"Oh no," said the good woman with a laugh; "only let him come. We will
take excellent care of him."

At another visit one Saturday, 20th March, (1621) Madame de Groot asked
her friend why all the bells of Gorcum march were ringing.

"Because to-morrow begins our yearly fair," replied Dame Daatselaer.

"Well, I suppose that all exiles and outlaws may come to Gorcum on this
occasion," said Madame de Groot.

"Such is the law, they say," answered her friend.

"And my husband might come too?"

"No doubt," said Madame Daatselaer with a merry laugh, rejoiced at
finding the wife of Grotius able to speak so cheerfully of her husband in
his perpetual and hopeless captivity. "Send him hither. He shall have,
a warm welcome."

"What a good woman you are!" said Madame de Groot with a sigh as she rose
to take leave. "But you know very well that if he were a bird he could
never get out of the castle, so closely, he is caged there."

Next morning a wild equinoctial storm was howling around the battlements
of the castle. Of a sudden Cornelia, daughter of the de Groots, nine
years of age, said to her mother without any reason whatever,

"To-morrow Papa must be off to Gorcum, whatever the weather may be."