The desperate character of the recent chase, aided by his late almost miraculous escape from death, joined to the necessity of parting from his mistress, rendered our hero melancholy, if not moody.  He could not ask Ghita to share his dangers any longer; yet he felt, if he permitted her now to quit him, the separation might be for ever.  Still he made no objection; but, leaving Ithuel in charge of the boat, he assisted Ghita up the funnel-like side of the basin, and prepared to accompany her on her way to the road.  Carlo preceded the pair, telling his niece that she would find him at a cottage on the way that was well known to both.

The obscurity was not so great as to render the walking very difficult, and Raoul and Ghita pursued their course slowly along the rocks, each oppressed with the same sensation of regret at parting, though influenced by nearly opposing views for the future.  The girl took the young man’s arm without hesitation; and there was a tenderness in the tones of her voice, as well as in her general manner, that betrayed how nearly her heart was interested in what was passing.  Still, principle was ever uppermost in her thoughts, and she determined now to speak plainly, and to the purpose.

“Raoul,” she said, after listening to some one of those fervent declarations of love that were peculiarly agreeable to one of her affectionate and sincere nature, even when she most felt the necessity of repelling the insinuating suit; “there must be an end of this.  I can never go through again the scenes I have lately witnessed, nor allow you to run such fearful risks.  The sooner we understand each other, and, I may say, the sooner we part, it will be the wiser, and the better for the interests of both.  I blame myself for suffering the intimacy to last so long, and for proceeding so far.”

“And this is said by a fervent-souled Italian girl!  One of eighteen years;—­who comes of a region in which it is the boast that the heart is even warmer than the sun; of a race, among whom it is hard to find one—­oui, even a poor one—­who is not ready to sacrifice home, country, hopes, fortune, nay, life itself, to give happiness to the man who has chosen her from all the rest of her sex.”

“It would seem to me easy to do all this, Raoul. Si—­I think I could sacrifice everything you have named, to make you happy!  Home I have not, unless the Prince’s Towers can thus be called; country, since the sad event of this week, I feel as if I had altogether lost; of hopes, I have few in this world, with which your image has not been connected; but those which were once so precious to me are now, I fear, lost; you know I have no fortune, to tempt me to stay, or you to follow; as for my life, I fear it will soon be very valueless—­an sure it will be miserable.”