Off the northern dunes the combined English and French fleets of war suffered defeat at the hands of the Dutch admirals, de Ruyter and Tromp, two hundred thirty-eight years ago to the day, as I write (the 21st of August), and in September, 1799, two armies of 10,000 and 13,000, English and Russian troops respectively, commanded by the Duke of York, landed here to try their luck at tempting the Dutch to revolt against the French. The Russian forces lost their way and were defeated by the French before they had advanced as far as Alkmaar, and the British, bearing in mind the comforting old adage about discretion being the best part of valor, retreated after having penetrated as far south as Castricum, near Zaandam. In the town of The Helder itself--why they refer to it as “The” Helder I do not know, unless it be for the reason that the article makes of it a pseudonym for a Dutch John o’ Groats--in the town itself there is little of interest. One street I have in mind, however, which is of rather peculiar construction. The north side of it, from the middle of what ought to be the common roadway, is possibly three and a half feet higher than its south side, the upper part built upon an embankment faced with a brick wall. The place is full of Dutch sailors and navy people, for about three quarters of a mile down the dike lies Nieuwediep, the Dutch combination of Hampton Roads, Annapolis, and the Brooklyn Navy Yard. Situated at the mouth of the North Holland Canal, Nieuwediep is the most important naval station in Holland, maintaining large wharves, docks, machine shops, and a naval academy, the students of which, two, four, and six abreast--Holland’s future Tromps and de Ruyters--can be seen strolling up and down the great dike. A fraction of the country’s one hundred vessels of war and of her 8,000 men that man them receive their orders at the station at Nieuwediep. Across the Strait of Marsdiep is the Island of Texel, the most southerly unit of the long series of vertebræ that curve far to the northeast, as if made to fit exactly the coast lines of the provinces of Friesland and Groningen. A steamer plies to Texel from Nieuwediep and returns four times daily; but you may profitably omit the island from your itinerary unless you are particularly interested in natural history and you happen to come upon Texel during the bird nesting season. The northern extremity of the island, called Eyerland, or “The Land of Eggs,” is infested with sea fowl, the eggs of which are collected by the myriads and shipped to the large cities. Texel is seventy-three square miles in area and supports one or two very plain bathing places, but most of its six thousand inhabitants are chiefly engaged in the business of sheep raising on the long, crater-like pasture land hemmed in by the sand dunes. XI FROM HOORN TO STAVOREN