come from the head of the Adriatic in quest of iron.

At the moment of which we are writing, however, but a dozen living
beings were visible in or about all these craft. The intelligence that
a strange lugger, resembling the one described, was in the offing, and
had drawn nearly all the mariners ashore; and most of the habitués of
the port had followed them up the broad steps of the crooked streets
which led to the heights behind the town; or to the rocky elevation that
overlooks the sea from northeast to west. The approach of the lugger
produced some such effect on the mariners of this unsophisticated and
little frequented port, as that of the hawk is known to excite among the
timid tenants of the barn-yard. The rig of the stranger had been noted
two hours before by one or two old coasters, who habitually passed their
idle moments on the heights, examining the signs of the weather, and
indulging in gossip; and their conjectures had drawn to the Porto
Ferrajo mall some twenty men, who fancied themselves, or who actually
were, _cognoscenti_ in matters of the sea. When, however, the low, long,
dark hull, which upheld such wide sheets of canvas, became fairly
visible, the omens thickened, rumors spread, and hundreds collected on
the spot, which, in Manhattanese parlance, would probably have been
called a battery. Nor would the name have been altogether inappropriate,
as a small battery was established there, and that, too, in a position
which would easily throw a shot two-thirds of a league into the offing;
or about the distance that the stranger was now from the shore.

Tommaso Tonti was the oldest mariner of Elba, and luckily, being a
sober, and usually a discreet man, he was the oracle of the island in
most things that related to the sea. As each citizen, wine-dealer,
grocer, innkeeper, or worker in iron, came up on the height, he
incontinently inquired for Tonti, or 'Maso, as he was generally called;