elongs to his country, he plunged into the sea, from
which his body never reappeared. The melancholy suicide was immediately
reported to Raoul.

"_Bon_ "--was the answer. "Had he done it an hour earlier, le Feu-Follet
would not have been set up on these rocks, like a vessel in a
ship-yard--_mais, mes enfans, courage!_--We'll yet see if our beautiful
lugger cannot be saved."

If there were stoicism and bitterness in this answer, there was not
deliberate cruelty. Raoul loved his lugger, next to Ghita, before all
things on earth; and, in his eyes, the fault of wrecking her in a calm
was to be classed among the unpardonable sins. Still, it was by no means
a rare occurrence. Ships, like men, are often cast away by an excess of
confidence; and our own coast, one of the safest in the known world for
the prudent mariner to approach, on account of the regularity of its
soundings, has many a tale to tell of disasters similar to this, which
have occurred simply because no signs of danger were apparent. Our hero
would not have excused himself for such negligence, and that which
self-love will not induce us to pardon will hardly be conceded to
philanthropy.

The pumps were sounded, and it was ascertained that the lugger had come
down so easily into her bed, and lay there with so little straining of
her seams, that she continued tight as a bottle. This left all the hope
which circumstances would allow, of still saving the vessel. Raoul
neglected no useful precaution. By this time the light was strong enough
to enable him to see a felucca coming slowly down from Salerno, before
the wind, or all that was still left of the night air, and he despatched
Ithuel with an armed boat to seize her, and bring her alongside of the
rocks. He took this course with the double purpose of using the prize,
if practicable, in getting his own vessel off, or, in the last resort,
of making his own escape, and that of his people, in her to France. He
did not condescend to explain his motives, however; nor did any one
presume to inquire into them. Raoul was now strictly a commander, acting
in a desperate emergency. He even succeeded in suppressing the
constitutional volubility of his countrymen, and in substituting for it
the deep, attentive silence of thorough discipline; one of the great
causes of his own unusual success in maritime enterprises. To the want
of this very silence and attention may be ascribed so many of those
naval disasters which have un