LITERATURE.

Globe, Volume XXII, Issue 2080, 23 October 1880, Page 3

LITERATURE.

A CONSPIRATOR IN SPITE OF MYSELF. [Abridged from “Allthe Year Round.”] ( Concluded .l Gustave, who was still half stupefied with bewilderment, mumbled bis thanks; and the lady, rising from the sofa upon which she had sat, again bowed to me, and retired with her female companion into the aftercabin. Gustave and I ascended to the deck, followed by the young officer, who told ns that we were at liberty to return to the lugger, which had accompanied the schooner, and was now about half-a-mile to leeward. 'Yon will place M. le Due and the other gentlemen who remained behind on board your vessel on shore at whatsoever spot M. le Duo shall advise,’ he said to Gustave, ‘then you will be free to go where you please. But I advise you to give the corvette a wide berth, and I warn you to be silent respecting what you have seen or heard this past night .’ Ho then warmly thanked me and returned to the cabin. The boat that was towing astern was hauled up alongside. The padrone and I and three additional seamen descended into her, and the seamen polled us alongside the lugger, which was hove-to as the boat approached her. Wo clambered to her deck, and the Italian sailors returned to their own vessel, which was likewise hove-to, in order to receive them on board. We saw the boat hoisted to the davits, and then the schooner’s

sails were trimmed, and she sailed away westward under a press of canvas, with great swiftness.

It was by this time six or seven o’clock a.m.and broad daylight; but with the exception of ten or a dozen fishing-vessels, whose crews were plying their avocation to windward, nothing was visible upon the water.

The aged officer, M. le Duo, directed the padrone to steer southward towards the coast of Calabria; and about mid-day we landed' onr passengers at a solitary spot a few miles south of the small seaport of Paola

The fishing-vessels were making their way slowly northward under easy sail; and by my advice the padrone ran down towards them, and when we reached them we threw out our nets, as If we had been patiently occupied in fishing throughout the night, Onstave and I having previously divested omselves of our military uniforms, and resumed our proper garb. I recommended the padrone to conceal the money-bag—which was found to contain five hundred scudos, making, with the hundred scudos Gustave had previously received, the sum of one hundred and forty pounds Stirling—in some secure place, where it was not likely to bo found if the vessel should be searched ; for I thought it very probable that the corvette—whose officers and crew has seen us enter the Gulf of Pollcastro on the previous day, as we sailed close past her—would be cruising about in search of the fugitives. We soon discovered that I had advised wisely. An hour or two later, a ahip-of-war was espied cruising to windward between the fishing-vessels and the shore. She bore down swiftly towards us; and the fishermen hauled in their nets and made sail on their vessels, for they dreaded, during these troublesome times lest they should be impressed, or lest their vessels should be seized for the service of the government. A gun fired from the corvette, the ball from which passed over them and ricochetted on the water for a Jong distance beyond them, speedily brousht them to; and when within a short distance of the little fleet, the corvette was hove to, and font boats filled with officers and men we T e lowered from her sides. The boats were pulled towards us, and one after another the fishing vessels were boarded and searched, and their ozews sharply questioned. The crew of La belle Jeannette were told, for the sake of their own safety, to be perfectly silent in respect to all that had occurred during the past night; and to reply to all questions that might be put to them, that they were harmless fishermen prosecuting their arduous calling. In a few moments it came to onr tnrn to be boarded; and we learned from the officer who came on board that some great personage had escaped from the shore during the night. This wm all that we could make ont, for we conld not understand the officer’s langnags, and his attempts at French'were nearly as unintelligible to ns as was his Italian. He made us to understand, however, that he was confident that our lugger had sailed from the Gulf daring the ' night. * Yes, monsieur, * I replied ; *we sailed at midnight. We have been unfortunate. The fish had quitted the Gulf, and we sailed to try our luck in open water.’ Between signs and words, he asked if we had seen any other vessel leave the Gulf during the night. ‘ Only a large boat, monsieur,’ I replied, *it was crowded with people, and it rowed out to a vessel that was awaiting it outside.’ ‘At what hour?’ * At midnight, monsieur officer, just when wo were leaving,’ The officer shook his head. It was evident that he suspected that we knew more than we thought proper to disclose. The vessel was searched narrowly, bat as he conld find nothing that looked suspicions on board, he did not detain us. I have no doubt that, had the lugger been nnder the Italian flag, he would have detained us; but nearly onehalf the number of the vessels that were searched were French, like our own, and he feared lest he might cause trouble with France, At the end of a fortnight we arrived at Tonlon. The fishery had been unsuccessful. La belle Jeannette had not half a full cargo on board, and none of the other luggers belonging to the port had met with much better fortune. Hut Gustave Failleur, though he had been much frightened, and though, had we been arrested, he would probably have been placed In a position of great peril, had after all made a prosperous voyage through his involuntary connection with a conspiracy of whose nature and object he was perfectly ignorant. About three weeks after my return to Tonlon, the frigate to which I belonged arrived in that port from her cruise, and I Immediately rejoined herj but a long time elapsed ere I spoke of the adventure in which I had taken part, even to my mfs - mates in the midshipmen’s berth. It was in fact to me an incomprehensible mystery. The more I strove to solve It, the more mysterious It appeared to be. It was not until nearly two years had elapsed from the dote of the occurrence that I came by chance across an old French newspaper—dated shortly after the cessation of the troubles in Naples—which, though in accordance with the French custom, proper names were designated simply by initials, threw some light upon the subject. The writer of the paragraph alluded to a * Romantic Affair ’ which occurred during the late revolution in Naples. ‘ A young demoiselle, ’ he wrote, ‘of high rank, nearly related to the king, beautiful, and the possessor of of great wealth in her own right, had long been secretly attached to the Prince de G , a young officer in his Majesty’s service. The king—who was, in fact, the young lady’s gnardian—was informed of this attachment, of which he strongly disapproved. It was his Majesty’s wish that his yonng and beautiful ward, who was at this period but nineteen years of age, should enter a convent, in order that he might appropriate to himself the greater portion, if not the whole, of her vast wealth.

The young lady, however —the Princess de L.—had no inclination towards the life of a religicuse, no matter how high the position to which she might have attained in the convent. Sympathising strongly with the distressed peasantry in the vicinity of her abode in the royal palazzo D., on the confines of Calabria, she frequently sent them such assistance as she —still a minor—was able to afford. It was said, moreover, probably with some truth, that she secretly favored the cause of the insurgents, and regarded with utter detestation the tyranny of the king. Be this as It may, his majesty made the rumor the pretext for a stricter confinement of hia ward to the palazzo, and ordered that her domestics, in bis pay, should exorcise a keen surveillance over her movements The princess, who had many friends among the nobles of the oonrt, revolted against this rigid surveillance, and at length, weary of persecution, determined to escape, if it were Eossible, frozn the country, carrying with ervnch an amount of wealth—chiefly constating of coatly jewels—aa she could collect together. The young Prince de G., to whom she confined her purpose, joyoutly consented to aid her to escape, and to accompany her in her self-exile. He arranged his plans

'with some other nobles and officers in whoirr he coaid place confidence—the chief of whom Was his ancle, the Duo do P. And, having been instrumental in the rescue, as I have described, I thus became a conspirator in spits of myself. And yet lamby no means sure that, even had 1 been aware beforehand of the nature of the adventure in which I perforce took part, I would not have voluntarily offered my services to aid in the rescue of a persecuted young and beautiful princess from her tyrannical guardian.