The palace on the Dam (square) is a square, stately edifice, and the
only building that the stranger will care to see. Its interior is
richer and more fit to live in than any palace we have seen. There
is nothing usually so dreary as your fine Palace. There are some
good frescoes, rooms richly decorated in marble, and a magnificent
hall, or ball-room, one hundred feet in height, without pillars.
Back of it is, of course, a canal, which does not smell fragrantly in
the summer; and I do not wonder that William III. and his queen
prefer to stop away. From the top is a splendid view of Amsterdam
and all the flat region. I speak of it with entire impartiality, for
I did not go up to see it. But better than palaces are the
picture-galleries, three of which are open to the sightseer. Here
the ancient and modern Dutch painters are seen at their best, and I
know of no richer feast of this sort. Here Rembrandt is to be seen
in his glory; here Van der Helst, Jan Steen, Gerard Douw, Teniers the
younger, Hondekoeter, Weenix, Ostade, Cuyp, and other names as
familiar. These men also painted what they saw, the people, the
landscapes, with which they were familiar. It was a strange pleasure
to meet again and again in the streets of the town the faces, or
types of them, that we had just seen on canvas so old.
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