“Pacheco was condemned to be hanged upon the very day of his arrival.  Having been brought forth from his prison, he begged hard but not abjectly for his life.  He offered a heavy ransom, but his enemies were greedy for blood, not for money.  It was, however, difficult to find an executioner.  The city hangman was absent, and the prejudice of the country and the age against the vile profession had assuredly not been diminished during the five horrible years of Alva’s administration.  Even a condemned murderer, who lay in the town gaol, refused to accept his life in recompence for performing the office.  It should never be said, he observed, that his mother had given birth to a hangman.  When told, however, that the intended victim was a Spanish officer, the malefactor consented to the task with alacrity, on condition that he might afterwards kill any man who taunted him with the deed.

“Arrived at the foot of the gallows, Pacheco complained bitterly of the disgraceful death designed for him.  He protested loudly that he came of a house as noble as that of Egmont or Hoorn, and was entitled to as honourable an execution as theirs had been.  ’The sword! the sword!’ he frantically exclaimed, as he struggled with those who guarded him.  His language was not understood, but the name of Egmont and Hoorn inflamed still more highly the rage of the rabble, while his cry for the sword was falsely interpreted by a rude fellow who had happened to possess himself of Pacheco’s rapier, at his capture, and who now paraded himself with it at the gallows foot.  ’Never fear for your sword, Senor,’ cried this ruffian; ’your sword is safe enough, and in good hands.  Up the ladder with you, Senor; you have no further use for your sword.’  Pacheco, thus outraged, submitted to his fate.  He mounted the ladder with a steady step, and was hanged between two other Spanish officers.

“So perished miserably a brave soldier, and one of the most distinguished engineers of his time; a man whose character and accomplishments had certainly merited for him a better fate.  But while we stigmatize as it deserves the atrocious conduct of a few Netherland partisans, we should remember who first unchained the demon of international hatred in this unhappy land, nor should it ever be forgotten that the great leader of the revolt, by word, proclamation, example, by entreaties, threats, and condign punishment, constantly rebuked and, to a certain extent, restrained the sanguinary spirit by which some of his followers disgraced the noble cause which they had espoused.”

Flushing’s hero is De Ruyter, whose rope-walk wheel we saw at Middelburg, and whose truculent lineaments have so often frowned at us from the walls of picture gallery and stadhuis throughout the country—­almost without exception from the hand of Ferdinand Bol, or a copyist.