Lysbeth

A Tale Of The Dutch, by H.
Rider Haggard

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Title: Lysbeth, A Tale Of The Dutch
Author: H. Rider Haggard

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Lysbeth, A Tale Of The Dutch By H. Rider Haggard
First Published 1901.

LYSBETH
A TALE OF THE DUTCH
BY
H. RIDER HAGGARD

DEDICATION
In token of the earnest reverence of a man of a later generation for his
character, and for that life work whereof we inherit the fruits to-day,
this tale of the times he shaped is dedicated to the memory of one of the
greatest and most noble-hearted beings that the world has known; the

immortal William, called the Silent, of Nassau.

AUTHOR'S NOTE
There are, roughly, two ways of writing an historical romance--the first
to choose some notable and leading characters of the time to be treated,
and by the help of history attempt to picture them as they were; the
other, to make a study of that time and history with the country in
which it was enacted, and from it to deduce the necessary characters.
In the case of "Lysbeth" the author has attempted this second method.
By an example of the trials, adventures, and victories of a burgher
family of the generation of Philip II. and William the Silent, he strives
to set before readers of to-day something of the life of those who lived
through perhaps the most fearful tyranny that the western world has
known. How did they live, one wonders; how is it that they did not die
of very terror, those of them who escaped the scaffold, the famine and
the pestilence?
This and another--Why were such things suffered to be?--seem
problems worth consideration, especially by the young, who are so apt
to take everything for granted, including their own religious freedom
and personal security. How often, indeed, do any living folk give a
grateful thought to the forefathers who won for us these advantages,
and many others with them?
The writer has sometimes heard travellers in the Netherlands express
surprise that even in an age of almost universal decoration its noble
churches are suffered to remain smeared with melancholy whitewash.
Could they look backward through the centuries and behold with the
mind's eye certain scenes that have taken place within these very
temples and about their walls, they would marvel no longer. Here we
are beginning to forget the smart at the price of which we bought
deliverance from the bitter yoke of priest and king, but yonder the
sword bit deeper and smote more often. Perhaps that is why in Holland
they still love whitewash, which to them may be a symbol, a perpetual

protest; and remembering stories that have been handed down as
heirlooms to this day, frown at the sight of even the most modest
sacerdotal vestment. Those who are acquainted with the facts of their
history and deliverance will scarcely wonder at the prejudice.

LYSBETH
A TALE OF THE DUTCH

BOOK THE FIRST
THE SOWING
CHAPTER I
THE WOLF AND THE BADGER
The time was in or about the year 1544, when the Emperor Charles V.
ruled the Netherlands, and our scene the city of Leyden.
Any one who has visited this pleasant town knows that it lies in the
midst of wide, flat meadows, and is intersected by many canals filled
with Rhine water. But now, as it was winter, near to Christmas indeed,
the meadows and the quaint gabled roofs of the city lay buried beneath
a dazzling