"So much the worse for thee, caro, since the good bishop is better at
stopping the lava than at quieting the winds. But there was danger,
then, of losing the felucca and her brave people among the Turks?"

"There was, in truth, a Tunis-man prowling about, between Stromboli and
Sicily; but, Ali di San Michele! he might better have chased the cloud
above the volcano than run after the felucca in a sirocco!"

"Thou wast chicken-hearted, Stefano!"

"I!--I was more like thy lion here, with some small additions of chains
and muzzles."

"As was seen by thy felucca's speed?"

"Cospetto! I wished myself a knight of San Giovanni a thousand times
during the chase, and La Bella Sorrentina a brave Maltese galley, if it
were only for the cause of Christian honor! The miscreant hung upon my
quarter for the better part of three glasses; so near, that I could tell
which of the knaves wore dirty cloth in his turban, and which clean. It
was a sore sight to a Christian, Stefano, to see the right thus borne
upon by an infidel."

"And thy feet warmed with the thought of the bastinado, caro mio?"

"I have run too often barefoot over our Calabrian mountains, to tingle
at the sole with every fancy of that sort."

"Every man has his weak spot, and I know thine to be dread of a Turk's