“‘True to the Wallet,’ whatever betide;
    ’Long live the Gueux,’—­the sea will provide
    Graves for the enemy, deep and wide: 
      Heave ho! rip the brown sails free!

    “Beggars, but not from the Spaniard’s hand;
    Beggars, ‘under the Cross’ we stand;
    Beggars, for love of the fatherland: 
      Heave ho! rip the brown sails free!

    “Now, if the Spaniard comes our way,
    What shall we give him, Beggars gray? 
    Give him a moment to kneel and pray: 
      Heave ho! rip the brown sails free!”

At the second verse, Mrs. Gordon rose and said, “Indeed, madam, I find my good-breeding no match against such singing.  And the tune is wonderful; it has the ring of trumpets, and the roar of the waves, in it.  Pray let us go at once to your daughters.”

“At work are they; but, if you mind not that, you are welcome indeed.”  Then she led the way to the large living, or dining, room, where Katherine stood at the table cleaning the silver flagons and cups and plates that adorned the great oak sideboard.

Joanna, who was darning some fine linen, rose and made her respects with perfect composure.  She had very little liking, either for Mrs. Gordon or her nephew; and many of their ways appeared to her utterly foolish, and not devoid of sin.  But Katherine trembled and blushed with pleasure and excitement, and Mrs. Gordon watched her with a certain kind of curious delight.  Her hair was combed backward, plaited, and tied with a ribbon; her arms bare to the shoulders, her black bodice and crimson petticoat neatly shielded with a linen apron:  and poised in one hand she held a beautiful silver flagon covered with raised figures, which with patient labour she had brought into shining relief.

“Oh,” cried the visitor, “that is indeed a piece of plate worth looking at!  Surely, child, it has a history,—­a romance perhaps.  La, there are words also upon it!  Pray, madam, be so obliging as to read the inscription;” and madam, blushing with pride and pleasure, read it aloud,—­

                    “’Hoog van Moed,
                    Klein van Goed,
                    Een zwaard in de hand: 
                    Is ‘t wapen van Gelderland.’”

“Dutch, I vow!  Surely, madam, it is very sonorous and emphatic; vastly different, I do assure you, from the vowelled idioms of Italy and Spain.  Pray, madam, be so civil as to translate the words for me.”

                    “’Of spirit great,
                    Of small estate,
                    A sword in the hand: 
                    Such are the arms of Guelderland.’

[Illustration:  A Guelderland flagon]

“You must know,” continued Madam Van Heemskirk, “that my husband’s father had a brother, who, in a great famine in Guelderland, filled one hundred flat boats with wheat of Zealand,—­in all the world it is the finest wheat, that is the truth,—­and help he sent to those who were ready to perish.  And when came better days, then, because their hearts were good, they gave to their preserver this flagon.  Joris Van Heemskirk, my husband, sets on it great store, that is so.”