cadet. On that occasion the future defender of his country was "badly in-
jured with various wounds and injuries" and in consequence was obliged
to keep to his bed and room for some weeks. Reynier Jansz, and his ac-
complice had thought it necessary to take flight, perhaps in order to escape
arrest. It is not an attractive proposition accurately to reconstruct the
course of a brawl, especially one that has taken place in an inn, and to fix
the guilt. But here there is room for surmise that the victim did not feel
quite innocent, since he was the first to make proposals towards settling
the affair amicably. He, Willem van Bijlandt, would consider the matter
as settled if his attackers would pay his damages and the doctor's bill, and
if his friends were to receive a free meal. In order to arrange for this
"Dingenom Balthasarsdr., housewife of Reynier Jansz. Vos" and the
mothers of his accomplices in the quarrel appeared before a Delft notary
on July 26th, 1625. It seems that the conditions demanded were accepted
without much opposition. At least on August 4th next all concerned--
also the fugitives and the witnesses--gathered again so as to declare that
all demands had been satisfied and that the incident might be considered
as closed ¹

Reynier Janszoon was certainly not only an innkeeper. For there is an
entry in the books of the Guild of St. Luke on October 13th, 1631, that
"Reynier Voss or Reynier van den Minne" (read: van der Meer) had
offered himself as a member and more especially as a master art-dealer ²

Even so neither of these trades, the inn nor the art-shop, were Reynier
Janszoon's real profession. Already at the time of his wedding in 1615 he
described himself as a "caffawercker" (silk-worker) ³ ; even after his death
he is mentioned in that capacity and he was, as it seems, only, or at last
chiefly, known as such. Caffa was a kind of silk, distinguished in the 17th
century from satin; it was used for clothes, curtains, furniture-covering,
etc. ⁴

For the nonce we do not read any more about the "child Joannes". His
name is not mentioned again until the occasion of his wedding on April
5th, 1653. Nothing is known of the first twenty years of his life, literally
nothing. Admittedly there is a verse by the Delft printer Arnold Bon,
publisher of Dirk van Bleyswijck's Description. This verse was made on
the occasion of the gun-powder explosion in 1654 when Carel Fabritius

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