They--the old Manhattan Dutch anyway--had a certain stubborn individuality of their own, which refused to give way or compromise.

I have always felt that the way the Dutch ladies used to drink their tea was a most illuminating sidelight upon their racial characteristics.

They served the dish of tea and the sugar separately--the latter in a large and awkward hunk from which they crunched out bites as they needed them.

Now I take it that there was no particular reason for this inconvenient and labourious method, except that it was _their way_.

They were used to doing things in an original and an unyielding fashion.