CHAPTER XVI.
Leeuwarden and Neighbourhood An agricultural centre--A city of prosperity and health--The fair Frisians--Metal head-dresses--Silver work--The Chancellerie--A paradise of blue china--Jumping poles--The sea swallow--A Sunday excursion--Dogs for England--The idle busybodies--The stork--A critical village--The green crop--The dyke--A linguist--Harlingen--A Dutch picture collector--Franeker--The Planetarium--Dokkum's bad reputation--A discursive guide-book--Bigamy punished--A husband-tamer--Boxum's record--Sjuck's short way--The heroic Bauck--A load of exorcists--Poor Lysse.
In an hour or two the train brings us to Leeuwarden, between flat green meadows unrelieved save for the frequent isolated homesteads, in which farm house, dairy, barn, cow stalls and stable are all under one great roof that starts almost from the ground.

On the Essex flats the homesteads have barns and sheltering trees to keep them company: here it is one house and a mere hedge of saplings or none at all.

For the rest--cows and plovers, plovers and cows.
Friesland's capital, Leeuwarden, might be described as an English market town, such as Horsham in Sussex, scoured and carried out to its highest power, rather than a small city.

The cattle trade of Friesland has here its headquarters, and a farmer needing agricultural implements must fare to Leeuwarden to buy them.

The Frisian farmer certainly does need them, for it is his habit to take three crops of short hay off his meadows, rather than one crop of long hay in the English manner.
Not only cattle but also horses are sold in Leeuwarden market.