brought up with that severe restraint which regulates the deportment of the young Italian females of condition, perhaps in a degree just as much too severely, as it leaves the young American too little restrained; but she had been taught all that decorum and delicacy required, either for the beautiful or the safe, and her notions inculcated the inexpediency, if not the impropriety, of one in her situation taking a passage in a privateer at all, and particularly so one commanded by an avowed lover.  But, on the other hand, the distance between Porto Ferrajo and the Towers was only about fifty miles, and a few hours would suffice to place her in safety beneath her own roof, and, what was of more importance in her view just then, Raoul in safety along with her.  On all this had she pondered, and she was consequently prepared with an answer to the proposal that had just been made.

“If my uncle and myself could accept this generous offer, when would it be convenient for you to sail, Raoul?” the girl demanded; “we have now been absent longer than we intended, and longer than we ought.”

“Within an hour, if there were any wind.  But you see how it is, Ghita; the zephyr has done blowing, and it now seems as if every fan of Italy had gone to sleep.  You can depend on our sailing the instant it shall be in our power.  At need, we will use the sweeps.”

“I will then see my uncle and mention to him that there is a vessel about to sail, in which we had better embark.  Is it not odd, Raoul, that he is profoundly ignorant of your being in the bay?  He gets more and more lost to things around him every day, and I do believe he does not recollect that you command an enemy’s vessel half the time.”

“Let him trust to me; he shall never have occasion to know it, Ghita.”

“We are assured of that, Raoul.  The generous manner in which you interposed to save us from the corsair of the Algerines, which began our acquaintance, and for which we shall always have occasion to bless you, has made peace between you and us for ever.  But for your timely succor, last summer, my uncle and myself would now have been slaves with barbarians!”

“That is another thing that inclines me to believe in a Providence, Ghita!  Little did I know, when rescuing you and your good kinsman from the boat of the Algerine, who I was saving.  And yet you see how all has come to pass, and that in serving you I have merely been serving myself.”

“Would thou could’st learn to serve that God who disposes of us all at his holy pleasure!” murmured Ghita, tears forcing themselves to her eyes, and a convulsive effort alone suppressing the deep emotion with which she uttered the words:  “but we thank thee again and again, Raoul, as the instrument of his mercy in the affair of the Algerine, and are willing to trust to thee now and always.  It will be easy to induce my uncle to embark; but, as he knows thy real character when he chooses to recollect it, I hardly think it will do to say with whom.  We must arrange an hour and a place to meet, when I will see to his being there and in readiness.”