urs after dark, and
thenceforth we should run almost the same risk of detection as by
daylight.

3. That in any case we could pass for what we really were, an
English trader in ballast, barely escaped from shipwreck, dismasted,
with broken steerage, making for the nearest port.

"Man," said Captain Pomery, looking about him, "we must be a poor set
of liars if we can't pitch a yarn on _this_ evidence!"

My father allowed himself to be persuaded, the more easily as the
argument jumped with his impatience. Accordingly, we stood on for
land, making no concealment; and the wind holding steady on our beam,
and the sun dropping astern of us in a sky without a cloud, 'twas
incredible how soon we began to make out the features of the land.
It rose like a shield to a central boss, which trembled, as it were,
into view and revealed itself a mountain peak, snowcapped and
shining, before ever the purple mist began to slip from the slopes
below it and disclose their true verdure. No sail broke the expanse
of sea between us and the shore; and, as we neared it, no scarp of
cliff, no house or group of houses broke the island's green monotony.
From the water's edge to the high snow-line it might have been built
of moss, so vivid its colour was, yet soft as velvet, and softer and
still more vivid as we approached.

Within two miles of shore, and not long before dark, the wind (as
Captain Pomery had promised) broke off and headed us, blowing cool
and fresh off the land. I was hauling in the foresheet and belaying
when a sudden waft of fragrance fetched me upright, with head thrown
back and nostrils inhaling the breeze.

"Ay," said my father, at my elbow, "there is no scent on earth to
compare with it. You smell the _macchia_, lad. Drink well your
first draught of it, delicious as first love."

"But somewhere--at some time--I have smelt it before," said I.
"The same scent, only fainter. Why does it remind me of home?"

My father considered. "I will tell you," he said. "In the corridor
at home, outside my bedroom door, stands a wardrobe, and in it hang
the clothes I wore, near upon twenty years ago, in Corsica.
They keep the fragrance of the _macchia_ yet; and if, as a child, you
ever opened that wardrobe, you recall it at this moment."

"Yes," said I, "that was the scent."

My father leaned and gazed at the island with dim eyes.

Still no sign of house or habitation greeted us as we worked by short
tacks towards a deep