When it was reported to the captain of the _Medusa_ that the wife of General de Ribeaupierre was in the _Bien Aimé_, he politely offered her the use of a cabin on board his ship; but having no wish to be separated from Eugene, she continued in the privateer, with which the frigate kept company for several days, until she saw her close in shore under the white cliffs of Old England, when she brought her starboard tacks on board, and, like a great eagle in search of fresh prey, stood over towards the coast of France. Thus, on the evening of the 16th of March, exactly two months after the battle of Corunna, Quentin found the _Bien Aimé_ safely anchored at Spithead, close by the guns of a line-of-battle ship. There Eugene gave his parole, and Quentin found himself a free man! The news spread rapidly in Portsmouth and in the Isle of Wight that the wife and son of Bonaparte's favourite cavalry officer, the Governor of Corunna, had been brought in as prisoners; and thus, on the very day they were preparing to go on shore, escorted by Quentin, a staff-officer, in full uniform, came fussily on board in a boat pulled by marines. Quentin recognised in him Lloyd Conyers, the aide-de-camp, whom he had frequently seen in Spain. He had come, he stated, "by direction of the General commanding in the Isle of Wight, to invite Madame de Ribeaupierre, with her friends and attendants, to share the hospitality of his house--to consider it as her home, in fact, until she could make such arrangements as she wished." "Is the general married, monsieur?" asked madame, smiling; "for I am not so very old." "Madame, the general is married, and is nearer seventy than sixty," replied Conyers, laughing behind his great staff plume. "A boat is in readiness, and a carriage awaits you on the beach. The general lives at Minden Lodge, St. Helen's--we dine at half-past six." Madame de Ribeaupierre, who was considerably crushed and crestfallen, accepted the general's offer; and accompanied by her maid, who had many misgivings and vague terrors of the natives, by her son and her aide-de-camp, as she laughingly styled Quentin, landed in the Isle of Wight; and for the first time in her life found herself treading English ground. CHAPTER XXIV. MINDEN LODGE. "What thing is Love, which not can countervail Naught save itself? even such a thing is Love. And worldly wealth in worth as far doth fail, As lowest earth doth yield to heaven above. Divine is Love, and scorneth worldly pelf, And can be bought with nothing but with self." RALEIGH.