MY WEDDING DAY.
"Come, my beloved, let us go forth into the field; let us lodge in the villages. Let us get up early to the vineyards; let us see whether the vine hath budded and the tender grape appear.--"
--The Song of Songs.
Ahead of us, high on our right, rose the mountain ridges, scarp upon scarp, to the snowy peak of Monte Stella; low on our left lay Nonza, and beyond it a sea blue as a sapphire, scarcely rippled, void save for one white sail far away on the south-west horizon--not the Gauntlet; for, distant though she was, I could make out the shape of her canvas, and it was square cut.
Nonza itself lay in the shadow of the shore with the early light shimmering upon its citadel and upper works--a fortress to all appearance asleep: but the Genoese pickets would be awake and guard
