If they did not obtain his return they at least made him gain a cause of consequence.  He reclaimed[167] his effects which were confiscated, grounding on the privilege of the Burghers of Delft; and his demand was granted.  He says neither favour nor solicitations had any influence in his gaining this suit; and that he owed it to the incontestable right of which the town of Delft was long in possession.

Though the information received from his brother of the inefficacy of his friends solicitations might have made him forget his country[168], he resolved to regulate his conduct by his wife’s advice, who had been on the spot.  On her return from Holland she told him it was necessary he should go thither.  He immediately wrote to his brother that on his wife’s information he resolved to go to see him and his father and mother; and that they would consult together what was best to be done for his advantage.  He adds, that if after so long patience he still found his Country ungrateful, he had received advantageous proposals from more than one quarter, where he might live with ease and honour.  He set out for Holland in the month of October, 1631.

FOOTNOTES: 

[162] Ep. 199. p. 71.

[163] Ep. 200. p. 71.

[164] Ep. 98. p. 783. 99. p. 783. and 100. p. 784.

[165] Ep. 148. p. 797.

[166] Ep. 223. p. 77.

[167] Ep. 261. p. 89.

[168] Ep. 278. p. 838.

XII.  The sentence passed against him was still in force.  His friends, afraid of his being arrested, as he had no safe-conduct, advised his concealing himself:  this step appeared to him shameful and timid.  He wrote to his brother on the nineteenth of November, 1631, that he would rather retire than conceal himself; and that by not appearing in public he had lessened the opinion of his innocence, and at the same time the courage of his friends.

He came to Rotterdam[169], where he imagined he would be safest, because, having filled the post of Pensionary with much honour, he was greatly beloved in the town.  He took it ill that the Magistrates did not make him the first visit after the signal services he had done the city; and hesitated whether he should go to see them:  one of them sent his son to acquaint him that it was not perhaps prudent, after the sentence of condemnation passed upon him, to appear in public.  Grotius made answer, that he had such a good opinion of the gratitude of the Burghers of Rotterdam, he was persuaded he had nothing to fear among them.  The young gentleman replied, that in a populous town there might possibly be some one who would do him an ill turn to gain the reward.  Grotius imagined this advice proceeded from the Magistrates jealousy, who were afraid that the people would discover too much attachment to him.  They spread a report that he was not in the Remonstrants sentiments, and that the counsels formerly given by him had been frequently