“You know all, Ghita.  After months of perseverance and a love such as man seldom felt before, you deliberately and coldly refused to be my wife;—­nay, you have deserted Monte Argentaro purposely to get rid of my importunities; for there I could go with the lugger at any moment; and have come here, upon this bay, crowded with the English and other enemies of France, fancying that I would not dare to venture hither.  Well, you see with what success; for neither Nelson nor his two-deckers can keep Raoul Yvard from the woman he loves, let him be as victorious and skilful as he may!”

The sailor had ceased rowing, to give vent to his feelings in this speech, neither of the two colloquists regarding the presence of Giuntotardi any more than if he had been a part of themselves.  This indifference to the fact that a third person was a listener proceeded from habit, the worthy scholar and religionist being usually too abstracted to attend to concerns as light as love and the youthful affections.  Ghita was not surprised either at the reproaches of her suitor or at his perseverance; and her conscience told her he uttered but the truth, in attributing to her the motives he had, in urging her uncle to make their recent change of residence; for, while a sense of duty had induced her to quit the towers, her art was not sufficient to suggest the expediency of going to any other abode than that which she was accustomed to inhabit periodically, and about which Raoul knew, from her own innocent narrations, nearly as much as she knew herself.

“I can say no more than I have said already,” the thoughtful girl answered, after Raoul had begun again to row.  “It is better on every account that we should part.  I cannot change my country; nor can you desert that glorious republic of which you feel so proud.  I am an Italian, and you are French; while, more than all, I worship my God, while you believe in the new opinions of your own nation.  Here are causes enough for separation surely, however favorably and kindly we may happen to think of each other in general.”

“Tell me not any more of the heart of an Italian girl, and of her readiness to fly to the world’s end with the man of her choice!” exclaimed Raoul, bitterly.  “I can find a thousand girls in Languedoc who would make the circuit of the earth yearly rather than be separated a day from the seamen they have chosen for their husbands.”

“Then look among the girls of Languedoc for a wife,” answered Ghita, with a smile so melancholy that it contradicted her words.  “Better to take one of your own nation and opinions, Raoul, than risk your happiness with a stranger, who might not answer all your hopes when you came to know her better.”

“We will not talk further of this now, dearest Ghita; my first care must be to carry you back to the cottage of your aunt—­unless indeed you will at once embark in le Feu-Follet and return to the towers?”

“Le Feu-Follet!—­she is hardly here, in the midst of a fleet of her enemies!—­Remember, Raoul, your men will begin to complain if you place them too often in such risks to gratify your own wishes.”