Conclusion
Our story is nearly told. Time passes in Holland just as surely
and steadily as here. In that respect no country is odd.
To the Brinker family it has brought great changes. Hans has
spent the years faithfully and profitably, conquering obstacles
as they arose and pursuing one object with all the energy of his
nature. If often the way has been rugged, his resolution has
never failed. Sometimes he echoes, with his good friend, the
words said long ago in that little cottage near Broek: "Surgery
is an ugly business," but always in his heart of hearts lingers
the echo of those truer words: "It is great and noble! It
awakes a reverence for God's work!"
Were you in Amsterdam today, you might see the famous Dr. Brinker
riding in his grand coach to visit his patients, or, it might be, you would see him skating with his own boys and girls upon the frozen canal. For Annie Bouman, the beautiful, frank-hearted peasant girl, you would inquire in vain; but Annie Brinker, the vrouw of the great physician, is very like her--only, as Hans says, she is even lovelier, wiser, more like a fairy godmother than ever.
Peter van Holp, also, is a married man. I could have told you
before that he and Hilda would join hands and glide through life
together, just as years ago they skimmed side by side over the
frozen sunlit river.
At one time, I came near hinting that Katrinka and Carl would
join hands. It is fortunate that the report was not started, for
Katrinka changed her mind and is single to this day. The lady is
not quite so merry as formerly, and, I grieve to say, some of the
tinkling bells are out of tune. But she is the life of her
social circle, still. I wish she would be in earnest, just for a
little while, but no; it is not in her nature. Her cares and
sorrows do nothing more than disturb the tinkling; they never
waken any deeper music.
Rychie's soul has been stirred to its depths during these long
years. Her history would tell how seed carelessly sown is
sometimes reaped in anguish and how a golden harvest may follow a
painful planting. If I mistake not, you may be able to read the
written record before long; that is, if you are familiar with the
Dutch language. In the witty but earnest author whose words are
welcomed to this day in thousands of Holland homes, few could
recognize the haughty, flippant Rychie who scoffed at little
Gretel.
Lambert van Mounen and Ludwig van Holp are good Christian men
and, what is more easily to be seen at a glance, thriving
citizens. Both are dwellers in Amsterdam, but one clings to the
old city of that name and the other is a pilgrim to the new. Van
Mounen's present home is not far from Central Park, and he says
if the New Yorkers do their duty the park will in time equal his
beautiful Bosch, near The Hague. He often thinks of the Katrinka
of his boyhood, but he is glad now that Katrinka, the woman, sent
him away, though it seemed at the time his darkest hour. Ben's
sister Jenny has made him very happy, happier than he could have
been with anyone else in the wide world.
Carl Schummel has had a hard life. His father met with reverses
in business, and as Carl had not many warm friends, and, above
all, was not sustained by noble principles, he has been tossed
about by fortune's battledore until his gayest feathers are
nearly all knocked off. He is a bookkeeper in the thriving
Amsterdam house of Boekman and Schimmelpenninck. Voostenwalbert, the junior partner, treats him kindly; and he, in turn, is very respectful to the "monkey with a long name for a tail."
Of all our group of Holland friends, Jacob Poot is the only one
who has passed away. Good-natured, true-hearted, and unselfish
to the last, he is mourned now as heartily as he was loved and
laughed at while on earth. He grew to be very thin before he
died, thinner than Benjamin Dobbs, who is now portliest among the
portly.