, and steamed to Woudrichem
(called Worcum) hoping to explore the fortress of Loevenstein. But
Loevenstein is enisled and beyond the reach of the casual visitor,
and we had therefore to sit in the upper room of the Bellevue inn,
overlooking the river, and await the tub's deliberate return, while
the tugs and the barges trailed past. Save for modifications brought
about by steam, the scene can be now little different from that in
the days when Hugo Grotius was imprisoned in the castle.

The philosopher's escape is one of the best things in the history of
wives. Two ameliorations were permitted him by Maurice--the presence
of the Vrouw Grotius and the solace of books. As it happened, this
lenience could not have been less fortunately (or, for Grotius, more
fortunately) framed. Books came continually to the prisoner, which,
when read, were returned in the same chest that conveyed his linen to
the Gorcum wash. At first the guard carefully examined each departing
load; but after a while the form was omitted. Grotius's wife, a woman
of no common order (when asked why she did not sue for her husband's
pardon, she had replied, "I will not do it: if he have deserved it let
them strike off his head"), was quick to notice the negligence of the
guard, and giving out that her husband was bedridden, she concealed
him in the chest, and he was dumped on a tjalck and earned over to
Gorcum. While on his journey he had the shuddering experience of
hearing some one remark that the box was heavy enough to have a man
in it; but it was his only danger. A Gorcum friend extricated him;
and, disguised as a carpenter armed with a footrule, he set forth
on his travels to Antwerp. Once certain that Grotius was safe, his
wife informed the guard, and the hue and cry was raised. But it was
raised in vain. At first there was a suggestion that the lady should
be retained in his stead, but all Holland applauded her deed and she
was permitted to go free.

The river, as I have said, must be still much the same as in Grotius's
day; while the two towns Gorcum and Worcum cluster about their noble
church towers as of old. Worcum is hardly altered; but Gorcum's railway
and factories have enlarged her borders. She has now twelve thousand
inhabitants, some eleven thousand of whom were in the streets when,
the tub having at length crawled back with us, we walked through them
to the station.

Odd how one nation's prettiness is another's grotesque. My companion