's deck; then she came sweeping into the wind, within fifty feet
of the yawl. Raoul watched the movement; and by the time her way was
nearly lost, he was alongside, and had caught a rope. At the next
instant, he was on board her.

Raoul trod the deck of his lugger again with the pride of a monarch as
he ascends his throne. Certain of her sailing qualities, and confident
of his own skill, this gallant seaman was perfectly indifferent to the
circumstance that he was environed by powerful enemies. The wind and
the hour were propitious, and no sensation of alarm disturbed the
exultation of that happy moment. The explanations that passed between
him and his first lieutenant, Pintard, were brief but distinct. Le
Feu-Follet had kept off the land, with her sails lowered, a trim in
which a vessel of her rig and lowness in the water would not be visible
more than five or six miles, until sufficient time had elapsed, when she
was taken into the Gulf of Salerno, to look for signals from the heights
of St. Agata. Finding none, she went to sea again, as has been stated,
sweeping along the coast, in the hope of falling in with intelligence.
Although she could not be seen by her enemies, she saw the three
cruisers who were on the lookout, and great uneasiness prevailed on
board concerning the fates of the absentees. On the afternoon of that
day, the lugger was carried close in with the northwest side of Ischia,
which island she rounded at dusk, seemingly intending to anchor at
Baiae, a harbor seldom without allied cruisers. As the wind came off the
land, however, she kept away, and, passing between Procida and Mysenum,
she came out into the Bay of Naples, about three hours before meeting
with Raoul, with the intention of examining the whole of the opposite
coast, in search of the yawl. She had seen the light at the gaff of the
Proserpine, and, at first, supposed it might be a signal from the
missing boat. With a view to make sure of it, the lugger had been kept
away until the night-glasses announced a ship; when she was hauled up on
a wind, and had made two or three successive half-boards, to weather the
point where her captain lay concealed; the Marina Grande of Sorrento
being one of the places of rendezvous mentioned by our hero, in his last
instructions.

There was a scene of lively congratulation, and of even pleasing
emotion, on the deck of the lugger, when Raoul so unexpectedly appeared.
He had every quality to make himself belo