Van der Werff! Holloa! Remember me to your husband and tell him, his
life may be valuable; but ours are not wisps of straw."

"Tell him, too," cried a cattle-dealer, who did not yet seem to have been
specially injured by the general distress, "tell him oxen can be
slaughtered, the more the better; but Leyden citizens--"

The cattle-dealer did not finish his sentence, for Herr Aquanus had seen
from the Angulus what was happening to the burgomaster's wife, came out
of the tavern into the street, and stepped into the midst of the
malcontents.

"For shame!" he cried. "To assail a respectable lady in the street!
Are these Leyden manners? Give me your hand, Frau Maria, and if I hear a
single reviling word, I'll call the constables. I know you. The gallows
Herr Van Bronkhorst had erected for men like you, is still standing by
the Blue Stone. Which of you wants to inaugurate them?"

The men, to whom these words were addressed, were not the bravest of
mortals, and not a syllable was heard, as Aquanus led the young wife into
the tavern. The landlord's wife and daughter received her in their own
rooms, which were separated from those occupied by guests of the inn,
and begged her to make herself comfortable there until the crowd had
dispersed. But Maria longed to reach home, and when she said she must
go, Aquanus offered his company.

Georg von Dornburg was standing in the entry and stepped back with a
respectful bow, but the innkeeper called to him, saying:

"There is much to be done to-day, for many a man will doubtless indulge