my friend," said the notary, imprudently.

The sailor is, in all lands, a being of a race apart, holding all
land-folk in contempt. This one happened to be a bas-Breton, who saw but
one thing in Maitre Mathias's request.

"Come ashore, indeed!" he thought, as he rowed. "Make the captain lose a
passenger! If one listened to those walruses we'd have nothing to do but
embark and disembark 'em. He's afraid that son of his will catch cold."

The sailor gave Paul the letter and said not a word of the message.
Recognizing the handwriting of his wife and de Marsay, Paul supposed
that he knew what they both would urge upon him. Anxious not to be
influenced by offers which he believed their devotion to his welfare
would inspire, he put the letters in his pocket unread, with apparent
indifference.

Absorbed in the sad thoughts which assail the strongest man under such
circumstances, Paul gave way to his grief as he waved his hand to
his old friend, and bade farewell to France, watching the steeples of
Bordeaux as they fled out of sight. He seated himself on a coil of rope.
Night overtook him still lost in thought. With the semi-darkness of the
dying day came doubts; he cast an anxious eye into the future. Sounding
it, and finding there uncertainty and danger, he asked his soul if
courage would fail him. A vague dread seized his mind as he thought of
Natalie left wholly to herself; he repented the step he had taken; he
regretted Paris and his life there. Suddenly sea-sickness overcame him.
Every one knows the effect of that disorder. The most horrible of its
sufferings devoid of danger is a complete dissolution of the will.
An inexplicable distress relaxes to their very centre the cords of
vitality; the soul no longer performs its functions; the sufferer
becomes indifferent to everything; the mother forgets her child, the
lover his mistress, the strongest man lies prone, like an inert mass.
Paul was carried to his cabin, where he stayed three days, lying on his
back, gorged with grog by the sailors, or vomiting; thinking of nothing,
and sleeping much. Then he revived into a species of convalescence, and
returned by degrees to his ordinary condition. The first morning after
he felt better he went on deck and passed the poop, breathing in the
salt breezes of another atmosphere. Putting his hands into his pockets
he felt the letters. At once he opened them, beginning with that of his
wife.

In order that the letter of the Comtes