Barneveldt, John D'Olden

, the celebrated Dutch statesman, and one of the founders of the civil liberty of Holland, was born in 1547. His patriotic zeal inducing him to limit the authority of Maurice prince of Orange, the second stadtholder of Holland, the partisans of that prince falsely accused him of a design to deliver his country into the hands of the Spanish monarch. On this absurd charge he was tried by twenty-six commissaries, deputed from the seven provinces, condemned, and beheaded in 1619. His sons, William and Réné, with a view of revenging their father’s death, formed a conspiracy against the usurper, which was discovered. William fled; but Réné was taken and condemned to die; which fatal circumstance has immortalized the memory of his mother, of whom the following anecdote is recorded. She solicited a pardon for Réné, upon which Maurice expressed his surprise that she should do that for her son, which she had refused to do for her husband. To this remark she replied with indignation, “I would not ask a pardon for my husband, because he was innocent. I solicit it for my son, because he is guilty.” ¹