But Burgomaster van Berk knew better. Had he not informed the twenty- four commissioners that, twelve years before, the Advocate wished to subject the country to Spain, and that Spinola had drawn a bill of exchange for 100,000 ducats as a compensation for his efforts? It was eleven o'clock. Barneveld requested one of the brethren to say an evening prayer. This was done by La Motte, and they were then requested to return by three or four o'clock next morning. They had been directed, they said, to remain with him all night. "That is unnecessary," said the Advocate, and they retired. His servant then helped his master to undress, and he went to bed as usual. Taking off his signet-ring, he gave it to John Franken. "For my eldest son," he said. The valet sat down at the head of his bed in order that his master might speak to him before he slept. But the soldiers ordered him away and compelled him to sit in a distant part of the room. An hour after midnight, the Advocate having been unable to lose himself, his servant observed that Isaac, one of the soldiers, was fast asleep. He begged the other, Tilman Schenk by name, to permit him some private words with his master. He had probably last messages, he thought, to send to his wife and children, and the eldest son, M. de Groeneveld, would no doubt reward him well for it. But the soldier was obstinate in obedience to the orders of the judges. Barneveld, finding it impossible to sleep, asked his servant to read to him from the Prayer-book. The soldier called in a clergyman however, another one named Hugo Bayerus, who had been sent to the prison, and who now read to him the Consolations of the Sick. As he read, he made exhortations and expositions, which led to animated discussion, in which the Advocate expressed himself with so much fervour and eloquence that all present were astonished, and the preacher sat mute a half-hour long at the bed-side. "Had there been ten clergymen," said the simple-hearted sentry to the valet, "your master would have enough to say to all of them." Barneveld asked where the place had been prepared in which he was to die. "In front of the great hall, as I understand," said Bayerus, "but I don't know the localities well, having lived here but little." "Have you heard whether my Grotius is to die, and Hoogerbeets also?" he asked? I have heard nothing to that effect," replied the clergyman.