"Oh, I never disputed your skill, Mr.
Cavert."

"What, then, do you scruple to confide your
niece to me?" said he, with a low whisper, in
which the tone was more of menace than mere
inquiry. " Is this the first time we have ever
gone out in a boat together?"

She muttered some assurance of her trustfulness,
but so confusedly, and with such embarrassment,
as to be scarcely intelligible. " There!
that was certainly thunder!" she cried.

"There are not three days in three months in
this place without thunder. It is the Italian
privilege, I take it, to make always more noise
than mischief."

"But will you go if it threatens so much?"
said Miss Grainger.

"Ask Florry. For my part, I think the day
will be a glorious one."

"I'm certain it will," said Florence, gaily;
"and I quite agree with what Harry said last
night. Disputing about the weather has the
same effect as firing great guns: it always brings
down the rain."

Calvert smiled graciously at hearing himself
quoted. It was the one sort of flattery he liked
the best, and it rallied him out of his dark
humour. " Are you ready?"—he had almost
added " dearest," and only caught himself in
time—perhaps, indeed, not completely in time—
for she blushed, as she said, " Eccomi."

The sisters affectionately embraced each other.
Emily even ran after Florence to kiss her once
again, after parting, and then Florry took
Calvert's arm, and hastened away to the jetty. " I
declare," said she, as she stepped into the boat,
"this leave-taking habit, when one is going out
to ride, or to row, or to walk for an hour, is about
the stupidest thing I know of."

"I always said so. It's like making one's
will every day before going down to dinner. It
is quite true you may chance to die before the
dessert, but the mere possibility should not
interfere with your asking for soup. No, no,
Florry, you are to steer; the tiller is yours for
to-day; my post is here;" and he stretched
himself at the bottom of the boat, and took out his
cigar. The light breeze was just enough to
move the little lateen sail, and gradually it filled
out, and the skiff stole quietly away from shore,
without even a ripple on the water.

"What's the line, Florry? 'Hope at the
helm, pleasure at the prow/ or is it love at the
helm?"

"A bad steersman, I should say; far too
capricious," cried she, laughing.

"I don't know. I think he has one wonderful
attribute; he has got wings to fly away with
whenever the boat is in danger, and I believe it
is pretty much what love does always."

"Can't say," said she, carelessly. "Isn't
that a net yonder? Oughtn't we to steer clear
of it?"

"Yes. Let her fall off—so—that's enough.
What a nice light hand you have."

"On a horse, they tell me, my hand is very
light"

"How I'd like to see you on my Arab ' Said.'
Such a creature! so large-eyed, and with such a
full nostril, the face so concave in front, the
true Arab type, and the jaw a complete semi-
circle. How proud he'd look under you, with
that haughty snort he gives, as he bends his
knee. He was the present of a great Rajah to
me—one of those native fellows we are
graciously pleased to call rebels, because they don't
fancy to be slaves. Two years ago he owned a
territory about the size of half Spain, and he is
now something like a brigand chief, with a few
hundred followers."

"Dear Harry, do not talk of India—at least
not of the mutiny."

"Mutiny! Why call it mutiny, Florry?
Well, love, I have done," he muttered, for the
word escaped him, and he feared how she might
resent it.

"Come back to my lightness of hand."

"Or of heart, for I sorely suspect, Florence,
the quality is not merely a manual one."

"Am I steering well?"

"Peri'ectly. Would that I could sail on and
on for ever thus:

Over an ocean just like this,
A life of such untroubled bliss."

Calvert threw in a sentimental glance with
this quotation.

"In other words, an existence of nothing to
do," said she, laughing, "with an excellent
cigar to beguile it."

"Well, but 'ladye faire,' remember that I
have earned some repose. I have not been
altogether a carpet knight. I have had my share
of lance and spear, and amongst fellows who
handle their weapons neatly.

"You are dying to get back to Ghoorkas and
Sikhs; but I won't have it. I'd rather hear
Metastasio or Petrarch, just now."

"What if I were to quote something apposite,
though it were only prose—something out
of the Promessi Sposi?"

She made no answer, and turned away her
head.

"Put up your helm a little: let the sails
draw freely. This is very enjoyable; it is a
right royal luxury. I'm not sure Antony ever
had his galley steered by Cleopatra; had he?"

"I don't know; but I do know that I am not
Cleopatra nor you Antony."

"How readily you take one up for a foolish
speech, as if these rambling indiscretions were
not the soul of such converse as ours. They
are like the squalls, that only serve to increase
our speed and never risk our safety, and, somehow,
I feel to-day as if my temper was all of
that fitful and capricious kind. I suppose it is
over-happiness. Are you happy, Florry?" asked
he, after a pause.

"If you mean, do I enjoy this glorious day
and our sail, yes, intensely. Now, what am
to do? The sail is flapping in spite of me."

"Because the wind has chopped round, and
is coming from the eastward. Down your helm,
and let her find her own way. We have the