The dark eye of Eudora instantly lighted.  She looked at the ’Skimmer of the Seas,’ and laughed.

“’Twas another of those womanly artifices which have been practised in my brigantine.  It was thought that a young commander of a royal cruiser would be less apt to watch our movements, were his mind bent on the discovery of such a correspondent.”

“And the trick has been practised before?”

“I confess it.—­But I can linger no longer.  In a few minutes, the tide will turn, and the inlet become impassable.  Eudora, we must decide on the fortunes of this child.  Shall he to the ocean again?—­or shall he remain, to vary his life with a landsman’s chances?”

“Who and what is the boy?” gravely demanded the Alderman.

“One dear to both,” rejoined the free-trader “His father was my nearest friend, and his mother long watched the youth of Eudora.  Until this moment, he has, been our mutual care,—­he must now choose between us.”

“He will not quit me!” hastily interrupted the alarmed Eudora—­“Thou art my adopted son, and none can guide thy young mind like me.  Thou hast need of woman’s tenderness, Zephyr, and wilt not quit me?”

“Let the child be the arbiter of his own fate.  I am credulous on the point of fortune, which is, at least, a happy belief for the contraband.”

“Then let him speak.  Wilt remain here, amid these smiling fields, to ramble among yonder gay and sweetly-scented flowers?—­or wilt thou back to the water, where all is vacant and without change?”

The boy looked wistfully into her anxious eye, and then he bent his own hesitating glance on the calm features of the free-trader.

“We can put to sea,” he said; “and when we make the homeward passage again, there will be many curious things for thee, Eudora!”

“But this may be the last opportunity to know the land of thy ancestors.  Remember how terrible is the ocean in its anger, and how often the brigantine has been in danger of shipwreck!”

“Nay, that is womanish!—­I have been on the royal-yard in the squalls, and it never seemed to me that there was danger.”

“Thou hast the unconsciousness and reliance of a ship-boy!  But those who are older, know that the life of a sailor is one of constant and imminent hazard.—­Thou hast been among the islands in the hurricane, and hast seen the power of the elements!”

“I was in the hurricane, and so was the brigantine; and there you see how taut and neat she is aloft, as if nothing had happened!”

“And you saw us yesterday floating on the open sea, while a few ill-fastened spars kept us from going into its depths!”

“The spars floated, and you were not drowned; else, I should have wept bitterly, Eudora.”

“But thou wilt go deeper into the country, and see more of its beauties—­its rivers, and its mountains—­its caverns, and its woods.  Here all is change, while the water is ever the same.”