At length, the living stream poured back through the galleries and stairs to the arched gateway, from which it was seen issuing like waters from a spout.

At the head of the first group, man was flying rather than running, his face hideously distorted with satanic glee: this man was the surgeon Tyckelaer.

"We have it! we have it!" he cried, brandishing a paper in the air.

"They have got the order!" muttered the officer in amazement.

"Well, then," his Highness quietly remarked, "now I know what to believe with regard to Mynheer Bowelt's honesty and courage: he has neither the one nor the other."

Then, looking with a steady glance after the crowd which was rushing along before him, he continued, --

"Let us now go to the Buytenhof, Captain; I expect we shall see a very strange sight there."

The officer bowed, and, without making any reply, followed in the steps of his master.

There was an immense crowd in the square and about the neighbourhood of the prison. But the dragoons of Tilly still kept it in check with the same success and with the same firmness.

It was not long before the Count heard the increasing din of the approaching multitude, the first ranks of which rushed on with the rapidity of a cataract.

At the same time he observed the paper, which was waving above the surface of clenched fists and glittering arms.

"Halloa!" he said, rising in his stirrups, and touching his lieutenant with the knob of his sword; "I really believe those rascals have got the order."

"Dastardly ruffians they are," cried the lieutenant.

It was indeed the order, which the burgher guard received with a roar of triumph. They immediately sallied forth, with lowered arms and fierce shouts, to meet Count Tilly's dragoons.

But the Count was not the man to allow them to approach within an inconvenient distance.

"Stop!" he cried, "stop, and keep off from my horse, or I shall give the word of command to advance."

"Here is the order!" a hundred insolent voices answered at once.

He took it in amazement, cast a rapid glance on it, and said quite aloud, --

"Those who have signed this order are the real murderers of Cornelius de Witt. I would rather have my two hands cut off than have written one single letter of this infamous order."

And, pushing back with the hilt of his sword the man who wanted to take it from him, he added, --

"Wait a minute, papers like this are of importance, and are to be kept."

Saying this, he folded up the document, and carefully put it in the pocket of his coat.

Then, turning round towards his troop, he gave the word of command, --

"Tilly's dragoons, wheel to the right!"

After this, he added, in an undertone, yet loud enough for his words to be not altogether lost to those about him, --

"And now, ye butchers, do your work!"

A savage yell, in which all the keen hatred and ferocious triumph rife in the precincts of the prison simultaneously burst forth, and accompanied the departure of the dragoons, as they were quietly filing off.

The Count tarried behind, facing to the last the infuriated populace, which advanced at the same rate as the Count retired.