Grotius proved so ignorant of the value of different coins in making small payments on the road, that the honest waggoner, on being occasionally asked who the odd-looking stranger was, answered that he was a bankrupt, and no wonder, for he did not know one piece of money from another.  For, his part he thought him little better than a fool.

Such was the depreciatory opinion formed by the Waalwyk coachman as to the “rising light of the world” and the “miracle of Holland.”  They travelled all night and, arriving on the morning of the 21st within a few leagues of Antwerp, met a patrol of soldiers, who asked Grotius for his passport.  He enquired in whose service they were, and was told in that of “Red Rod,” as the chief bailiff of Antwerp was called.  That functionary happened to be near, and the traveller approaching him said that his passport was on his feet, and forthwith told him his name and story.

Red Rod treated him at once with perfect courtesy, offered him a horse for himself with a mounted escort, and so furthered his immediate entrance to Antwerp.  Grotius rode straight to the house of a banished friend of his, the preacher Grevinkhoven.  He was told by the daughter of that clergyman that her father was upstairs ministering at the bedside of his sick wife.  But so soon as the traveller had sent up his name, both the preacher and the invalid came rushing downstairs to fall upon the neck of one who seemed as if risen from the dead.

The news spread, and Episcopius and other exiled friends soon thronged to the house of Grevinkhoven, where they all dined together in great glee, Grotius, still in his journeyman’s clothes, narrating the particulars of his wonderful escape.

He had no intention of tarrying in his resting-place at Antwerp longer than was absolutely necessary.  Intimations were covertly made to him that a brilliant destiny might be in store for him should he consent to enter the service of the Archdukes, nor were there waning rumours, circulated as a matter of course by his host of enemies, that he was about to become a renegade to country and religion.  There was as much truth in the slanders as in the rest of the calumnies of which he had been the victim during his career.  He placed on record a proof of his loyal devotion to his country in the letters which he wrote from Antwerp within a week of his arrival there.  With his subsequent history, his appearance and long residence at the French court as ambassador of Sweden, his memorable labours in history, diplomacy, poetry, theology, the present narrative is not concerned.  Driven from the service of his Fatherland, of which his name to all time is one of the proudest garlands, he continued to be a benefactor not only to her but to all mankind.  If refutation is sought of the charge that republics are ungrateful, it will certainly not be found in the history of Hugo Grotius or John of Barneveld.

Nor is there need to portray the wrath of Captain Deventer when he returned to Castle Loevestein.