"By his stature and bearing," said I, conning him through a glass which one of the monks passed to me, "this must be the General himself." "Paoli?" queried the Princess. I nodded. "Shall we go down the rock to meet him?" "It is Paoli's place to mount to us," said she proudly. We waited therefore while my uncle led him up to us. But Pascal Paoli was too great a man to trouble about his dignity; and for courtesies, he contented himself with omitting none. "Salutation, O Princess!" He halted within a few steps of the head of the stairway, and lifted his hat. "Salutation, O General!" "And to you, Cavalier!" He included me in his bow, "Pouf!" he panted, looking about him; "the ascent is a sharp one, under the best conditions. And you carried it in the darkness, against odds?" He turned upon my uncle. "You English are a great race." "Excuse me, General," said my uncle, indicating Dom Basilio and the monks: "the credit belongs rather to my friends here." "I had the pleasure to meet Sir John Constantine, a while ago, outside our new town of Isola Rossa, where he did me a signal service. You are his son, sir?" I bowed. "I condole with you, since I come too late to thank him--on behalf of Corsica, Princess--for a yet more brilliant service. An assault such as your party made last night requires brave men; but even more, it requires a brave leader and a genius even to conceive it. Let me say, sirs, that we heard your fire and saw Giraglia blazing, as far south as Nonza, where we were conducting a far meaner enterprise; and came north in wonder where Corsica had found such friends." "Say rather, sir, where my mother had found them," interposed the Princess, coldly. "Is this curiosity of yours all your business?" The General met her look frankly. If annoyed, he hid his annoyance. "O Princess," answered he, "I will own that Corsica has left the Queen, your mother, overlong here in captivity. For reasons of state it was decided to work northward from point to point, clearing the Genoese as we went. We did not reckon that, before we reached Giraglia, an Englishman of genius would step in to anticipate us. Our hopes, Princess, fell short of an event so happy. But I can say that every Corsican is glad, and would wish to be such a hero." "Did you, then, clear the Genoese from Nonza?" I put in hastily, noting the curl of my mistress's lips. "Sir, there were no Genoese to clear. We bombarded it idly, only to learn that the Commandant Fornari had abandoned it some hours before; that he and his men had escaped northward in long boats, rowing close under the land." I glanced at the Princess, and saw her mouth whiten. "Excuse me," I said. "Do you tell me that the whole garrison of Nonza had escaped?"