12 MS dated 3 December 1636 (Huygens 1893b, pp. 31-32). The Doelen in The Hague to which the poem refers was a clubhouse and training-school for the town marksmen. The marksmen's guild or schutterij was a feature of the life of most major towns in The Netherlands in the early modern period, as witnessed by the Guild portraits by Frans Hals in Haarlem, Rembrandt's Night Watch in Amsterdam, etc. 9 White stones were used as votes by the Romans: ‘alicui rei album calculum adicere’ was to approve of, or authorize it. In particular, the Thracians preserved the recollection of fortunate occurrences with white stones. A day thus marked was noted for the future as auspicious (Pliny, Historia vii. 40, 41, and his Letters, vi.ii. iii). 12 Refers to Matthew 21.42: ‘the stone the builders rejected, the same is become the head of the corner’. The reference may be to the troubled relations between Prince Frederik Hendrik and the States of Holland after 1633. 13 The first public exploit of David, future king of Israel, was to kill the gigantic Philistine Goliath with a sling-shot (1 Samuel 17).