, was building all
sorts of castles in the air, and was struggling between hope and fear,
the shutter of the grating in the door opened, and Rosa, beaming with
joy, and beautiful in her pretty national costume--but still more
beautiful from the grief which for the last five months had blanched her
cheeks--pressed her little face against the wire grating of the window,
saying to him,--

"Oh, sir, sir! here I am!"

Cornelius stretched out his arms, and, looking to heaven, uttered a cry
of joy,--

"Oh, Rosa, Rosa!"

"Hush! let us speak low: my father follows on my heels," said the girl.

"Your father?"

"Yes, he is in the courtyard at the bottom of the staircase, receiving
the instructions of the Governor; he will presently come up."

"The instructions of the Governor?"

"Listen to me, I'll try to tell you all in a few words. The Stadtholder
has a country-house, one league distant from Leyden, properly speaking a
kind of large dairy, and my aunt, who was his nurse, has the management
of it. As soon as I received your letter, which, alas! I could not read
myself, but which your housekeeper read to me, I hastened to my aunt;
there I remained until the Prince should come to the dairy; and when he
came, I asked him as a favour to allow my father to exchange his post at
the prison of the Hague with the jailer of the fortress of Loewestein.
The Prince could not have suspected my object; had he known it, he would
have refused my request, but as it is he granted it."

"And so you are here?"

"As you see."

"And thus I shall see you every day?"

"As often as I can manage it."

"Oh, Rosa, my beautiful Rosa, do you love me a little?"

"A little?" she said, "you make no great pretensions, Mynheer
Cornelius."

Cornelius tenderly stretched out his hands towards her, but they were
only able to touch each other with the tips of their fingers through the
wire grating.

"Here is my father," said she.

Rosa then abruptly drew back from the door, and ran to meet old Gryphus,
who made his appearance at the top of the staircase.

Chapter 15. The Little Grated Window

Gryphus was followed by the mastiff.

The turnkey took the animal round the jail, so that, if needs be, he
might recognize the prisoners.

"Father," said Rosa, "here is the famous prison from which Mynheer
Grotius escaped. You know Mynheer Grotius?"

"Oh, yes, that rogue Grotius, a friend of that villain Barneveldt,
whom I saw executed when I