[Illustration: DUINHOEK. Interior of a Farmhouse.]
The country life is simple. A good deal of hard drinking goes on
in most villages. More beer, probably, is consumed in Belgium per
head of the population than in any other European country, Germany
not excepted, and the system of swallowing 'little glasses' of fiery
spirit on the top of beer brings forth its natural fruits. The
drunken ways of the people are encouraged by the excessive number
of public-houses. Practically anyone who can pay the Government
fee and obtain a barrel of beer and a few tumblers may open a
drinking-shop. It is not uncommon in a small country village with
about 200 inhabitants to see the words 'Herberg' or 'Estaminet' over
the doors of a dozen houses, in which beer is sold at a penny (or
less) for a large glass, and where various throat-burning liquors
of the _petit verre_ species can be had at the same price; and
the result is that very often a great portion of the scanty wage
paid on Saturday evening is melted into beer or gin on Sunday and
Monday. As a rule, the Flemish labourer, being a merry, light-hearted
soul, is merely noisy and jovial in a brutal sort of way in his
cups; but let a quarrel arise, out come the knives, and before
the rural policeman saunters along there are nasty rows, ending
in wounds and sometimes in murder.
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