“I have an uncle—the King of the Isle.” “My poor Victoire, has grief unsettled your reason?” “Why?” “Just now you spoke of your daughter as princess of the Isle, but as you also called her a star of the sea, I considered both phrases figurative. Now, however, when you talk gravely of your uncle, who is the King of the Island——” “But grand Dieu! my dear and good friend, you comprehend not. I have one uncle who is a bachelor—old and rich, and resident for a long time upon an island in the sea. But, mon Dieu! he is foolish, imbecile, idiotic,” said Victoire, in a tone of real or assumed grief. “I am sorry, since it distresses you; but I cannot see what your mad uncle has to do with the life of your daughter or the ignorance of her mother.” “But, my faith! it has a great deal to do with both the one and the other. Attend you. I shall nothing conceal. Regard you. You shall know all. Listen you, then, my dear friend!” And Monsieur Victoire L’Orient commenced an explanation which I beg leave to disembarrass from his idiomatic French and broken English and give in less unintelligible language. It seems from the representations of Monsieur Victoire that the family of “L’Orient” really once belonged to the ancient seignory of Provence. The younger and of course poorer branch of that family, were of the company of French Roman Catholics who went out with Lord Baltimore’s emigrant troop, and settled the province of Maryland. This particular family fixed upon one of the loveliest and loneliest of the Islands of the Chesapeake, and from that day, through several successive generations, held it in their exclusive possession. Indeed, their greatest desire, their hereditary passion, seemed to be to keep this beloved and beauteous Island in the family. In all these years the intercourse between the European and the American branches of the old house was not suffered to wane. On the contrary, several successive intermarriages had revived and consolidated the relationship. Thus when an heir of the Island reached man’s estate, his choice of a bride was limited by the number of his marriageable female cousins in France. Or if a daughter happened to be the sole heiress, a husband was found for her among the males of the same. The American branch of the house were called for distinction L’Oriens _de l’Ile_ (or, of the Island). But this term in the course of time became a second surname, or a sort of title, so that the owners of the Island were always called Monsieur L’Orient De L’Ile. And any European L’Orient who married a sole heiress of the Island became in her right, also Monsieur L’Orient De L’Ile;—though by his American neighbors of the coast, he was called simply Mr. De L’Ile.