In the agricultural villages the life is totally different. The farm is the centre. The workers are away in distant fields; the village deserted for most of the day; the cottages aren't in a compact huddle and the village often straggles over a mile or so of lanes. The residents are of fewer "types." In some villages of this kind there are only a few elderly ladies of the independent income status; the farmers; the farm labourers; and no "in-between class" of resident. A village of this kind is not the place for the townsman and his wife who must have company, It will take years to become accepted in the old-established quarters.
The great Netherlands writer, Maarten Maartens, left an excellent description of the evening of 18-year-old Queen Wilhelmina's Coronation day 40 years ago. He said: "The Queen was dead tired at the banquet, and there was a placard put up in the streets: Her Majesty requests her subjects to make less noise in front of the palace this night"
"While all the rest of the city was gay with rejoicing, the Dam, or great square, remained almost silent. Only a compact stream flowing round it humming 'Sleep, childe, sleep; the national lullaby.'
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.