Two brothers of the young captain had fallen in the service of the republic.

He, too, had distinguished himself at Ostend, and his gallantry during the recent siege of Sluys had been in every mouth, and had excited the warm applause of so good a judge of soldiership as the veteran Roger Williams.

The scars of the wounds received in the desperate conflicts of that siege were fresh upon his breast.

He had not intended to commit treason, but, convinced by the sophistry of older soldiers than himself, as well as by learned deacons and theologians, he had imagined himself doing his duty, while obeying the Earl of Leicester.

If there were ever a time for mercy, this seemed one, and young Maurice of Nassau might have remembered, that even in the case of the assassins who had attempted the life of his father, that great-hearted man had lifted up his voice--which seemed his dying one--in favour of those who had sought his life.
But they authorities were inexorable.