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about it. Not all the boys accompanied Floris, only
those who were bigger than he was and got tired
of playing with the younger ones. Then, one day,
a poor woman from the Omvalspoort came, with
tears in her eyes, saying that the boy had wilfully
smashed one of her windows ; another time an old
man from Gierstraat came, demanding compensation
for a pot of paint that had been kicked over. And
sometimes the damage that had been done cost
several guilders. Werendonk paid the money and
inflicted just punishment, never in anger. The daily
woman and the servant-maid scolded him furiously
for causing money to be flung away through his
mischievousness; the neighbours lost their tempers
and said he was a disgrace ; even Frans said he'd
have to keep a sharper eye on him : Werendonk
merely repeated that doubtless he would grow out
of it.
But no one in the house realised how difficult he
sometimes found it to administer these chastisements.
For the last few years Agnete's health had been fail-
ing, her cheeks were so hollow and transparent that
often he would send her out of the shop to go and
sit on her chair in the parlour ; occasionally she pro-
tested, but sometimes she felt so tired she couldn't
stand up. Once, when Floris was about eight years
old, she was sitting thus when Werendonk came into
the room leading the boy by the hand to punish
him. He laid him across his knee and the stick