Page:In Maremma, by Ouida (vol 3).djvu/68

 to do but to try at Orbetello. The wind was all in her favour, and the sea, though boisterous, was no stormier than pleased her, sea-gull as she had been called so long.

The boat beneath her, as it rose and sank and leaped the crests of this wave and of that, was to her as the horse is to the fearless rider. The sea was so familiar to her; she was at home upon it as any one of the storm swallows after which they had named her in her babyhood.

The red and green of the tufa land, the deep shadows of the pine-woods, the pale aloe-dotted shores, the distant mountains amethyst and purple as the mists cleared from them, flew by her rapidly; a belt of seething, wind-blown, sunny water flashing and heaving between herself and them.

At Orbetello she could sell her linen, not over well but at a fairly decent price.

She rested a little, ate her bread, and bought for a small bronze coin a plateful of cooked rice; then she purchased the wine and the flour she needed at home, and put the rest of the money she had earned safely away in the breast of her tunic.

There did not remain much, for wine was dear in vineless Maremma. She paid a