the fabric of a fresh romance on the instant, especially (on
Florence telling him more about her forebears) when he began to
mix up the Pilgrim Fathers, the Revolutionary War, and the Alabama
in one brisk panorama of his ever dear "Far Vest"!

Florence's acquaintance with the comte de Souvary went back to
Majorca, where, in the course of one of those sudden blows, so
common on the Mediterranean, their respective yachts had fled for
shelter. His own was a large auxiliary schooner called the
Paquita, a lofty, showy vessel which he sailed himself with his
usual courage and audacity. He had the reputation of scaring his
unhappy guests--when any were bold enough to accept his
invitations--to within the proverbial inch of their lives; and
they usually changed "ze sensation" for the nearest mail-boat
home. Florence and he had struck up a warm friendship from the
start, and for the whole summer their vessels were inseparable,
sailing everywhere in company and anchoring side by side.

The count had a way of courtship peculiarly his own. He made it
apparent from the first how deeply he had been stirred by
Florence's beauty and how ready he was to offer her his hand; but
as a matter of fact he never did so in set terms, and treated her
more as a comrade than a divinity. He talked of his own devotion
to her as something detached and impersonal, willing as much as
she to laugh over it and treat it lightly. He was never jealous,
never exacting, and seemed to be as happy to share her with others
as when he had her all alone in one of their tete-a-tetes. What he
coveted most of all was her intimacy, her confidence, the frank
expression of her own true self; and in this exchange he was
willing to give as much as he received and often more. Sometimes