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In ten minutes, the gates were forced open old Koops knocked down, and trod under foot till he was dead every article of value that was portable was secured; chairs, tables, glasses, not portable, were thrown out of the window; Wilhelmina's harp and pianoforte battered to fragments; beds, bedding, everything flew about in the air, and then the fragments of the furniture were set fire to, and in less than an hour, Mynheer Krause's splendid house was burning furiously, while the mob cheered and cried, "Long live King William!"
Darwin should think what I had said of sufficient importance to be affected by it. It was plain that some one besides myself, of whom I as yet knew nothing, had been writing about the elder Darwin, and had taken much the same line concerning him that I had done. It was for the benefit of this person, then, that Dr. Krause's paragraph was intended.
There was a poor fellow there, Hairy Willard, who was dying of poison given him by some chief, and I remember quite well his wife, who was a Tahitian, telling me that if the witch woman of Danger Island was near she would quickly render the poison innocuous." Mrs. Krause's dark eyes lit up with undoubted pleasure "I must tell her that " "Is she living on Tarawa, then?"
But heavy and clumsy-looking as she was, I was sure she would prove a good sea boat, for she had great beam and a corresponding floor in fact, rather too much for her length. However, when I had finished with and launched her, we made a trial trip over to Mrs. Krause's station, and I was well satisfied with her.
Darwin, who should be the best judge, think my work worth notice, but that he did not venture to meet it openly. As for Dr. Krause's concluding sentence, I thought that when a sentence had been antedated the less it contained about anachronism the better. Only one of the reviews that I saw of Mr. Darwin's "Life of Erasmus Darwin" showed any knowledge of the facts.
Somewhat disappointed at missing him, I got out of my boat with the intention of at least resting in one of the native huts for half an hour, so as to be out of the intense heat and glare of a torrid sun, when one of Krause's servants came down and said that the trader's wife would be glad if I would come to her husband's station and there await his return.
The widow then proceeded to state how she had been thrown into a dungeon, and how she and Mynheer Krause, the syndic, had been released the next day; how Mynheer Krause's house had been burnt to the ground, and all the other particulars with which the reader is already acquainted.
At last the word was given, which they all waited for. "To his house to his house down with it death to the traitor!" and the loyal mob hastened on, each individual eager to be first to prove his loyalty, by helping himself to Mynheer Krause's goods and chattels. In the low countries, this species of loyalty always has been, and is now very much the fashion.
So argued Mr Krause's most particular friend, who thought it proper to make known his opinions on the subject, and to submit to the other authorities whether this was not a fair subject for representation in their next despatches to England; and in consequence of his suggestion, the representation was duly made. Mynheer Krause was not the first person whose tongue had got him into difficulties.
"I am pleased to find one of your age so circumspect," replied Krause; "perhaps it would be better to defer our conversation till after supper; but in the meantime, could you not just give me a little inkling of what is going on?" Ramsay had difficulty in stifling a smile at this specimen of Mynheer Krause's eagerness for intelligence.
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