requested; and also, further, that he would acknowledge before witnesses
that he was guilty of the charges made against him.

The latter clause was to justify the Prince of Orange in his actions
toward him.

Rubens refused to plead guilty, even for the sake of sweet liberty, on
account of the smirch to the name of the Princess.

But on the earnest request of both his wife and the "co-respondent," he
finally accepted the terms in the same manner that Galileo declared the
earth stood still. Rubens got his liberty, was loyal to his parole, but
John of Nassau kept the six thousand thalers for "expenses."

So much for the honor of princes; but in passing it is worthy of recall
that Jan Rubens pleaded guilty of disloyalty to his wife, on request of
said wife, in order that he might enjoy the society of said wife--and
cast a cloud on the good name of another woman on said woman's request.

So here is a plot for a play: a tale of self-sacrifice and loyalty on the
part of two women that puts to shame much small talk we hear from small
men concerning the fickleness and selfishness of woman's love. "Brief as
woman's love!" said Hamlet--but then, Hamlet was crazy.

Jan Rubens died in Cologne, March Eighteenth, Fifteen Hundred
Eighty-seven, and lies buried in the Church of Saint Peter. Above the
grave is a slab containing this inscription: "Sacred to the Memory of Jan
Rubens, of Antwerp, who went into voluntary exile and retired with his
family to Cologne, where he abode for nineteen years with his wife Maria,
who was the mother of his seven children. With this his only wife Maria