Wyllie visited Holland several times. His third visit, with his wife and son, was in 1888 when they sailed across the North Sea in their yawl, 'Ladybird'. This voyage provided the subject for Lionel Smythe, Wyllie's half brother, in his painting 'On the way to Holland' which shows the three of them at sea, Mrs Wyllie steering, Wyllie himself lying on the deck studying a chart.

This fluid watercolour may date from this or a later visit. It expresses the essence of the Dutch landscape. The thin band of land and trees compressed between the sky and the water of the canal, in which the tall sail of the Dutch boat is reflected, create both a strong vertical and a strong horizontal element, of a kind the Dutch artist Mondrian was later to develop in his abstract paintings.