Part 17

He threw one arm around my body, and pressing me to his side, he said: "Look at this sheet of paper. Do you see? These are the corrections made by my poor mother. She always strengthened my _l_'s and my _t_'s. And the last lines are entirely hers. She had learned to imitate my characters; and when I was tired and sleepy, she finished my work for me. My sainted mother!"

And he kissed the page.

"See here," said the teacher, showing him the other packages; "these are my reminiscences. Each year I laid aside one piece of work of each of my pupils; and they are all here, dated and arranged in order. Every time that I open them thus, and read a line here and there, a thousand things recur to my mind, and I seem to be living once more in the days that are past. How many of them have passed, my dear sir! I close my eyes, and I see behind me face after face, class after class, hundreds and hundreds of boys, and who knows how many of them are already dead! Many of them I remember well. I recall distinctly the best and the worst: those who gave me the greatest pleasure, and those who caused me to pass sorrowful moments; for I have had serpents, too, among that vast number! But now, you understand, it is as though I were already in the other world, and I love them all equally."

He sat down again, and took one of my hands in his.

"And tell me," my father said, with a smile, "do you not recall any roguish tricks?"

"Of yours, sir?" replied the old man, also with a smile. "No; not just at this moment. But that does not in the least mean that you never played any. However, you had good judgment; you were serious for your age. I remember the great affection of your mother for you. But it is very kind and polite of you to have come to seek me out. How could you leave your occupations, to come and see a poor old schoolmaster?"

"Listen, Signor Crosetti," responded my father with vivacity. "I recollect the first time that my poor mother accompanied me to school. It was to be her first parting from me for two hours; of letting me out of the house alone, in other hands than my father's; in the hands of a stranger, in short. To this good creature my entrance into school was like my entrance into the world, the first of a long series of necessary and painful separations; it was society which was tearing her son from her for the first time, never again to return him to her intact. She was much affected; so was I. I bade her farewell with a trembling voice, and then, as she went away, I saluted her once more through the glass in the door, with my eyes full of tears. And just at that point you made a gesture with one hand, laying the other on your breast, as though to say, 'Trust me, signora.' Well, the gesture, the glance, from which I perceived that you had comprehended all the sentiments, all the thoughts of my mother; that look which seemed to say, 'Courage!' that gesture which was an honest promise of protection, of affection, of indulgence, I have never forgotten; it has remained forever engraved on my heart; and it is that memory which induced me to set out from Turin. And here I am, after the lapse of four and forty years, for the purpose of saying to you, 'Thanks, dear teacher.'"

The master did not reply; he stroked my hair with his hand, and his hand trembled, and glided from my hair to my forehead, from my forehead to my shoulder.

In the meanwhile, my father was surveying those bare walls, that wretched bed, the morsel of bread and the little phial of oil which lay on the window-sill, and he seemed desirous of saying, "Poor master! after sixty years of teaching, is this all thy recompense?"

But the good old man was content, and began once more to talk with vivacity of our family, of the other teachers of that day, and of my father's schoolmates; some of them he remembered, and some of them he did not; and each told the other news of this one or of that one. When my father interrupted the conversation, to beg the old man to come down into the town and lunch with us, he replied effusively, "I thank you, I thank you," but he seemed undecided. My father took him by both hands, and besought him afresh. "But how shall I manage to eat," said the master, "with these poor hands which shake in this way? It is a penance for others also."

"We will help you, master," said my father. And then he accepted, as he shook his head and smiled.

"This is a beautiful day," he said, as he closed the outer door, "a beautiful day, dear Signor Bottini! I assure you that I shall remember it as long as I live."

My father gave one arm to the master, and the latter took me by the hand, and we descended the lane. We met two little barefooted girls leading some cows, and a boy who passed us on a run, with a huge load of straw on his shoulders. The master told us that they were scholars of the second grade; that in the morning they led the cattle to pasture, and worked in the fields barefoot; and in the afternoon they put on their shoes and went to school. It was nearly mid-day. We encountered no one else. In a few minutes we reached the inn, seated ourselves at a large table, with the master between us, and began our breakfast at once. The inn was as silent as a convent. The master was very merry, and his excitement augmented his palsy: he could hardly eat. But my father cut up his meat, broke his bread, and put salt on his plate. In order to drink, he was obliged to hold the glass with both hands, and even then he struck his teeth. But he talked constantly, and with ardor, of the reading-books of his young days; of the notaries of the present day; of the commendations bestowed on him by his superiors; of the regulations of late years: and all with that serene countenance, a trifle redder than at first, and with that gay voice of his, and that laugh which was almost the laugh of a young man. And my father gazed and gazed at him, with that same expression with which I sometimes catch him gazing at me, at home, when he is thinking and smiling to himself, with his face turned aside.

The teacher allowed some wine to trickle down on his breast; my father rose, and wiped it off with his napkin. "No, sir; I cannot permit this," the old man said, and smiled. He said some words in Latin. And, finally, he raised his glass, which wavered about in his hand, and said very gravely, "To your health, my dear engineer, to that of your children, to the memory of your good mother!"

"To yours, my good master!" replied my father, pressing his hand. And at the end of the room stood the innkeeper and several others, watching us, and smiling as though they were pleased at this attention which was being shown to the teacher from their parts.

At a little after two o'clock we came out, and the master wanted to escort us to the station. My father gave him his arm once more, and he again took me by the hand: I carried his cane for him. The people paused to look on, for they all knew him: some saluted him. At one point in the street we heard, through an open window, many boys' voices, reading together, and spelling. The old man halted, and seemed to be saddened by it.

"This, my dear Signor Bottini," he said, "is what pains me. To hear the voices of boys in school, and not be there any more; to think that another man is there. I have heard that music for sixty years, and I have grown to love it. Now I am deprived of my family. I have no sons."

"No, master," my father said to him, starting on again; "you still have many sons, scattered about the world, who remember you, as I have always remembered you."

"No, no," replied the master sadly; "I have no longer a school; I have no longer any sons. And without sons, I shall not live much longer. My hour will soon strike."

"Do not say that, master; do not think it," said my father. "You have done so much good in every way! You have put your life to such a noble use!"

The aged master inclined his hoary head for an instant on my father's shoulder, and pressed my hand.

We entered the station. The train was on the point of starting.

"Farewell, master!" said my father, kissing him on both cheeks.

"Farewell! thanks! farewell!" replied the master, taking one of my father's hands in his two trembling hands, and pressing it to his heart.

Then I kissed him and felt that his face was bathed in tears. My father pushed me into the railway carriage, and at the moment of starting he quickly removed the coarse cane from the schoolmaster's hand, and in its place he put his own handsome one, with a silver handle and his initials, saying, "Keep it in memory of me."

The old man tried to return it and to recover his own; but my father was already inside and had closed the door.

"Farewell, my kind master!"

"Farewell, my son!" responded the master as the train moved off; "and may God bless you for the consolation which you have afforded to a poor old man!"

"Until we meet again!" cried my father, in a voice full of emotion.

But the master shook his head, as much as to say, "We shall never see each other more."

"Yes, yes," repeated my father, "until we meet again!"

And the other replied by raising his trembling hand to heaven, "Up there!"

And thus he disappeared from our sight, with his hand on high.

CONVALESCENCE.

Thursday, 20th.

Who could have told me, when I returned from that delightful excursion with my father, that for ten days I should not see the country or the sky again? I have been very ill--in danger of my life. I have heard my mother sobbing--I have seen my father very, very pale, gazing intently at me; and my sister Silvia and my brother talking in a low voice; and the doctor, with his spectacles, who was there every moment, and who said things to me that I did not understand. In truth, I have been on the verge of saying a final farewell to every one. Ah, my poor mother! I passed three or four days at least, of which I recollect almost nothing, as though I had been in a dark and perplexing dream. I thought I beheld at my bedside my kind schoolmistress of the upper primary, who was trying to stifle her cough in her handkerchief in order not to disturb me. In the same manner I confusedly recall my master, who bent over to kiss me, and who pricked my face a little with his beard; and I saw, as in a mist, the red head of Crossi, the golden curls of Derossi, the Calabrian clad in black, all pass by, and Garrone, who brought me a mandarin orange with its leaves, and ran away in haste because his mother is ill.

Then I awoke as from a very long dream, and understood that I was better from seeing my father and mother smiling, and hearing Silvia singing softly. Oh, what a sad dream it was! Then I began to improve every day. The little mason came and made me laugh once more for the first time, with his hare's face; and how well he does it, now that his face is somewhat elongated through illness, poor fellow! And Coretti came; and Garoffi came to present me with two tickets in his new lottery of "a penknife with five surprises," which he purchased of a second-hand dealer in the Via Bertola. Then, yesterday, while I was asleep, Precossi came and laid his cheek on my hand without waking me; and as he came from his father's workshop, with his face covered with coal dust, he left a black print on my sleeve, the sight of which caused me great pleasure when I awoke.

How green the trees have become in these few days! And how I envy the boys whom I see running to school with their books when my father carries me to the window! But I shall go back there soon myself. I am so impatient to see all the boys once more, and my seat, the garden, the streets; to know all that has taken place during the interval; to apply myself to my books again, and to my copy-books, which I seem not to have seen for a year! How pale and thin my poor mother has grown! Poor father! how weary he looks! And my kind companions who came to see me and walked on tiptoe and kissed my brow! It makes me sad, even now, to think that one day we must part. Perhaps I shall continue my studies with Derossi and with some others; but how about all the rest? When the fourth grade is once finished, then good by! we shall never see each other again: I shall never see them again at my bedside when I am ill,--Garrone, Precossi, Coretti, who are such fine boys and kind and dear comrades,--never more!

FRIENDS AMONG THE WORKINGMEN.

Thursday, 20th.

Why "never more," Enrico? That will depend on yourself. When you have finished the fourth grade, you will go to the Gymnasium, and they will become workingmen; but you will remain in the same city for many years, perhaps. Why, then, will you never meet again? When you are in the University or the Lyceum, you will seek them out in their shops or their workrooms, and it will be a great pleasure for you to meet the companions of your youth once more, as men at work.

I should like to see you neglecting to look up Coretti or Precossi, wherever they may be! And you will go to them, and you will pass hours in their company, and you will see, when you come to study life and the world, how many things you can learn from them, which no one else is capable of teaching you, both about their arts and their society and your own country. And have a care; for if you do not preserve these friendships, it will be extremely difficult for you to acquire other similar ones in the future,--friendships, I mean to say, outside of the class to which you belong; and thus you will live in one class only; and the man who associates with but one social class is like the student who reads but one book.

Let it be your firm resolve, then, from this day forth, that you will keep these good friends even after you shall be separated, and from this time forth, cultivate precisely these by preference because they are the sons of workingmen. You see, men of the upper classes are the officers, and men of the lower classes are the soldiers of toil; and thus in society as in the army, not only is the soldier no less noble than the officer, since nobility consists in work and not in wages, in valor and not in rank; but if there is also a superiority of merit, it is on the side of the soldier, of the workmen, who draw the lesser profit from the work. Therefore love and respect above all others, among your companions, the sons of the soldiers of labor; honor in them the toil and the sacrifices of their parents; disregard the differences of fortune and of class, upon which the base alone regulate their sentiments and courtesy; reflect that from the veins of laborers in the shops and in the country issued nearly all that blessed blood which has redeemed your country; love Garrone, love Coretti, love Precossi, love your little mason, who, in their little workingmen's breasts, possess the hearts of princes; and take an oath to yourself that no change of fortune shall ever eradicate these friendships of childhood from your soul. Swear to yourself that forty years hence, if, while passing through a railway station, you recognize your old Garrone in the garments of an engineer, with a black face,--ah! I cannot think what to tell you to swear. I am sure that you will jump upon the engine and fling your arms round his neck, though you were even a senator of the kingdom.

THY FATHER.

GARRONE'S MOTHER.

Saturday, 29th.

On my return to school, the first thing I heard was some bad news. Garrone had not been there for several days because his mother was seriously ill. She died on Saturday. Yesterday morning, as soon as we came into school, the teacher said to us:--

"The greatest misfortune that can happen to a boy has happened to poor Garrone: his mother is dead. He will return to school to-morrow. I beseech you now, boys, respect the terrible sorrow that is now rending his soul. When he enters, greet him with affection, and gravely; let no one jest, let no one laugh at him, I beg of you."

And this morning poor Garrone came in, a little later than the rest; I felt a blow at my heart at the sight of him. His face was haggard, his eyes were red, and he was unsteady on his feet; it seemed as though he had been ill for a month. I hardly recognized him; he was dressed all in black; he aroused our pity. No one even breathed; all gazed at him. No sooner had he entered than at the first sight of that schoolroom whither his mother had come to get him nearly every day, of that bench over which she had bent on so many examination days to give him a last bit of advice, and where he had so many times thought of her, in his impatience to run out and meet her, he burst into a desperate fit of weeping. The teacher drew him aside to his own place, and pressed him to his breast, and said to him:--

"Weep, weep, my poor boy; but take courage. Your mother is no longer here; but she sees you, she still loves you, she still lives by your side, and one day you will behold her once again, for you have a good and upright soul like her own. Take courage!"

Having said this, he accompanied him to the bench near me. I dared not look at him. He drew out his copy-books and his books, which he had not opened for many days, and as he opened the reading-book at a place where there was a cut representing a mother leading her son by the hand, he burst out crying again, and laid his head on his arm. The master made us a sign to leave him thus, and began the lesson. I should have liked to say something to him, but I did not know what. I laid one hand on his arm, and whispered in his ear:--

"Don't cry, Garrone."

He made no reply, and without raising his head from the bench he laid his hand on mine and kept it there a while. At the close of school, no one addressed him; all the boys hovered round him respectfully, and in silence. I saw my mother waiting for me, and ran to embrace her; but she repulsed me, and gazed at Garrone. For the moment I could not understand why; but then I perceived that Garrone was standing apart by himself and gazing at me; and he was gazing at me with a look of indescribable sadness, which seemed to say: "You are embracing your mother, and I shall never embrace mine again! You have still a mother, and mine is dead!" And then I understood why my mother had thrust me back, and I went out without taking her hand.

GIUSEPPE MAZZINI.

Saturday, 29th.

This morning, also, Garrone came to school with a pale face and his eyes swollen with weeping, and he hardly cast a glance at the little gifts which we had placed on his desk to console him. But the teacher had brought a page from a book to read to him in order to encourage him. He first informed us that we are to go to-morrow at one o'clock to the town-hall to witness the award of the medal for civic valor to a boy who has saved a little child from the Po, and that on Monday he will dictate the description of the festival to us instead of the monthly story. Then turning to Garrone, who was standing with drooping head, he said to him:--

"Make an effort, Garrone, and write down what I dictate to you as well as the rest."

We all took our pens, and the teacher dictated.

"Giuseppe Mazzini, born in Genoa in 1805, died in Pisa in 1872, a grand, patriotic soul, the mind of a great writer, the first inspirer and apostle of the Italian Revolution; who, out of love for his country, lived for forty years poor, exiled, persecuted, a fugitive heroically steadfast in his principles and in his resolutions. Giuseppe Mazzini, who adored his mother, and who derived from her all that there was noblest and purest in her strong and gentle soul, wrote as follows to a faithful friend of his, to console him in the greatest of misfortunes. These are almost his exact words:--