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ity followed than my having to call myself le Capitaine Smeet', and finding out the means of mystifying le vicegovernatori."

Ghita laughed, in spite of the fears she entertained, for it was one of the most powerful of the agencies the sailor employed in making others converts to his opinions, to cause them to sympathize with his light-hearted gaiety, whether it suited their natural temperaments or not. She knew that Raoul had already been a prisoner in England two years, where, as he often said himself, he staid just long enough to acquire a very respectable acquaintance with the language, f not with the institutions, manners, and religion, when he made his escape, aided by the American, called Ithuel Bolt, an impressed seaman of our own Republic, who fully entering into all the plans imagined by his more enterprising friend and fellow-sufferer, had cheerfully enlisted in the execution of his future schemes of revenge. States, like powerful individuals in private life, usually feel themselves too strong to allow any considerations of the direct consequences of departures from the right to influence their policy, and a nation is apt to fancy its power of such a character, as to despise all worldly amends, while its moral responsibility is divided among too many to make it a matter of much moral concernment to its particular citizens. Nevertheless, he truth will show that none are so low, but they may become dangerous to the highest; and even powerful communities seldom fail to meet with their punishment for every departure from justice. It would seem, indeed, that a principle pervades nature, which renders it impossible for man to escape the consequences of his own evil deeds, even in this life; as if God had decreed the universal predominance of truth, and the never-failing downfall of falsehood, from the beginning; the success of wrong being ever temporary, while the triumph of the right is eternal. To apply these consoling considerations to the matter more immediately before us; the practice of impressment, in its day, raised a feeling among the seamen of other nations, as well as, in fact, among those of Great Britain herself, that probably has had as much effect in destroying the prestige of her nautical invincibility, supported, as was that prestige, by a vast existing force, as any other one cause whatever. It was

necessary, to witness the feeling of hatred and resentment that was raised by the practice of this despotic power, more especially among those who felt that their foreign birth ought at least to have assured them impunity from the abuse, in order fully to appreciate what might so readily become its consequences. Ithuel Bolt, the seaman just mentioned, was a proof, in a small way, of the harm that even an insignificant individual can effect, when his mind is fully and wholly bent on revenge. Ghita knew him well; and, although she little liked either his character or his appearance, she had often been obliged to smile at the narrative of the deceptions he practised on the English, and of the thousand low inventions he had devised to do them injury. She was not slow, now, to imagine that his agency had not been trifling in carrying on the present fraud.

"You do not openly call your lugger le Feu-Follet, Raoul;" she answered, after a minute's pause; "that would be a dangerous name to utter, even in Porto Ferrajo. It is not a week since I heard a mariner dwelling on her misdeeds, and the reasons that all good Italians have to detest her. It is fortunate the man is away, or he could not fail to know you.'

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"Of that I am not so certain, Ghita. We alter our paint often, and, at need, can alter our rig. You may be certain, however, that we hide our Jack-o'Lantern, and sail under another name. The lugger, now she is in the English service, is called the "Ving-And-Ving."

"I heard the answer given to the hail from the shore, but it sounded different from this."

"Non-Ving-And-Ving. Ithuel answered for us, and you may be sure he can speak his own tongue. Ving-AndVing is the word, and he pronounces it as I do."

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Ving-y-Ving!" repeated Ghita, in her pretty Italian tones, dropping naturally into the vice-governatore's fault of pronunciation "it is an odd name, and I like it less than Feu-Follet."

"I wish, dearest Ghita, I could persuade you to like the name of Yvard," rejoined the young man, in a half-reproachful, half-tender manner, "and I should care nothing for any other. You accuse me of disrespect for priests; but no son .could ever kneel to a father for his blessing, half so readily

or half so devoutly, as I could kneel with thee, before any friar in Italy, to receive that nuptial benediction which 1 have so often asked at your hand, but which you have so constantly and so cruelly refused."

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"I am afraid the name would not then be Feu-Follet, but Ghita-Folie," said the girl, laughing, though she felt a bitter pang at the heart, that cost her an effort to control;more of this now, Raoul; we may be observed, and watched; it is necessary that we separate.'

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A hurried conversation, of more interest to the young couple themselves, than it would prove to the reader, though it might not have been wholly without the latter, but which it would be premature to relate, now followed, when Ghita left Raoul on the hill, insisting that she knew the town too well to have any apprehensions about threading its narrow and steep streets, at any hour, by herself. This much, in sooth, must be said in favour of Andrea Barrofaldi's administration of justice; he had made it safe for the gentle, the feeble and the poor, equally, to move about the island by day or by night; it seldom happening that so great an enemy to peace and tranquillity appeared among his simple dependants, as was the fact at this precise moment.

In the mean time, there was not quite as much tranquillity in Porto Ferrajo, as the profound silence which reigned in the place might have induced a stranger to imagine. Tommaso Tonti was a man of influence, within his sphere, as well as the vice-governatore; and having parted from Vito Viti, as has been related, he sought the little clientelle of padroni and piloti, who were in the habit of listening to his opinions as if they were oracles. The usual place of resort of this set, after dark, was a certain house kept by a widow of the name of Benedetta Galopo, the uses of which were plainly enough indicated by a small bush that hung dangling from a short pole, fastened above the door. If Benedetta knew anything of the proverb, that "good wine needs no bush," she had not sufficient faith in the contents of her own casks, to trust their reputation; for this bush of hers was as regularly renewed, as its withering leaves required. Indeed, it was a common remark, among her customers, that her bush was always as fresh as her face, and that the latter was one of the most comely that was to be met with on the.

island; a circumstance that aided much indifferent wine, in finding a market. Benedetta bore a reasonably good name, nevertheless, though it was oftener felt, perhaps, than said, that she was a confirmed coquette. She tolerated 'Maso principally on two accounts; because, if he were old and unattractive in his own person, many of his followers were among the smartest seamen of the port, and because he not only drank his full proportion, but paid with punctuality. These inducements rendered the pilot always a welcome guest at La Santa Maria Degli Venti, as the house was called, though it had no other sign than the often-renewed bush, already mentioned.

At the very moment, then, when Raoul Yvard and Ghita parted on the hill, 'Maso was seated in his usual place, at the table in Benedetta's upper room, the windows of which commanded as full a view of the lugger as the hour permitted; that craft being anchored about a cable's length distant, and, as a sailor might have expressed it, just abeam. On this occasion he had selected the upper room, and but three companions, because it was his wish that as few should enter into his counsels, as at all comported with the love of homage to his own experience. The party had been assembled a quarter of an hour, and there had been time to cause the tide to ebb materially in the flask, which it may be well to tell the reader at once, contained very little less than half a gallon of liquor, such as it was.

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"I have told it all to the podestâ," said 'Maso, with an important manner, as he put down his glass, after potation the second, which quite equalled potation the first, in quantity; "yes, I have told it all to Vito Viti, and no doubt he has told it to Il Signor Vice-governatore, who now knows as much about the whole matter as either of us four. Cospetto!to think such a thing dare happen in a haven like Porto Ferrajo! Had it come to pass over on the other side of the island, at Porto Longone, one wouldn't think so much of it, for they are never much on the look-out; but, to take place here, in the very capital of Elba, I should as soon have expected it in Livorno !"

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But, 'Maso," put in Daniele Bruno, in the manner of one who was a little sceptical, "I have often seen the pavilion of the Inglese, and this is as much like that which all their

frigates and corvettes: wear, as one of our feluccas is like another. The flag, at least, is right."

"What signifies a flag, Daniele, when a French hand can hoist an English ensign as easily as the king of Inghilterra, himself? If that lugger was not built by the Francese, you were not built by an Italian father and mother. But, I should not think so much of the hull, for that may have been captured, as the English take many of their enemies on the high seas; but look at the rigging and sails-Santa Maria! I could go to the shop of the very sail-maker, in Marseilles, who made that foresail! His name is Pierre Benoit, and a very good workman he is, as all will allow who have had occasion to employ him."

This particularity greatly aided the argument; common minds being seldom above yielding to the circumstances which are so often made to corroborate imaginary facts. Tommaso Tonti, though so near the truth as to his main point -the character of the visiter-was singularly out as to the sail, notwithstanding; le Feu-Follet having been built, equipped, and manned at Nantes, and Pierre Benoit never having seen her or her foresail either; but, it mattered not, in the way of discussion and assertion, one sail-maker being as good as another, provided he was French.

"And have you mentioned this to the podestâ ?" inquired Benedetta, who stood with the empty flask in her hand, listening to the discourse; "I should think that sail would open his eyes."

"I cannot say I have; but then I told him so many other things, more to the point, that he cannot do less than believe this, when he hears it. Signor Viti promised to meet me here, after he has had a conversation with the vice-governatore; and we may now expect him every minute.”

"Il Signor Podestâ will be welcome," said Benedetta, wiping off a spare table, and bustling round the room to make things look a little smarter than they ordinarily did; "he may frequent grander wine-houses than this, but he will hardly find better liquor."

"Poverina!-Don't think that the podestâ comes here on any such errand; he comes to meet me;" answered 'Maso, with an indulgent smile; "he takes his wine too often on the heights, to wish to come as low as this after a glass.

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