The morning on which the wedding took place, Garvloit’s house put forth all its splendour.  Dress suits from former days of better circumstances were brought out from old boxes for the occasion; and Madam Garvloit appeared in a green-silk dress of stiff brocade, with a massive brooch, and a huge gilt comb that shone over her forehead like a piece of a crown.  Garvloit, too, did his best; but his utmost endeavour had only availed to adapt one article of his grandfather’s state dress to his corpulent person—­a gold-laced waistcoat namely, which was much too long for him, and which appeared to occasion him extreme discomfort in the region of the buttons.

A couple of old friends of the family and the children went with the pair to church, and also the skipper’s son from Vlieland, over whose round soft cheeks there trickled a regretful tear or two as the bride, with her myrtle wreath and long white veil, was led up to the altar by Garvloit.  Elizabeth wore that day a pair of particularly handsome shoes with silver buckles, which Salve, with glad surprise, recognised as the ones he had presented to her many years before.

There was an entertainment provided by Madam Garvloit when they returned from church, which was not a very lively affair, the Garvloits not being in spirits at the prospect of losing Elizabeth, and she, notwithstanding all her present happiness, being really sorry to go.

A couple of hours after, they were on their way to Puermurende, and later on in the mellow evening, were standing together on the deck of the Apollo, as she was being towed up the wide canal.  The bells were ringing out from Alkmar as they passed—­ringing a sweet old chime of other days; and as they stood together by the ship’s side, silently listening to the changing tones from the tower as they mingled in the air above them, they pleased themselves with the thought that it was their wedding chime.

CHAPTER XXI.

In a small house at Tonsberg, at the entrance to the beautiful Christiana fjord, the first summer of their married life passed without a cloud upon its sky.  The house and all about it, with its flowers in each window, were a model of neatness and Dutch polish; and with Elizabeth herself as a centre to it all, it was no wonder that Salve’s crew found him indifferent to all weathers when it was a question of getting home.

The charming young skipper’s wife, however, during her husband’s frequent absences, had attracted the notice of some of the leading families of the town, and had come presently to be if not exactly on intimate terms, at all events on a footing of acquaintanceship with many of them; and Salve’s enjoyment of his home ceased then to be so perfectly unalloyed.