province of Limburg, a narrow tongue of land successfully battled for by the Dutch against the Belgians in the war of 1830–31, lying away to the south of Gelderland and wedged in between Belgium on the west and Germany on the east, is so un-Netherlandish, both as to peoples and topography, that it can scarcely be considered as a part of the Holland that the tourist expects. Its inhabitants even speak a low German dialect instead of Dutch. Furthermore, it is not on any route that a tour through Holland might include, for Maastricht, its historical old capital, is on the direct railway line between Brussels and Cologne and may be more easily visited from either of those points than from any city in Holland proper. CHAPTER XV UTRECHT AND ’S HERTOGENBOSCH