At the entrance of the street that led past the Assendelft house to the Leibfrau Bridge, several loaded wagons had become entangled, and the drivers, instead of getting down and procuring help, struck at each other in their terror, hitting the women and children seated among the bales.  Their cries and shrieks echoed a long distance, but were destined to be drowned, for a dancing-bear had broken loose and was putting every one near him to flight.  The people, who were frightened by the beast, rushed down the street, screaming and yelling, dragging with them others who did not know the cause of the alarm, and misled by the most imminent fear, roared:  “The Spaniards!  The Spaniards!” Whatever came in the way of the terrified throngs was overthrown.  A sieve-dealer’s child, standing beside its father’s upset cart, fell beneath the mob close beside Adrian, who had stationed himself in the door-way of a house.  But the lad was crowded so closely into his hiding-place, that he could not spring to the little one’s aid, and his attention was attracted to a new sight, as Janus Dousa appeared on horseback.  In answer to the cry of “The Spaniards!  The Spaniards!” he shouted loudly:  “Quiet, people, quiet!  The enemy hasn’t come yet!  To the Rhine!  Vessels are waiting there for all strangers.  To the Rhine!  There are no Spaniards there, do you hear, no Spaniards!”

The nobleman stopped just before Adrian, for his horse could go no farther and stood snorting and trembling under his rider.  The advice bore little fruit, and not until hundreds had rushed past him, did the frightened crowd diminish.  The bear, from which they fled, had been caught by a brewer’s apprentice and taken back to its owner long before.  The city constables now appeared, led by Adrian’s father, and the boy followed them unobserved to the timber-market on the southern bank of the Rhine.  There another crowd met him, for many dealers had hurried thither to save their property in the ships.  Men and women pressed past bales and wares, that were being rolled down the narrow wooden bridges to the vessels.  A woman, a child, and a rope-maker’s cart had been pushed into the water, and the wildest confusion prevailed around the spot.  But the burgomaster reached the place just at the right time, gave directions for rescuing the drowning people, and then made every, exertion to bring order out of the confusion.

The constables were commanded to admit fugitives only on board the vessels bound for the places where they belonged; two planks were laid to every ship, One for goods, the other for passengers; the constables loudly shouted that—­as the law directed when the alarm-bell rang—­all citizens of Leyden must enter their houses and the streets be cleared, on pain of a heavy penalty.  All the city gates were opened for the passage of wheeled vehicles, except the Hohenort Gate, which led to Leyderdorp, where egress was refused.  Thus the crowd in the streets was lessened, order appeared amid the tumult, and when, in the dawn of morning, Adrian turned his steps towards home, there was little more bustle in the streets than on ordinary nights.