Her son plotting to avenge his father and crush the Stadtholder was discovered and imprisoned.

His mother visited Maurice to ask his pardon.

"Why," said he, "how is this--you value your son more than your husband! You did not ask pardon for him." "No," said Barneveldt's widow; "I did not ask pardon for my husband, because he was innocent; I ask pardon for my son, because he is guilty." Prince Maurice never recovered from the error--to put for the moment no worse epithet to it--of the death of Barneveldt.

He had killed his best counsellor; thenceforward his power diminished; and with every rebuff he who had abandoned his first adviser complained that God had abandoned him.

Davies sums up the case thus: "The escutcheon of Maurice is bright with the record of many a deed of glory; the fabric of his country's greatness raised by his father, strengthened and beautified by himself; her armies created the masters of military science to the civilized world; her States the centre and mainspring of its negotiations; her proud foe reduced to sue humbly at her feet.