M. d’O——­ looked thoughtful and full of the project which his fancy had painted in such gay colours.  He said a good deal about it, dwelling on the mystic virtues of numbers, and told his daughter to read out all the questions she had addressed to the oracle with the answers she had received.  There were six or seven of them, all briefly worded, some direct and some equivocal.  Esther, who had constructed the pyramids, had shone, with my potent assistance, in extracting the answers, which I had really invented, and her father, in the joy of his heart, seeing her so clever, imagined that she would become an adept in the science by the force of intelligence.  The lovely Esther, who was much taken with the trifle; was quite ready to be of the same opinion.

After passing several hours in the discussion of the answers, which my host thought divine, we had supper, and at parting M. d’O——­ said that as Sunday was a day for pleasure and not business he hoped I would honour them by passing the day at their pretty house on the Amstel, and they were delighted at my accepting their invitation.

I could not help pondering over the mysteries of the commercial mind, which narrows itself down to considerations of profit and loss.  M. d’O——­ was decidedly an honest man; but although he was rich, he was by no means devoid of the greed incident to his profession.  I asked myself the question, how a man, who would consider it dishonourable to steal a ducat, or to pick one up in the street and keep it, knowing to whom it belonged, could reconcile it with his conscience to make an enormous profit by insuring a vessel of the safety of which he was perfectly certain, as he believed the oracle infallible.  Such a transaction was certainly fraudulent, as it is dishonest to play when one is certain of winning.

As I was going home I passed a tea-garden, and seeing a good many people going in and coming out I went in curious to know how these places were managed in Holland.  Great heavens!  I found myself the witness of an orgy, the scene a sort of cellar, a perfect cesspool of vice and debauchery.  The discordant noise of the two or three instruments which formed the orchestra struck gloom to the soul and added to the horrors of the cavern.  The air was dense with the fumes of bad tobacco, and vapours reeking of beer and garlic issued from every mouth.  The company consisted of sailors, men of the lowest-class, and a number of vile women.  The sailors and the dregs of the people thought this den a garden of delight, and considered its pleasures compensation for the toils of the sea and the miseries of daily labour.  There was not a single woman there whose aspect had anything redeeming about it.  I was looking at the repulsive sight in silence, when a great hulking fellow, whose appearance suggested the blacksmith, and his voice the blackguard, came up to me and asked me in bad Italian if I would like to dance.  I answered in the negative, but before leaving me he pointed out a Venetian woman who, he said, would oblige me if I gave her some drink.