She gathered herself up instantly, and with eyes fixed on the deck slid through the group, and disappeared below.

“Ah!” said Yeo, with a tone of exquisite sadness; “the young to the young!  Over land and sea, in the forests and in the galleys, in battle and prison, I have sought her!  And now!—­”

“My good friend,” said Amyas, “neither are you master of yourself yet.  When she comes round again, whom will she love and thank but you?”

“You, sir!  She owes all to you; and so do I. Let me go below, sir.  My old wits are shaky.  Bless you, sir, and thank you for ever and ever!”

And Yeo grasped Amyas’s hand, and went down to his cabin, from which he did not reappear for many hours.

From that day Ayacanora was a new creature.  The thought that she was an Englishwoman; that she, the wild Indian, was really one of the great white people whom she had learned to worship, carried in it some regenerating change:  she regained all her former stateliness, and with it a self-restraint, a temperance, a softness which she had never shown before.  Her dislike to Cary and Jack vanished.  Modest and distant as ever, she now took delight in learning from them about England and English people; and her knowledge of our customs gained much from the somewhat fantastic behaviour which Amyas thought good, for reasons of his own, to assume toward her.  He assigned her a handsome cabin to herself, always addressed her as madam, and told Cary, Brimblecombe, and the whole crew that as she was a lady and a Christian, he expected them to behave to her as such.  So there was as much bowing and scraping on the poop as if it had been a prince’s court:  and Ayacanora, though sorely puzzled and chagrined at Amyas’s new solemnity, contrived to imitate it pretty well (taking for granted that it was the right thing); and having tolerable masters in the art of manners (for both Amyas and Cary were thoroughly well-bred men), profited much in all things, except in intimacy with Amyas, who had, cunning fellow, hit on this parade of good manners, as a fresh means of increasing the distance between him and her.  The crew, of course, though they were a little vexed at losing their pet, consoled themselves with the thought that she was a “real born lady,” and Mr. Oxenham’s daughter, too; and there was not a man on board who did not prick up his ears for a message if she approached him, or one who would not have, I verily believe, jumped overboard to do her a pleasure.

Only Yeo kept sorrowfully apart.  He never looked at her, spoke to her, met her even, if he could.  His dream had vanished.  He had found her! and after all, she did not care for him?  Why should she?

But it was hard to have hunted a bubble for years, and have it break in his hand at last.  “Set not your affections on things on the earth,” murmured Yeo to himself, as he pored over his Bible, in the vain hope of forgetting his little maid.