anding him the
tin cup containing it, down through the hatchway. After drinking it he
felt really hungry;--he ate more macaroni than he had ever eaten
before. Then, while Sparicio slept, he aided Carmelo; and during the
middle of the day he rested again. He had not had so much
uninterrupted repose for many a week. He fancied he could feel himself
getting strong. At supper-time it seemed to him he could not get
enough to eat,--although there was plenty for everybody.

All day long there had been exactly the same wave-crease distorting the
white shadow of the San Marco's sail upon the blue water;--all day long
they had been skimming over the liquid level of a world so jewel-blue
that the low green ribbon-strips of marsh land, the far-off fleeing
lines of pine-yellow sand beach, seemed flaws or breaks in the
perfected color of the universe;--all day long had the cloudless sky
revealed through all its exquisite transparency that inexpressible
tenderness which no painter and no poet can ever reimage,--that
unutterable sweetness which no art of man may ever shadow forth, and
which none may ever comprehend,--though we feel it to be in some
strange way akin to the luminous and unspeakable charm that makes us
wonder at the eyes of a woman when she loves.

Evening came; and the great dominant celestial tone deepened;--the
circling horizon filled with ghostly tints,--spectral greens and grays,
and pearl-lights and fish-colors ... Carmelo, as he crouched at the
tiller, was singing, in a low, clear alto, some tristful little melody.
Over the sea, behind them, lay, black-stretching, a long low arm of
island-shore;--before them flamed the splendor of sun-death; they were
sailing into a mighty glory,--into a vast and awful light of gold.

Shading his vision with his fingers, Sparicio pointed to the long lean
limb of land from which they were fleeing, and said to La Brierre:--

--"Look-a, Doct-a! Last-a Islan'!"

Julien knew it;--he only nodded his head in reply, and looked the other
way,--into the glory of God. Then, wishing to divert the fisherman's
attention to another theme, he asked what was Carmelo singing.
Sparicio at once shouted to the lad:--

--"Ha! ... ho! Carmelo!--Santu diavulu! ... Sing-a loud-a! Doct-a
lik-a! Sing-a! sing!" .... "He sing-a nicee,"--added the boatman, with
his peculiar dark smile. And then Carmelo sang, loud and clearly, the
song he had been singing before,--one of those artless Mediterranean