Note 25 — HOW MATHIS KNOUPS TURNED “LIBERAL” AND THEN “CATHOLIC” AGAIN.

This story appears to have several morals, the reader being left free to choose the one most in accordance with his own views. The author himself is strictly impartial. Perhaps the most obvious is, that it is not good to match your wits against those of the Roman Catholic clergy, unless you have capital to back your opposition, and not always even then. M. Seipgens does not obtrude his own views, and we are not quite sure whether the conclusion is meant to be serious and edifying, or whether there is an underlying pointe d’ironie. The story gives a lively picture of life and manners in the Limburg district, that picturesque and little known region which, though part of Holland, is in some respects so un-Dutch. The language spoken there is less like Dutch proper than some broad and harsh dialect of German, such as they speak about Cologne. After some hesitation between the two, we have given this sketch of Seipgens’ in preference to “Kobus Mulders’ Vote,”—which also turns on politics and clerical influence, and is, in some respects, more characteristic; but the crisis—when Mulders and his family are cut off by the flood—comes too near tragedy for such a book as this.