azement. Van Dyk gave the two
brothers 100 pistoles in gold--a coin about equal to a guinea--for their
immediate reward as well as for that of the comrades to be engaged. Yet
it seems almost certain from subsequent revelations that they were
intending all the time to deceive him, to take as much money as they
could get from him, "to milk, the cow as long as she would give milk," as
William Party expressed it, and then to turn round upon and betray him.
It was a dangerous game however, which might not prove entirely
successful.

Van Dyk duly communicated with Stoutenburg, who grew more and more
feverish with hatred and impatience as the time for gratifying those
passions drew nigh, and frequently said that he would like to tear the
Stadholder to pieces with his own hands. He preferred however to act as
controlling director over the band of murderers now enrolled.

For in addition to the Leyden party, the Reverend Slatius, supplied with
funds by van Dyk, had engaged at Rotterdam his brother-in-law Gerritsen,
a joiner, living in that city, together with three sailors named
respectively Dirk, John, and Herman.

The ex-clergyman's house was also the arsenal of the conspiracy,
and here were stored away a stock of pistols, snaphances, and
sledge-hammers--together with that other death-dealing machinery, the
whole edition of the 'Clearshining Torch', an inflammatory, pamphlet by
Slatius--all to be used on the fatal day fast approaching.

On the 1st February van Dyk visited Slatius at Rotterdam. He found
Gerritsen hard at work.

There in a dark back kitchen, by the lurid light of the fire in a dim
wintry afternoon, stood the burly Slatius, with his swarthy face and
heavy eyebrows, accompanied by his brother-in-law the joiner, both in
workman's dress, melting lead, running bullets, drying powder, and
burnishing and arranging the fire-arms and other tools to be used in the
great crime now so rapidly maturing. The lean, busy, restless van Dyk,
with his adust and sinister visage, came peering in upon the couple thus
engaged, and observed their preparations with warm approval.

He recommended that in addition to Dirk, John, and Herman, a few more
hardy seafaring men should be engaged, and Slatius accordingly secured
next day the services of one Jerome Ewouts and three other sailors. They
were not informed of the exact nature of the enterprise, but were told
that it was a dangerous although not a desperate one, and sure to be of