The Burgomasters Wife | Page 2

day before committed many an annoyance, had been dismissed
with song and music. The carpenter's axe flashed in the spring sunlight
before the red walls, towers and gates, and cut sharply into the beams
from which new scaffolds and frames were to be erected; noble cattle
grazed peacefully undisturbed around the city, whose desolated gardens
were being dug, sowed and planted afresh. In the streets and houses a
thousand hands, which but a short time before had guided spears and
arquebuses on the walls and towers, were busy at useful work, and old
people sat quietly before their doors to let the warm spring sun shine on
their backs.
Few discontented faces were to be seen in Leyden on this eighteenth of
April. True, there was no lack of impatient ones, and whoever wanted
to seek them need only go to the principal school, where noon was
approaching and many boys gazed far more eagerly through the open
windows of the school-room, than at the teacher's lips.
But in that part of the spacious hall where the older lads received
instruction, no restlessness prevailed. True, the spring sun shone on
their books and exercises too, the spring called them into the open air,
but even more powerful than its alluring voice seemed the influence

exerted on their young minds by what they were now hearing.
Forty sparkling eyes were turned towards the bearded man, who
addressed them in his deep voice. Even wild Jan Mulder had dropped
the knife with which he had begun to cut on his desk a well-executed
figure of a ham, and was listening attentively.
The noon bell now rang from the neighboring church, and soon after
was heard from the tower of the town-hall, the little boys noisily left
the room, but--strange-=the patience of the older ones still held out;
they were surely hearing things that did not exactly belong to their
lessons.
The man who stood before them was no teacher in the school, but the
city clerk, Van Hout, who, to-day filled the place of his sick friend,
Verstroot, master of arts and preacher. During the ringing of the bells
he had closed the book, and now said:
"'Suspendo lectionem.' Jan Mulder, how would you translate my
'suspendere'?"
"Hang," replied the boy.
"Hang!" laughed Van Hout. "You might be hung from a hook perhaps,
but where should we hang a lesson? Adrian Van der Werff."
The lad called rose quickly, saying:
"'Suspendere lectionen' means to break off the lesson."
"Very well; and if we wanted to hang up Jan Mulder, what should we
say?"
"Patibulare--ad patibulum!" cried the scholars. Van Hout, who had just
been smiling, grew very grave. Drawing a long breath, he said:
"Patibulo is a bad Latin word, and your fathers, who formerly sat here,
understood its meaning far less thoroughly than you. Now, every child
in the Netherlands knows it, Alva has impressed it on our minds. More

than eighteen thousand worthy citizens have come to the gallows
through his 'ad patibulum.'"
With these words he pulled his short black doublet through his girdle,
advanced nearer the first desk, and bending his muscular body forward,
said with constantly increasing emotion:
"'This shall be enough for to-day, boys. It will do no great harm, if you
afterwards forget the names earned here. But always remember one
thing: your country first of all. Leonidas and his three hundred Spartans
did not die in vain, so long as there are men ready to follow their
example. Your turn will come too. It is not my business to boast, but
truth is truth. We Hollanders have furnished fifty times three hundred
men for the freedom of our native soil. In such stormy times there are
steadfast men; even boys have shown themselves great. Ulrich yonder,
at your head, can bear his nickname of Lowing with honor. 'Hither
Persians--hither Greeks!' was said in ancient times, but we cry: 'Hither
Netherlands, hither Spain!' And indeed, the proud Darius never ravaged
Greece as King Philip has devastated Holland. Ay, my lads, many
flowers bloom in the breasts of men. Among them is hatred of the
poisonous hemlock. Spain has sowed it in our gardens. I feel it growing
within me, and you too feel and ought to feel it. But don't
misunderstand me! 'Hither Spain--hither Netherlands!' is the cry, and
not: 'Hither Catholics and hither Protestants.' Every faith may be right
in the Lord's eyes, if only the man strives earnestly to walk in Christ's
ways. At the throne of Heaven, it will not be asked: Are you Papist,
Calvinist, or Lutheran? but: What were your intentions and acts?
Respect every man's belief; but despise him who makes common cause
with the tyrant against the liberty of our native land. Now pray silently,
then you may go home."