116

HISTORY OF ENGLAND.

CHAP.

XVII.

16S1.

my company?” A bold Dutch seaman ventured to spring out,and, ivith great difficulty, swam and scrambled through breakers,ice and mud, to firm ground. Here he discharged a musketand lighted a fire as a signal that he was safe. None of hisfellow passengers, however, thought it prudent to follow hisexample. They lay tossing in sight of the flame which he hadkindled, till the first pale light of a January morning showedthem that they were close to the island of Goree. The Kingand his Lords, stiff with cold and covered with icicles, gladlylanded to warm and rest themselves.*

After reposing some hours in the hut of a peasant, Williamproceeded to the Hague. He was impatiently expected there:for, though the fleet which brought him was not visible from theshore, the royal salutes had been heard through the mist, andhad apprised the whole coast of his arrival. Thousands had as-sembled at Iionslaerdyk to welcome him with applause whichcame from their hearts and which went to his heart. That wasone of the few white days of a life, beneficent indeed and glo-rious, but far from happy. After more than two years passed ina strange land, the exile had again set foot on his native soil.He heard again the language of his nursery. He saw again thescenery and the architecture which were inseparably associatedin his mind with the recollections of childhood and the sacredfeeling of home; the dreary mounds of sand, shells and W'eeds,on which the waves of the German Ocean broke; the intermi-nable meadows intersected by trenches; the straight canals; thevillas bright with paint and adorned with quaint images and in-scriptions. He had lived during many weary months among apeople who did not love him, who did not understand him, whocould never forget that he was a foreigner. Those Englishmen

* Relation de la Voyage de Sa Majesty Britannique en Ilollandc,enrichie de planches trfes curieuses, 1692; Wagenaar; London Gazette,Jan. 29. 169J; Burnet, ii, 71.