Part 5

At sunset the whole line of the Italian advance-posts marched forward towards the foe, and along the same road which had been traversed in the morning by the detachment of cavalry, there proceeded, in two files, a heavy battalion of sharpshooters, who, a few days before, had valiantly watered the hill of San Martino with blood. The news of the boy's death had already spread among the soldiers before they left the encampment. The path, flanked by a rivulet, ran a few paces distant from the house. When the first officers of the battalion caught sight of the little body stretched at the foot of the ash-tree and covered with the tricolored banner, they made the salute to it with their swords, and one of them bent over the bank of the streamlet, which was covered with flowers at that spot, plucked a couple of blossoms and threw them on it. Then all the sharpshooters, as they passed, plucked flowers and threw them on the body. In a few minutes the boy was covered with flowers, and officers and soldiers all saluted him as they passed by: "Bravo, little Lombard!" "Farewell, my lad!" "I salute thee, gold locks!" "Hurrah!" "Glory!" "Farewell!" One officer tossed him his medal for valor; another went and kissed his brow. And flowers continued to rain down on his bare feet, on his blood-stained breast, on his golden head. And there he lay asleep on the grass, enveloped in his flag, with a white and almost smiling face, poor boy! as though he heard these salutes and was glad that he had given his life for his Lombardy.

THE POOR.

Tuesday, 29th.

To give one's life for one's country as the Lombard boy did, is a great virtue; but you must not neglect the lesser virtues, my son. This morning as you walked in front of me, when we were returning from school, you passed near a poor woman who was holding between her knees a thin, pale child, and who asked alms of you. You looked at her and gave her nothing, and yet you had some coppers in your pocket. Listen, my son. Do not accustom yourself to pass indifferently before misery which stretches out its hand to you and far less before a mother who asks a copper for her child. Reflect that the child may be hungry; think of the agony of that poor woman. Picture to yourself the sob of despair of your mother, if she were some day forced to say, "Enrico, I cannot give you any bread even to-day!" When I give a soldo to a beggar, and he says to me, "God preserve your health, and the health of all belonging to you!" you cannot understand the sweetness which these words produce in my heart, the gratitude that I feel for that poor man. It seems to me certain that such a good wish must keep one in good health for a long time, and I return home content, and think, "Oh, that poor man has returned to me very much more than I gave him!" Well, let me sometimes feel that good wish called forth, merited by you; draw a soldo from your little purse now and then, and let it fall into the hand of a blind man without means of subsistence, of a mother without bread, of a child without a mother. The poor love the alms of boys, because it does not humiliate them, and because boys, who stand in need of everything, resemble themselves: you see that there are always poor people around the schoolhouses. The alms of a man is an act of charity; but that of a child is at one and the same time an act of charity and a caress--do you understand? It is as though a soldo and a flower fell from your hand together. Reflect that you lack nothing, and that they lack everything, that while you aspire to be happy, they are content simply with not dying. Reflect, that it is a horror, in the midst of so many palaces, along the streets thronged with carriages, and children clad in velvet, that there should be women and children who have nothing to eat. To have nothing to eat! O God! Boys like you, as good as you, as intelligent as you, who, in the midst of a great city, have nothing to eat, like wild beasts lost in a desert! Oh, never again, Enrico, pass a mother who is begging, without placing a soldo in her hand!

THY FATHER.

DECEMBER.

THE TRADER.

Thursday, 1st.

MY father wishes me to have some one of my companions come to the house every holiday, or that I should go to see one of them, in order that I may gradually become friends with all of them. Sunday I shall go to walk with Votini, the well-dressed boy who is always polishing himself up, and who is so envious of Derossi. In the meantime, Garoffi came to the house to-day,--that long, lank boy, with the nose like an owl's beak, and small, knavish eyes, which seem to be ferreting everywhere. He is the son of a grocer; he is an eccentric fellow; he is always counting the soldi that he has in his pocket; he reckons them on his fingers very, very rapidly, and goes through some process of multiplication without any tables; and he hoards his money, and already has a book in the Scholars' Savings Bank. He never spends a soldo, I am positive; and if he drops a centesimo under the benches, he is capable of hunting for it for a week. He does as magpies do, so Derossi says. Everything that he finds--worn-out pens, postage-stamps that have been used, pins, candle-ends--he picks up. He has been collecting postage-stamps for more than two years now; and he already has hundreds of them from every country, in a large album, which he will sell to a bookseller later on, when he has got it quite full. Meanwhile, the bookseller gives him his copy-books gratis, because he takes a great many boys to the shop. In school, he is always bartering; he effects sales of little articles every day, and lotteries and exchanges; then he regrets the exchange, and wants his stuff back; he buys for two and gets rid of it for four; he plays at pitch-penny, and never loses; he sells old newspapers over again to the tobacconist; and he keeps a little blank-book, in which he sets down his transactions, which is completely filled with sums and subtractions. At school he studies nothing but arithmetic; and if he desires the medal, it is only that he may have a free entrance into the puppet-show. But he pleases me; he amuses me. We played at keeping a market, with weights and scales. He knows the exact price of everything; he understands weighing, and makes handsome paper horns, like shopkeepers, with great expedition. He declares that as soon as he has finished school he shall set up in business--in a new business which he has invented himself. He was very much pleased when I gave him some foreign postage-stamps; and he informed me exactly how each one sold for collections. My father pretended to be reading the newspaper; but he listened to him, and was greatly diverted. His pockets are bulging, full of his little wares; and he covers them up with a long black cloak, and always appears thoughtful and preoccupied with business, like a merchant. But the thing that he has nearest his heart is his collection of postage-stamps. This is his treasure; and he always speaks of it as though he were going to get a fortune out of it. His companions accuse him of miserliness and usury. I do not know: I like him; he teaches me a great many things; he seems a man to me. Coretti, the son of the wood-merchant, says that he would not give him his postage-stamps to save his mother's life. My father does not believe it.

"Wait a little before you condemn him," he said to me; "he has this passion, but he has heart as well."

VANITY.

Monday, 5th.

Yesterday I went to take a walk along the Rivoli road with Votini and his father. As we were passing through the Via Dora Grossa we saw Stardi, the boy who kicks disturbers, standing stiffly in front of the window of a book-shop, with his eyes fixed on a geographical map; and no one knows how long he had been there, because he studies even in the street. He barely returned our salute, the rude fellow! Votini was well dressed--even too much so. He had on morocco boots embroidered in red, an embroidered coat, small silken frogs, a white beaver hat, and a watch; and he strutted. But his vanity was destined to come to a bad end on this occasion. After having run a tolerably long distance up the Rivoli road, leaving his father, who was walking slowly, a long way in the rear, we halted at a stone seat, beside a modestly clad boy, who appeared to be weary, and was meditating, with drooping head. A man, who must have been his father, was walking to and fro under the trees, reading the newspaper. We sat down. Votini placed himself between me and the boy. All at once he recollected that he was well dressed, and wanted to make his neighbor admire and envy him.

[Illustration: "STOP THAT, YOU LITTLE RASCALS!"--Page 60.]

He lifted one foot, and said to me, "Have you seen my officer's boots?" He said this in order to make the other boy look at them; but the latter paid no attention to them.

Then he dropped his foot, and showed me his silk frogs, glancing askance at the boy the while, and said that these frogs did not please him, and that he wanted to have them changed to silver buttons; but the boy did not look at the frogs either.

Then Votini fell to twirling his very handsome white castor hat on the tip of his forefinger; but the boy--and it seemed as though he did it on purpose--did not deign even a glance at the hat.

Votini, who began to become irritated, drew out his watch, opened it, and showed me the wheels; but the boy did not turn his head. "Is it of silver gilt?" I asked him.

"No," he replied; "it is gold."

"But not entirely of gold," I said; "there must be some silver with it."

"Why, no!" he retorted; and, in order to compel the boy to look, he held the watch before his face, and said to him, "Say, look here! isn't it true that it is entirely of gold?"

The boy replied curtly, "I don't know."

"Oh! oh!" exclaimed Votini, full of wrath, "what pride!"

As he was saying this, his father came up, and heard him; he looked steadily at the lad for a moment, then said sharply to his son, "Hold your tongue!" and, bending down to his ear, he added, "he is blind!"

Votini sprang to his feet, with a shudder, and stared the boy in the face: the latter's eyeballs were glassy, without expression, without sight.

Votini stood humbled,--speechless,--with his eyes fixed on the ground. At length he stammered, "I am sorry; I did not know."

But the blind boy, who had understood it all, said, with a kind and melancholy smile, "Oh, it's no matter!"

Well, he is vain; but Votini has not at all a bad heart. He never laughed again during the whole of the walk.

THE FIRST SNOW-STORM.

Saturday, 10th.

Farewell, walks to Rivoli! Here is the beautiful friend of the boys! Here is the first snow! Ever since yesterday evening it has been falling in thick flakes as large as gillyflowers. It was a pleasure this morning at school to see it beat against the panes and pile up on the window-sills; even the master watched it, and rubbed his hands; and all were glad, when they thought of making snowballs, and of the ice which will come later, and of the hearth at home. Stardi, entirely absorbed in his lessons, and with his fists pressed to his temples, was the only one who paid no attention to it. What beauty, what a celebration there was when we left school! All danced down the streets, shouting and tossing their arms, catching up handfuls of snow, and dashing about in it, like poodles in water. The umbrellas of the parents, who were waiting for them outside, were all white; the policeman's helmet was white; all our satchels were white in a few moments. Every one appeared to be beside himself with joy--even Precossi, the son of the blacksmith, that pale boy who never laughs; and Robetti, the lad who saved the little child from the omnibus, poor fellow! he jumped about on his crutches. The Calabrian, who had never touched snow, made himself a little ball of it, and began to eat it, as though it had been a peach; Crossi, the son of the vegetable-vendor, filled his satchel with it; and the little mason made us burst with laughter, when my father invited him to come to our house to-morrow. He had his mouth full of snow, and, not daring either to spit it out or to swallow it, he stood there choking and staring at us, and made no answer. Even the schoolmistress came out of school on a run, laughing; and my mistress of the first upper class, poor little thing! ran through the drizzling snow, covering her face with her green veil, and coughing; and meanwhile, hundreds of girls from the neighboring schoolhouse passed by, screaming and frolicking on that white carpet; and the masters and the beadles and the policemen shouted, "Home! home!" swallowing flakes of snow, and whitening their moustaches and beards. But they, too, laughed at this wild hilarity of the scholars, as they celebrated the winter.

You hail the arrival of winter; but there are boys who have neither clothes nor shoes nor fire. There are thousands of them, who descend to their villages, over a long road, carrying in hands bleeding from chilblains a bit of wood to warm the schoolroom. There are hundreds of schools almost buried in the snow, bare and dismal as caves, where the boys suffocate with smoke or chatter their teeth with cold as they gaze in terror at the white flakes which descend unceasingly, which pile up without cessation on their distant cabins threatened by avalanches. You rejoice in the winter, boys. Think of the thousands of creatures to whom winter brings misery and death.

THY FATHER.

THE LITTLE MASON.

Sunday, 11th.

The little mason came to-day, in a hunting-jacket, entirely dressed in the cast-off clothes of his father, which were still white with lime and plaster. My father was even more anxious than I that he should come. How much pleasure he gives us! No sooner had he entered than he pulled off his ragged cap, which was all soaked with snow, and thrust it into one of his pockets; then he advanced with his listless gait, like a weary workman, turning his face, as smooth as an apple, with its ball-like nose, from side to side; and when he entered the dining-room, he cast a glance round at the furniture and fixed his eyes on a small picture of Rigoletto, a hunchbacked jester, and made a "hare's face."

It is impossible to refrain from laughing when one sees him make that hare's face. We went to playing with bits of wood: he possesses an extraordinary skill at making towers and bridges, which seem to stand as though by a miracle, and he works at it quite seriously, with the patience of a man. Between one tower and another he told me about his family: they live in a garret; his father goes to the evening school to learn to read, and his mother is a washerwoman. And they must love him, of course, for he is clad like a poor boy, but he is well protected from the cold, with neatly mended clothes, and with his necktie nicely tied by his mother's hands. His father, he told me, is a fine man,--a giant, who has trouble in getting through doors, but he is kind, and always calls his son "hare's face": the son, on the contrary, is rather small.

At four o'clock we lunched on bread and goat's-milk cheese, as we sat on the sofa; and when we rose, I do not know why, but my father did not wish me to brush off the back, which the little mason had spotted with white, from his jacket: he restrained my hand, and then rubbed it off himself on the sly. While we were playing, the little mason lost a button from his hunting-jacket, and my mother sewed it on, and he grew quite red, and began to watch her sew, in perfect amazement and confusion, holding his breath the while. Then we gave him some albums of caricatures to look at, and he, without being aware of it himself, imitated the grimaces of the faces there so well, that even my father laughed. He was so much pleased when he went away that he forgot to put on his tattered cap; and when we reached the landing, he made a hare's face at me once more in sign of his gratitude. His name is Antonio Rabucco, and he is eight years and eight months old.

Do you know, my son, why I did not wish you to wipe off the sofa? Because to wipe it while your companion was looking on would have been almost the same as administering a reproof to him for having soiled it. And this was not well, in the first place, because he did not do it intentionally, and in the next, because he did it with the clothes of his father, who had covered them with plaster while at work; and what is contracted while at work is not dirt; it is dust, lime, varnish, whatever you like, but it is not dirt. Labor does not engender dirt. Never say of a laborer coming from his work, "He is filthy." You should say, "He has on his garments the signs, the traces, of his toil." Remember this. And you must love the little mason, first, because he is your comrade; and next, because he is the son of a workingman.

THY FATHER.

A SNOWBALL.

Friday, 16th.

It is still snow, snow. A shameful thing happened in connection with the snow this morning when we came out of school. A flock of boys had no sooner got into the Corso than they began to throw balls of that watery snow which makes missiles as solid and heavy as stones. Many persons were passing along the sidewalks. A gentleman called out, "Stop that, you little rascals!" and just at that moment a sharp cry rose from another part of the street, and we saw an old man who had lost his hat and was staggering about, covering his face with his hands, and beside him a boy who was shouting, "Help! help!"

People instantly ran from all directions. He had been struck in the eye with a ball. All the boys dispersed, fleeing like arrows. I was standing in front of the bookseller's shop, into which my father had gone, and I saw several of my companions approaching at a run, mingling with others near me, and pretending to be engaged in staring at the windows: there was Garrone, with his penny roll in his pocket, as usual; Coretti, the little mason; and Garoffi, the boy with the postage-stamps. In the meantime a crowd had formed around the old man, and a policeman and others were running to and fro, threatening and demanding: "Who was it? Who did it? Was it you? Tell me who did it!" and they looked at the boys' hands to see whether they were wet with snow.

Garoffi was standing beside me. I perceived that he was trembling all over, and that his face was as white as that of a corpse. "Who was it? Who did it?" the crowd continued to cry.

Then I overheard Garrone say in a low voice to Garoffi, "Come, go and present yourself; it would be cowardly to allow any one else to be arrested."

"But I did not do it on purpose," replied Garoffi, trembling like a leaf.

"No matter; do your duty," repeated Garrone.

"But I have not the courage."

"Take courage, then; I will accompany you."

And the policeman and the other people were crying more loudly than ever: "Who was it? Who did it? One of his glasses has been driven into his eye! He has been blinded! The ruffians!"

I thought that Garoffi would fall to the earth. "Come," said Garrone, resolutely, "I will defend you;" and grasping him by the arm, he thrust him forward, supporting him as though he had been a sick man. The people saw, and instantly understood, and several persons ran up with their fists raised; but Garrone thrust himself between, crying:--

"Do ten men of you set on one boy?"

Then they ceased, and a policeman seized Garoffi by the hand and led him, pushing aside the crowd as he went, to a pastry-cook's shop, where the wounded man had been carried. On catching sight of him, I suddenly recognized him as the old employee who lives on the fourth floor of our house with his grandnephew. He was stretched out on a chair, with a handkerchief over his eyes.

"I did not do it intentionally!" sobbed Garoffi, half dead with terror; "I did not do it intentionally!"

Two or three persons thrust him violently into the shop, crying, "Your face to the earth! Beg his pardon!" and they threw him to the ground. But all at once two vigorous arms set him on his feet again, and a resolute voice said:--

"No, gentlemen!" It was our head-master, who had seen it all. "Since he has had the courage to present himself," he added, "no one has the right to humiliate him." All stood silent. "Ask his forgiveness," said the head-master to Garoffi. Garoffi, bursting into tears, embraced the old man's knees, and the latter, having felt for the boy's head with his hand, caressed his hair. Then all said:--

"Go away, boy! go, return home."

And my father drew me out of the crowd, and said to me as we passed along the street, "Enrico, would you have had the courage, under similar circumstances, to do your duty,--to go and confess your fault?"

I told him that I should. And he said, "Give me your word, as a lad of heart and honor, that you would do it." "I give thee my word, father mine!"

THE MISTRESSES.

Saturday, 17th.

Garoffi was thoroughly terrified to-day, in the expectation of a severe punishment from the teacher; but the master did not make his appearance; and as the assistant was also missing, Signora Cromi, the oldest of the schoolmistresses, came to teach the school; she has two grown-up children, and she has taught several women to read and write, who now come to accompany their sons to the Baretti schoolhouse.

She was sad to-day, because one of her sons is ill. No sooner had they caught sight of her, than they began to make an uproar. But she said, in a slow and tranquil tone, "Respect my white hair; I am not only a school-teacher, I am also a mother"; and then no one dared to speak again, in spite of that brazen face of Franti, who contented himself with jeering at her on the sly.