“Long live His Highness!”
“Death to the bad magistrates!”
“Down with John de Witt!”
“To hell with the friends of France!”
All night long the town seethed. The magistrates trembled when they considered what the outburst of fury would be should the deputation return, the Prince not with them.
As soon as it was light the people were out on the quays, gazing down the flat, grey waters of the Maas and the Merwede, which stretched almost to the horizon where Rotterdam lay, and spread to right and left encircling the town in a belt of water.
The burgher companies were up and armed, patrolling the streets, clattering their blunderbusses under the windows of Cornelius de Witt’s house, where the Ruard lay sick, and shouting in insulting tones for the Prince, so that he could hear them in his bed.
Others amused themselves with breaking into the town hall, destroying the remaining portraits of John and Cornelius de Witt, and savagely tearing out of its frame Baan’s picture of the Victory at Chatham, which was dedicated to the glory of the Ruard.
About ten o’clock the feeling rose to frenzy; it became known that the deputation had returned in company with the young Prince.
The magistrates hastened to receive William, who was landing at the Groothoofd Poort, one of the finest gates of the wealthy city, situate on the junction of the Merwede and the Maas.