ou did not want to go, astonished and angry you
would be that any one did not like the place which is not heaven."

"Come, friends and neighbours," said Joris cheerily, "I will sing you a
song; and every one knows the tune to it, and every one has heard their
vaders and their moeders sing it,--sometimes, perhaps, on the great
dikes of Vaderland, and sometimes in their sweet homes that the great
Hendrick Hudson found out for them. Now, then, all, a song for

"'MOEDER HOLLAND.

"'We have taken our land from the sea,
Its fields are all yellow with grain,
Its meadows are green on the lea,--
And now shall we give it to Spain?
No, no, no, no!

"'We have planted the faith that is pure,
That faith to the end we'll maintain;
For the word and the truth must endure.
Shall we bow to the Pope and to Spain?
No, no, no, no!

"'Our ships are on every sea,
Our honour has never a stain,
Our law and our commerce are free:
Are we slaves for the tyrant of Spain?
No, no, no, no!

"'Then, sons of Batavia, the spade,--
The spade and the pike and the main,
And the heart and the hand and the blade;
Is there mercy for merciless Spain?
No, no, no, no!'"

By this time the enthusiasm was wonderful. The short, quick denials came
hotter and louder at every verse; and it was easy to understand how
these large, slow men, once kindled to white heat, were both
irresistible and unconquerable. Every eye was turned to Joris, who stood
in his massive, manly beauty a very conspicuous figure. His face was
full of feeling and purpose, his large blue eyes limpid and shining;
and, as the tumult of applause gradually ceased, he said,--

[Illustration: "Listen to me!"]

"My friends and neighbours, no poet am I; but always wrongs burn in the
heart until plain prose cannot utter them. Listen to me. If we wrung the
Great Charter and the right of self-taxation from Mary in A.D. 1477; if
in A.D. 1572 we taught Alva, by force of arms, how dear to us was our
maxim, 'No taxation without representation,'--

"Shall we give up our long-cherished right?
Make the b