To MISTRESS COLONEL GORDON:  HONOURED MADAM:  My father forbids that I come to see you.  He thinks you should upon my mother call.  That you will judge me to be rude and ungrateful I fear very much.  But that is not true.  I am unhappy, indeed.  I think all the day of you.

                                   Your obedient servant,
                                                KATHERINE VAN HEEMSKIRK.

“’The poor child,” said Mrs. Gordon, when she had read the few anxious sentences.  “Look here, Dick;” and Dick, who was beating a tattoo upon the window-pane, turned listlessly and asked, “Pray, madam, what is it?”

“Of all earthly things, a letter from that poor child, Katherine Van Heemskirk.  She has more wit than I expected.  So her father won’t let her come to me.  Why, then, upon my word, I will go to her.”

Captain Hyde was interested at once.  He took the letter his aunt offered, and read it with a feeling of love and pity and resentment.  “You will go to-morrow?” he asked; “and would it be beyond good breeding for me to accompany you?”

“Indeed, nephew, I think it would.  But I will give your service, and say everything that is agreeable.  Be patient; to-morrow morning I will call upon our fair neighbour.”

The next morning was damp, for there had been heavy rain during the night; but Captain Hyde would not let his aunt forget or forego her promise.  She had determined to make an unceremonious visit; and early in the day she put on her bonnet and pelisse, and walked over to the Van Heemskirks.  A negro woman was polishing the brass ornaments of the door, and over its spotless threshold she passed without question or delay.

A few minutes she waited alone in the best parlour, charmed with its far off air and Eastern scents, and then Madam Van Heemskirk welcomed her.  In her heart she was pleased at the visit.  She thought privately that her Joris had been a little too strict.  She did not really see why her beautiful daughters should not have the society and admiration of the very best people in the Province.  And Mrs. Gordon’s praise of Katharine, and her declaration that “she was inconsolable without the dear creature’s society,” seemed to the fond mother the most proper and natural of feelings.

“Do but let me see her an hour, madam,” she said.  “You know my sincere admiration.  Is not that her voice?  I vow, she sings to perfection And what a singular melody!  Please to set wide the door, madam.”

“It is the brave song of the brave men of Zealand, when from the walls of Leyden they drove away the Spaniards;” and madam stood in the open door, and called to her daughter, “Well, then, Katharine, begin again the song of ‘The Beggars of the Sea.’”

    “We are the Beggars of the Sea,—­
    Strong, gray Beggars from Zealand we;
    We are fighting for liberty: 
      Heave ho! rip the brown sails free!

    “Hardy sons of old Zierikzee,
    Fed on the breath of the wild North Sea. 
    Beggars are kings if free they be: 
      Heave ho! rip the brown sails free!