"After this we were a very happy party. The girls, of course, wanted to know all about Miranda here"—here my darling smiled, and took his hand; "I dashed off a sketch, and some day you can ask Mariana and Elinor—both great friends of mine they are—if it is a good likeness."
"I am afraid it was too good," sighed Miranda, "and they will be dreadfully disappointed."
The end of it was that we left the Florentia at eight bells, in great state and majesty, in a whaleboat—upon which Miranda insisted, despising the captain's gig as a trumpery skiff—and a picked crew, with the skipper himself as the steer-oar.
"That's really something like," she said, as she stepped lightly on to the thwart. "If there was a little swell on, I should feel quite myself again, and think of the dear days when I was a happy little island girl, bare-footed and bare-headed, and thought going off to a strange vessel through the great, solemn, sweeping rollers the wildest enjoyment. But I am a happy girl now," she added, with a look in her deep eyes which expressed a world of love and rich content; "only the thought of learning to be a lady sometimes troubles me."
"You will never need to do that," I said.
"There is the house?" I cried; "there's Isola Bella!" as we rounded a point, and a picturesque stone house came full into view. It had been built in the early days of the colony by an Imperial officer, long resident in Italy, and showed the period in its massive stone walls, Florentine façade, and wide, paved verandah. The site was elevated above the lake-like waters of the bay, towards which a winding walk led, terminating in a massive stone pier, into which iron rings and stanchions had been let. The beach was white and smooth, though the tide ran high, and the wavelets rippled close to the pale sandstone rocks, which lent a tone of delicacy and purity to the foreshore.
The weather-stained walls of the house were half covered with climbers, a wilderness of tropical shrubs, and richly-blooming flower-thickets. There were glades interspersed, carpeted with the thick-swarded couch or "dhoub" grass, originally imported from India, and which, nourished by the coast showers, and delighting in a humid atmosphere, preserves its general freshness of colour the long Australian summer through.
I had been so preoccupied with speculations as to Miranda's reception by my family, that my own emotions, on returning to my childhood's home, lay in abeyance. Now, however, at the near view of the house—the pier, the walled-in sea-bath—the scenes and adventures of my earliest youth came back with overwhelming force and clearness. There was the boat-house, into which I had paddled so many a time after nightfall, returning from fishing or sailing excursions. There was the flagstaff on which was displayed the Union Jack and other flags on great occasions. The old flag floated in the breeze to-day. I knew for what reason and celebration. I could see my mother, as of old, walking down to the pier to welcome and embrace, or to remonstrate and fondly chide when I had remained absent in stormy weather. How many fears and anxieties had I not caused to agitate that loving heart! And my stern and mostly silent parent—did I not once surprise him in scarce dignified sorrow at my night-long absence and probable untimely decease. Yet all his words were, "God forgive you, my boy, for the misery you have caused us this night."
And now the years had passed—had flown rather, crowded as they were with incident—that had changed the heedless boy into the man,—matured, perhaps, by too early worldly knowledge, and the grim comradeship of danger and death. I had returned safely, bringing my sheaves with me in the guise of one dearer to me than life. I had, during the intervals of reflection I had lately enjoyed, repented fully of the unconsciously selfish sins of my youth, and was fixed in firm resolve to atone, so far as in me lay, by care and consideration in the future.