Paul Van Swieten again clasped his wounded arm with his right hand and
ran swiftly around the church. Several other boys followed, but the new-
comer of whom they were afraid, a man scarcely thirty years old, had legs
of considerable length, and knew how to use them bravely.

"Stop, boys!" he shouted in an echoing voice of command. "Stop! What
has Happened here?"

Every one in Leyden respected the learned and brave young nobleman, so
all the lads who had not instantly obeyed Van Swieten's warning shout,
stood still until Herr von Nordwyk reached them.

A strange, eager light sparkled in this man's clever eyes, and a subtle
smile hovered around his moustached lip, as he called to the musician:

"What has happened here, Meister Wilhelm? Didn't the clamor of
Minerva's apprentices harmonize with your organ-playing, or did--but by
all the colors of Iris, that's surely Nico Matanesse, young Wibisma! And
how he looks! Brawling in the shadow of the church--and you here too,
Adrian, and you, Meister Wilhelm?"

"I separated them," replied the other quietly, smoothing his rumpled
cuffs.

"With perfect calmness, but impressively--like your organ-music," said
the commander, laughing.

"Who began the fight? You, young sir? or the others?"