Just for the present Will was too hurt and too humiliated to think of his poverty, as he stalked a few paces behind Donna Rusidda and the Admiral, who, having made up his charitable resolve, soon melted again under the smiles of the beautiful girl. "It would be much better if you had not seen the all sit-oo-ation," said Donna Rusidda. "Oh, I can easily make that all right," answered the Admiral cheerily. "Is it so? I think the Signor W-Will he look like the thunder." "Well, I think he looks more like the rain; but he can thunder, I assure you, and lighten too." "Perhaps I oughted not to do it, but in Naples it is very droll." "Well, of course I had rather you had done it to me, or to my captain. I always make a point of considering a boy's pride more than a man's. I was a very little chap when I first went to sea, Princess. The first thing the boatswain said when he saw me, was that I was not long for this world. But I have cheated him," he continued, cutting a comical little caper. "Do not speak it too soon, Eccellenza: you are not so old." "Not old!--why, I am forty." "The Ambassador's wife she gave the ball on your native day, is it not?" He nodded pleasantly, with a smile at her English. "You had the earth under your feet before you were of forty years." "Mostly sea, Princess, I can assure you." "I ought to have spoken _world_ instead of _earth_, is it so?" "Dear Princess, I was but jesting to turn off your flattery. I understood you perfectly." "Please not to jest against my English, Eccellenza," she begged, with a rich rush of colour to her dusky cheeks: "I feel the _mauvaise honte_ at speaking it, but strive to defeat myself." "My dear young lady! you make me feel more ashamed of myself than the whole French fleet could. If I were to wrestle with your language, as you do with mine, you would keep in such a fit of laughing that you could not understand a single word." Will noted the look of unutterable gratitude on the girl's face, and put down the whole Sicilian nation as more theatrical than My Lady. "Will you take it unhappily, if I speak something, Eccellenza?" "No, I am sure I shall not: you may say anything you like to me," he replied gallantly. "The Ambassador's wife she is very beautiful." "She is the loveliest woman on earth," he said warmly, "and the best. There never was a woman so good-hearted, and so thoroughly good." "She loves you."