gust, Cornelius was to leave his prison for exile, and
a fierce Orangist populace, incited to violence by the harangues of
Tyckelaer, was rushing to the Buytenhof prepared to do murder, and
fearful lest the prisoner should escape alive. "To the gaol! To the
gaol!" yelled the mob. But outside the prison was a line of cavalry
drawn up under the command of Captain Tilly with orders to guard the
Buytenhof, and while the populace stood in hesitation, not daring to
attack the soldiers, John de Witt had quietly driven up to the prison,
and had been admitted by the gaoler.

The shouts and clamour of the people could be heard within the prison as
John de Witt, accompanied by Gryphus the gaoler, made his way to his
brother's cell.

Cornelius learnt there was no time to be lost, but there was a question
of certain correspondence between John de Witt and M. de Louvois of
France to be discussed. These letters, entirely creditable though they
were to the statesmanship of the Grand Pensionary, would have been
accepted as evidence of treason by the maddened Orangists, and
Cornelius, instead of burning them, had left them in the keeping of his
godson, Van Baerle, a quiet, scholarly young man of Dordrecht, who was
utterly unaware of the nature of the packet.

"They will kill us if these papers are found," said John de Witt, and
opening the window, they heard the mob shouting, "Death to traitors!"

In spite of fingers and wrists broken by the rack, Cornelius managed to
write a note.

DEAR GODSON: Burn the packet I gave you, burn without opening
or looking at it, so that you may not know the contents. The
secrets it contains bring death. Burn it, and you will have
saved both John and Cornelius.

Farewell, from your affectionate

CORNELIUS DE WITT.

Then a letter was given to Craeke, John de Witt's faithful servant, who
at once set off for Dordrecht, and within a few minutes the two brothers
were driving away to the city gate. Rosa, the gaoler's daughter, unknown
to her father, had opened the postern, and had herself bidden De Witt's
coachman drive round to the rear of the prison, and by this means the
fury of the mob was, for the moment, evaded.

And now the clamour of the Orangists was at the prison door, for Tilly's
horse had withdrawn on an order signed by the deputies in the town hall,
and the people were raging to get within the Buytenhof.

The mob burst open the great gate, and yelling, "Dea