His companions were similarly entertained. Captain La Vasseur was soon satisfied that he too was greatly pleasing to the fair and lovely savage who had been assigned him; and not one of the Frenchmen, but had his share of the delights and endearments which made the business of life in Iracana. The soldiers had each a fair creature, with whom he waltzed and wandered; and fond discourse, everywhere in the great shadows of the wood, between sympathizing spirits, opened a new idea of existence to the poor Huguenots who, hitherto, had only known the land of Florida, by its privations and its gold. The dusky damsels, alike sweet and artless, brought back to our poor adventurers precious recollections of youthful fancies along the banks of the Garonne and the Loire, and it is not improbable, that, under the excitement of new emotions, had Laudonniere proposed to transfer La Caroline to the Satilla, or Somme, instead of May River, they might have been ready to waive, for a season at least, their impatient desire to return to France. Night was at length subdued to silence on the banks of the Satilla. The sounds of revelry had ceased. All slept, and the transition from night to day passed, sweetly and insensibly, almost without the consciousness of the parties. But, with the sunrise, the great conch sounded in the forest. The Eden of the Floridian did not imply a life of mere repose. The people were gathered to their harvesting, and the labors of the day, under the auspices of a gracious rule, were made to seem a pleasure. Hand in hand, the Queen Iracana, with her maidens, and her guests, followed to the maize fields. Already had she found D'Erlach, and her slender fingers, without any sense of shame, had taken possession of his hand, which she pressed at moments very tenderly. He had already informed her of the wants and the sufferings of his garrison, and she smiled with a new feeling of happiness, as she eagerly assured him that his people should receive abundance. She bent with her own hands the towering stalks; and, detaching the ears, flung to the ground a few in all these places, on which it was meant that the heaps should be accumulated. "Give these to our friends, the Frenchmen," she said, indicating with a sweep of the hand, a large tract of the field, through which they went. D'Erlach felt this liberality. He squeezed her fingers fondly in return,--saying words of compliment which, possibly, in her ear, meant something more than compliment.