Nothing,
therefore, was farther from my thoughts and inclinations than a return
to the life of peril through which, in my younger days, I had passed,
when suddenly the blow fell which changed all my plans.
During the year 1630 an epidemic known as the "Black Death" raged
through the Netherlands, and, as one of the victims to the fell
disease, Anna, my wife, was taken from me. I followed her to the grave,
and returned to my desolate hearth determined to die also. To this end
I shut myself in the room which Anna had lately occupied, where I would
permit nothing to be disturbed, nor would allow any to enter. Such food
as I required was brought, by my orders, into an adjoining apartment,
where I ate, when my appetite craved, in moody silence. Dust gathered.
The air in the room became oppressive. I regarded this mournful chamber
as my tomb.
My servants, and those who had called themselves my friends, avoided
me. I heard whispers at my barred and bolted door, saying that I was
mad.
A madhouse I knew to be worse than a prison. I therefore resolved to
leave my home before I was prevented from doing so.
How long I had remained in the state of misery and dejection to which I
had abandoned myself I cannot say.
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