One who understood Englishmen better than Andrea Barrofaldi would have been satisfied at a glance that he who now entered was really a native of that country.  He was a young man of some two or three and twenty, of a ruddy, round, good-natured face, wearing an undress coat of the service to which he professed to belong, and whose whole air and manner betrayed his profession quite as much as his country.  The salutations he uttered were in very respectable Italian, familiarity with the language being the precise reason why he had been selected for the errand on which he had come.  After these salutations he put a piece of parchment into Andrea’s hand, remarking: 

“If you read English, Signore, you will perceive by that commission I am the person I represent myself to be.”

“Doubtless, Signor Tenente, you belong to ze Ving-y-Ving and are a subordinate of Sir Smees?”

The young man looked surprised and at the same time half disposed to laugh, though a sense of decorum suppressed the latter inclination.

“I belong to His Britannic Majesty’s ship Proserpine, Signore,” he dryly answered, “and know not what you mean by the Ving-y-Ving.  Captain Cuffe of that ship, the frigate you saw off your harbor this morning, has sent me down in the felucca that got in this evening to communicate intelligence concerning the lugger which we chased to the southward about nine o’clock, but which, I see, is again snug at her anchor in this bay.  Our ship was lying behind Capraya when I left her, but will be here to take me off, and to hear the news, before daylight, should the wind ever blow again.”

Andrea Barrofaldi and Vito Viti stared, and that, too, as if a messenger had come from the lower regions to summon them away for their misdeeds.  Lieutenant Griffin spoke unusually good Italian for a foreigner, and his manner of proceeding was so straightforward and direct as to carry with it every appearance of truth.

“You do not know what I mean by ze Ving-y-Ving?” demanded the vice-governatore, with emphasis.

“To be frank with you, I do not, Signore.  Ving-y-Ving is not English; nor do I know that it is Italian.”

Mr. Griffin lost a good deal of ground by this assertion, which implied a doubt of Andrea’s knowledge of foreign tongues.

“You say, Signor Tenente, if I comprehend your meaning, that Ving-y-Ving is not English?”

“Indeed I do, sir; at least no English that I have ever heard spoken, at sea or ashore; and we seamen have a language of our own.”

“Will you, then, permit me to ask you what is the translation of ala e ala, word for word?”

The lieutenant paused a moment and pondered.  Then he laughed involuntarily, checking himself almost immediately with an air of respect and gravity.

“I believe I now understand you, Signor Vice-governatore,” he said; “we have a sea-phrase something like this, to describe a fore-and-aft vessel with her sails swinging off on both sides; but we call it wing-and-wing.”