FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   313   314   315   316   317   318   319   320   321   322   323   324   325   326   327   >>  
rough the inner courtyard to the great hall. Observing the windows of the Stadholder's apartments crowded with spectators, among whom he seemed to recognize the Prince's face, he took off his hat and made a graceful and dignified salute. He greeted with courtesy many acquaintances among the crowd through which he passed. He entered the hall and listened in silence to the sentence condemning him to be immediately executed with the sword. Van Dyk and Korenwinder shared the same doom, but were provisionally taken back to prison. Groeneveld then walked calmly and gracefully as before from the hall to the scaffold, attended by his own valet, and preceded by the provost-marshal and assistants. He was to suffer, not where his father had been beheaded, but on the "Green Sod." This public place of execution for ordinary criminals was singularly enough in the most elegant and frequented quarter of the Hague. A few rods from the Gevangen Poort, at the western end of the Vyverberg, on the edge of the cheerful triangle called the Plaats, and looking directly down the broad and stately Kneuterdyk, at the end of which stood Aremberg House, lately the residence of the great Advocate, was the mean and sordid scaffold. Groeneveld ascended it with perfect composure. The man who had been browbeaten into crime by an overbearing and ferocious brother, who had quailed before the angry waves of the North Sea, which would have borne him to a place of entire security, now faced his fate with a smile upon his lips. He took off his hat, cloak, and sword, and handed them to his valet. He calmly undid his ruff and wristbands of pointlace, and tossed them on the ground. With his own hands and the assistance of his servant he unbuttoned his doublet, laying breast and neck open without suffering the headsman's hands to approach him. He then walked to the heap of sand and spoke a very few words to the vast throng of spectators. "Desire of vengeance and evil counsel," he said, "have brought me here. If I have wronged any man among you, I beg him for Christ's sake to forgive me." Kneeling on the sand with his face turned towards his father's house at the end of the Kneuterdyk, he said his prayers. Then putting a red velvet cap over his eyes, he was heard to mutter: "O God! what a man I was once, and what am I now?" Calmly folding his hands, he said, "Patience." The executioner then struck off his head at a blow. His body, wrapped in a bla
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   313   314   315   316   317   318   319   320   321   322   323   324   325   326   327   >>  



Top keywords:

scaffold

 

calmly

 
walked
 

spectators

 

father

 
Groeneveld
 
Kneuterdyk
 
laying
 

suffering

 

breast


servant
 

doublet

 

unbuttoned

 
security
 
entire
 
overbearing
 
ferocious
 

brother

 

quailed

 
pointlace

wristbands

 

tossed

 

ground

 

headsman

 

handed

 
assistance
 

counsel

 

mutter

 

putting

 

velvet


wrapped

 

struck

 
Calmly
 

folding

 

Patience

 

executioner

 

prayers

 
vengeance
 

Desire

 

brought


throng

 

forgive

 

Kneeling

 

turned

 

Christ

 
wronged
 
approach
 

called

 

executed

 

Korenwinder