Page:Biographical catalogue of the portraits at Weston, the seat of the Earl of Bradford (IA gri 33125003402027).pdf/44

 the vessel heeled over to one side, and the girl had to beseech the skipper to have the box secured with ropes, and down she sat beside it in an agony of terror, both for herself and her precious charge. She then threw a white handkerchief over her head and let the ends flutter in the breeze, the signal that had been agreed on between her and her mistress to show so far all was well and the vessel in motion; for a servant in the castle had added to the women's accumulated terror by predicting that the captain would not embark in such a storm.

The unhappy wife was straining her eyes, dimmed by tears, between the bars of the window, while the maid sat shivering with cold and fear, her head between her hands; and on the top of the chest an officer of the garrison had taken up his post, and drummed and pommelled with his feet against the sides, and she dared not bid him desist from doing so—for what reason could she assign for interference? At last she bethought herself to ask him to get off, as there were not only books but fragile china in the chest, and he might break it by that constant shaking. The longest voyage, like the longest day, will have an end, and surely that voyage from Loevenstein to Gorcum must have seemed like one round the world to the terrified girl; yet her fears did not deaden her woman's wit, and she was always ready with an answer. She bribed the skipper and his son to transport the chest themselves to its destination on a hand-barrow, beside which she walked. 'Do you hear what my boy says?' observed the captain; 'he declares there is some living thing in your trunk, Miss.' 'No doubt,' was the answer, with a forced laugh; 'don't you know that Arminian books are alive, full of motion and spirit?' In this manner the three companions, with the fourth concealed, threaded the dense crowds of the fair at Gorcum, and made their way to a warehouse which Lieschen indicated. It belonged to a well-to-do tradesman (relative of a learned professor, a friend of the prisoner's), and the wife was one of