A second and third rainy day followed the first one.

White mists and grey fog hung over the meadows.

The cold, damp north-west wind drove heavy clouds together and darkened the sky.

Rivulets dashed into the streets from the gutters on the steep roofs of Leyden; the water in the canals and ditches grew turbid and rose towards the edges of the banks.
Dripping, freezing men and women hurried past each other without any form of greeting, while the pair of storks pressed closer to each other in their nest, and thought of the warm south, lamenting their premature return to the cold, damp, Netherland plain.
In thoughtful minds the dread of what must inevitably come was increasing.

The rain made anxiety grow as rapidly in the hearts of many citizens, as the young blades of grain in the fields.