He had himself borne arms more than once before, having shouldered his matchlock under Batenburg, and marched on that officer's spirited but disastrous expedition for the relief of Haarlem.

But this was the life of those Dutch rebels.

Quill-driving, law-expounding, speech-making, diplomatic missions, were intermingled with very practical business in besieged towns or open fields, with Italian musketeers and Spanish pikemen.

And here, too, young Maurice was taking his first solid lesson in the art of which he was one day to be so distinguished a professor.

It was a sharp beginning.