Chapter III: Part 3

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.

Signora Delcati, my brother's teacher, was sent to take charge of Signora Cromi's class, and to Signora Delcati's was sent the teacher who is called "the little nun," because she always dresses in dark colors, with a black apron, and has a small white face, hair that is always smooth, very bright eyes, and a delicate voice, that seems to be forever murmuring prayers. And it is incomprehensible, my mother says; she is so gentle and timid, with that thread of a voice, which is always even, which is hardly audible, and she never speaks loud nor flies into a passion; but, nevertheless, she keeps the boys so quiet that you cannot hear them, and the most roguish bow their heads when she merely admonishes them with her finger, and her school seems like a church; and it is for this reason, also, that she is called "the little nun."

But there is another one who pleases me,--the young mistress of the first lower, No. 3, that young girl with the rosy face, who has two pretty dimples in her cheeks, and who wears a large red feather on her little bonnet, and a small cross of yellow glass on her neck. She is always cheerful, and keeps her class cheerful; she is always calling out with that silvery voice of hers, which makes her seem to be singing, and tapping her little rod on the table, and clapping her hands to impose silence; then, when they come out of school, she runs after one and another like a child, to bring them back into line: she pulls up the cape of one, and buttons the coat of another, so that they may not take cold; she follows them even into the street, in order that they may not fall to quarrelling; she beseeches the parents not to whip them at home; she brings lozenges to those who have coughs; she lends her muff to those who are cold; and she is continually tormented by the smallest children, who caress her and demand kisses, and pull at her veil and her mantle; but she lets them do it, and kisses them all with a smile, and returns home all rumpled and with her throat all bare, panting and happy, with her beautiful dimples and her red feather. She is also the girls' drawing-teacher, and she supports her mother and a brother by her own labor.

IN THE HOUSE OF THE WOUNDED MAN.

Sunday, 18th.

The grandnephew of the old employee who was struck in the eye by Garoffi's snowball is with the schoolmistress who has the red feather: we saw him to-day in the house of his uncle, who treats him like a son. I had finished writing out the monthly story for the coming week,--_The Little Florentine Scribe_,--which the master had given to me to copy; and my father said to me:--

"Let us go up to the fourth floor, and see how that old gentleman's eye is."

We entered a room which was almost dark, where the old man was sitting up in bed, with a great many pillows behind his shoulders; by the bedside sat his wife, and in one corner his nephew was amusing himself. The old man's eye was bandaged. He was very glad to see my father; he made us sit down, and said that he was better, that his eye was not only not ruined, but that he should be quite well again in a few days.

"It was an accident," he added. "I regret the terror which it must have caused that poor boy." Then he talked to us about the doctor, whom he expected every moment to attend him. Just then the door-bell rang.

"There is the doctor," said his wife.

The door opened--and whom did I see? Garoffi, in his long cloak, standing, with bowed head, on the threshold, and without the courage to enter.

"Who is it?" asked the sick man.

"It is the boy who threw the snowball," said my father. And then the old man said:--

"Oh, my poor boy! come here; you have come to inquire after the wounded man, have you not? But he is better; be at ease; he is better and almost well. Come here."

Garoffi, who did not perceive us in his confusion, approached the bed, forcing himself not to cry; and the old man caressed him, but could not speak.

"Thanks," said the old man; "go and tell your father and mother that all is going well, and that they are not to think any more about it."

But Garoffi did not move, and seemed to have something to say which he dared not utter.

"What have you to say to me? What is it that you want?"

"I!--Nothing."

"Well, good by, until we meet again, my boy; go with your heart in peace."

Garoffi went as far as the door; but there he halted, turned to the nephew, who was following him, and gazed curiously at him. All at once he pulled some object from beneath his cloak, put it in the boy's hand, and whispered hastily to him, "It is for you," and away he went like a flash.

The boy carried the object to his uncle; we saw that on it was written, _I give you this_; we looked inside, and uttered an exclamation of surprise. It was the famous album, with his collection of postage-stamps, which poor Garoffi had brought, the collection of which he was always talking, upon which he had founded so many hopes, and which had cost him so much trouble; it was his treasure, poor boy! it was the half of his very blood, which he had presented in exchange for his pardon.

THE LITTLE FLORENTINE SCRIBE.

(_Monthly Story._)

He was in the fourth elementary class. He was a graceful Florentine lad of twelve, with black hair and a white face, the eldest son of an employee on the railway, who, having a large family and but small pay, lived in straitened circumstances. His father loved him and was tolerably kind and indulgent to him--indulgent in everything except in that which referred to school: on this point he required a great deal, and showed himself severe, because his son was obliged to attain such a rank as would enable him to soon obtain a place and help his family; and in order to accomplish anything quickly, it was necessary that he should work a great deal in a very short time. And although the lad studied, his father was always exhorting him to study more.

His father was advanced in years, and too much toil had aged him before his time. Nevertheless, in order to provide for the necessities of his family, in addition to the toil which his occupation imposed upon him, he obtained special work here and there as a copyist, and passed a good part of the night at his writing-table. Lately, he had undertaken, in behalf of a house which published journals and books in parts, to write upon the parcels the names and addresses of their subscribers, and he earned three lire[1] for every five hundred of these paper wrappers, written in large and regular characters. But this work wearied him, and he often complained of it to his family at dinner.

[1] Sixty cents.

"My eyes are giving out," he said; "this night work is killing me." One day his son said to him, "Let me work instead of you, papa; you know that I can write like you, and fairly well." But the father answered:--

"No, my son, you must study; your school is a much more important thing than my wrappers; I feel remorse at robbing you of a single hour; I thank you, but I will not have it; do not mention it to me again."

The son knew that it was useless to insist on such a matter with his father, and he did not persist; but this is what he did. He knew that exactly at midnight his father stopped writing, and quitted his workroom to go to his bedroom; he had heard him several times: as soon as the twelve strokes of the clock had sounded, he had heard the sound of a chair drawn back, and the slow step of his father. One night he waited until the latter was in bed, then dressed himself very, very softly, and felt his way to the little workroom, lighted the petroleum lamp again, seated himself at the writing-table, where lay a pile of white wrappers and the list of addresses, and began to write, imitating exactly his father's handwriting. And he wrote with a will, gladly, a little in fear, and the wrappers piled up, and from time to time he dropped the pen to rub his hands, and then began again with increased alacrity, listening and smiling. He wrote a hundred and sixty--one lira! Then he stopped, placed the pen where he had found it, extinguished the light, and went back to bed on tiptoe.

At noon that day his father sat down to the table in a good humor. He had perceived nothing. He performed the work mechanically, measuring it by the hour, and thinking of something else, and only counted the wrappers he had written on the following day. He seated himself at the table in a fine humor, and slapping his son on one shoulder, he said to him:--

"Eh, Giulio! Your father is even a better workman than you thought. In two hours I did a good third more work than usual last night. My hand is still nimble, and my eyes still do their duty." And Giulio, silent but content, said to himself, "Poor daddy, besides the money, I am giving him some satisfaction in the thought that he has grown young again. Well, courage!"

Encouraged by these good results, when night came and twelve o'clock struck, he rose once more, and set to work. And this he did for several nights. And his father noticed nothing; only once, at supper, he uttered this exclamation, "It is strange how much oil has been used in this house lately!" This was a shock to Giulio; but the conversation ceased there, and the nocturnal labor proceeded.

However, by dint of thus breaking his sleep every night, Giulio did not get sufficient rest: he rose in the morning fatigued, and when he was doing his school work in the evening, he had difficulty in keeping his eyes open. One evening, for the first time in his life, he fell asleep over his copy-book.

"Courage! courage!" cried his father, clapping his hands; "to work!"

He shook himself and set to work again. But the next evening, and on the days following, the same thing occurred, and worse: he dozed over his books, he rose later than usual, he studied his lessons in a languid way, he seemed disgusted with study. His father began to observe him, then to reflect seriously, and at last to reprove him. He should never have done it!

"Giulio," he said to him one morning, "you put me quite beside myself; you are no longer as you used to be. I don't like it. Take care; all the hopes of your family rest on you. I am dissatisfied; do you understand?"

At this reproof, the first severe one, in truth, which he had ever received, the boy grew troubled.

"Yes," he said to himself, "it is true; it cannot go on so; this deceit must come to an end."

But at dinner, on the evening of that very same day, his father said with much cheerfulness, "Do you know that this month I have earned thirty-two lire more at addressing those wrappers than last month!" and so saying, he drew from under the table a paper package of sweets which he had bought, that he might celebrate with his children this extraordinary profit, and they all hailed it with clapping of hands. Then Giulio took heart again, courage again, and said in his heart, "No, poor papa, I will not cease to deceive you; I will make greater efforts to work during the day, but I shall continue to work at night for you and for the rest." And his father added, "Thirty-two lire more! I am satisfied. But that boy there," pointing at Giulio, "is the one who displeases me." And Giulio received the reprimand in silence, forcing back two tears which tried to flow; but at the same time he felt a great pleasure in his heart.

And he continued to work by main force; but fatigue added to fatigue rendered it ever more difficult for him to resist. Thus things went on for two months. The father continued to reproach his son, and to gaze at him with eyes which grew constantly more wrathful. One day he went to make inquiries of the teacher, and the teacher said to him: "Yes, he gets along, he gets along, because he is intelligent; but he no longer has the good will which he had at first. He is drowsy, he yawns, his mind is distracted. He writes short compositions, scribbled down in all haste, in bad chirography. Oh, he could do a great deal, a great deal more."

That evening the father took the son aside, and spoke to him words which were graver than any the latter had ever heard. "Giulio, you see how I toil, how I am wearing out my life, for the family. You do not second my efforts. You have no heart for me, nor for your brothers, nor for your mother!"

"Ah no! don't say that, father!" cried the son, bursting into tears, and opening his mouth to confess all. But his father interrupted him, saying:--

"You are aware of the condition of the family; you know that good will and sacrifices on the part of all are necessary. I myself, as you see, have had to double my work. I counted on a gift of a hundred lire from the railway company this month, and this morning I have learned that I shall receive nothing!"

At this information, Giulio repressed the confession which was on the point of escaping from his soul, and repeated resolutely to himself: "No, papa, I shall tell you nothing; I shall guard my secret for the sake of being able to work for you; I will recompense you in another way for the sorrow which I occasion you; I will study enough at school to win promotion; the important point is to help you to earn our living, and to relieve you of the fatigue which is killing you."

And so he went on, and two months more passed, of labor by night and weakness by day, of desperate efforts on the part of the son, and of bitter reproaches on the part of the father. But the worst of it was, that the latter grew gradually colder towards the boy, only addressed him rarely, as though he had been a recreant son, of whom there was nothing any longer to be expected, and almost avoided meeting his glance. And Giulio perceived this and suffered from it, and when his father's back was turned, he threw him a furtive kiss, stretching forth his face with a sentiment of sad and dutiful tenderness; and between sorrow and fatigue, he grew thin and pale, and he was constrained to still further neglect his studies. And he understood well that there must be an end to it some day, and every evening he said to himself, "I will not get up to-night"; but when the clock struck twelve, at the moment when he should have vigorously reaffirmed his resolution, he felt remorse: it seemed to him, that by remaining in bed he should be failing in a duty, and robbing his father and the family of a lira. And he rose, thinking that some night his father would wake up and discover him, or that he would discover the deception by accident, by counting the wrappers twice; and then all would come to a natural end, without any act of his will, which he did not feel the courage to exert. And thus he went on.

But one evening at dinner his father spoke a word which was decisive so far as he was concerned. His mother looked at him, and as it seemed to her that he was more ill and weak than usual, she said to him, "Giulio, you are ill." And then, turning to his father with anxiety: "Giulio is ill. See how pale he is Giulio, my dear, how do you feel?"

His father gave a hasty glance, and said: "It is his bad conscience that produces his bad health. He was not thus when he was a studious scholar and a loving son."

"But he is ill!" exclaimed the mother.

"I don't care anything about him any longer!" replied the father.

This remark was like a stab in the heart to the poor boy. Ah! he cared nothing any more. His father, who once trembled at the mere sound of a cough from him! He no longer loved him; there was no longer any doubt; he was dead in his father's heart. "Ah, no! my father," said the boy to himself, his heart oppressed with anguish, "now all is over indeed; I cannot live without your affection; I must have it all back. I will tell you all; I will deceive you no longer. I will study as of old, come what will, if you will only love me once more, my poor father! Oh, this time I am quite sure of my resolution!"

Nevertheless he rose that night again, by force of habit more than anything else; and when he was once up, he wanted to go and salute and see once more, for the last time, in the quiet of the night, that little chamber where he toiled so much in secret with his heart full of satisfaction and tenderness. And when he beheld again that little table with the lamp lighted and those white wrappers on which he was never more to write those names of towns and persons, which he had come to know by heart, he was seized with a great sadness, and with an impetuous movement he grasped the pen to recommence his accustomed toil. But in reaching out his hand he struck a book, and the book fell. The blood rushed to his heart. What if his father had waked! Certainly he would not have discovered him in the commission of a bad deed: he had himself decided to tell him all, and yet--the sound of that step approaching in the darkness,--the discovery at that hour, in that silence,--his mother, who would be awakened and alarmed,--and the thought, which had occurred to him for the first time, that his father might feel humiliated in his presence on thus discovering all;--all this terrified him almost. He bent his ear, with suspended breath. He heard no sound. He laid his ear to the lock of the door behind him--nothing. The whole house was asleep. His father had not heard. He recovered his composure, and he set himself again to his writing, and wrapper was piled on wrapper. He heard the regular tread of the policeman below in the deserted street; then the rumble of a carriage which gradually died away; then, after an interval, the rattle of a file of carts, which passed slowly by; then a profound silence, broken from time to time by the distant barking of a dog. And he wrote on and on: and meanwhile his father was behind him. He had risen on hearing the fall of the book, and had remained waiting for a long time: the rattle of the carts had drowned the noise of his footsteps and the creaking of the door-casing; and he was there, with his white head bent over Giulio's little black head, and he had seen the pen flying over the wrappers, and in an instant he had divined all, remembered all, understood all, and a despairing penitence, but at the same time an immense tenderness, had taken possession of his mind and had held him nailed to the spot suffocating behind his child. Suddenly Giulio uttered a piercing shriek: two arms had pressed his head convulsively.

"Oh, papa, papa! forgive me, forgive me!" he cried, recognizing his parent by his weeping.

"Do you forgive me!" replied his father, sobbing, and covering his brow with kisses. "I have understood all, I know all; it is I, it is I who ask your pardon, my blessed little creature; come, come with me!" and he pushed or rather carried him to the bedside of his mother, who was awake, and throwing him into her arms, he said:--

"Kiss this little angel of a son, who has not slept for three months, but has been toiling for me, while I was saddening his heart, and he was earning our bread!" The mother pressed him to her breast and held him there, without the power to speak; at last she said: "Go to sleep at once, my baby, go to sleep and rest.--Carry him to bed."

The father took him from her arms, carried him to his room, and laid him in his bed, still breathing hard and caressing him, and arranged his pillows and coverlets for him.

"Thanks, papa," the child kept repeating; "thanks; but go to bed yourself now; I am content; go to bed, papa."

But his father wanted to see him fall asleep; so he sat down beside the bed, took his hand, and said to him, "Sleep, sleep, my little son!" and Giulio, being weak, fell asleep at last, and slumbered many hours, enjoying, for the first time in many months, a tranquil sleep, enlivened by pleasant dreams; and as he opened his eyes, when the sun had already been shining for a tolerably long time, he first felt, and then saw, close to his breast, and resting upon the edge of the little bed, the white head of his father, who had passed the night thus, and who was still asleep, with his brow against his son's heart.

WILL.

Wednesday, 28th.

There is Stardi in my school, who would have the force to do what the little Florentine did. This morning two events occurred at the school: Garoffi, wild with delight, because his album had been returned to him, with the addition of three postage-stamps of the Republic of Guatemala, which he had been seeking for three months; and Stardi, who took the second medal; Stardi the next in the class after Derossi! All were amazed at it. Who could ever have foretold it, when, in October, his father brought him to school bundled up in that big green coat, and said to the master, in presence of every one:--

"You must have a great deal of patience with him, because he is very hard of understanding!"

Every one credited him with a wooden head from the very beginning. But he said, "I will burst or I will succeed," and he set to work doggedly, to studying day and night, at home, at school, while walking, with set teeth and clenched fists, patient as an ox, obstinate as a mule; and thus, by dint of trampling on every one, disregarding mockery, and dealing kicks to disturbers, this big thick-head passed in advance of the rest. He understood not the first thing of arithmetic, he filled his compositions with absurdities, he never succeeded in retaining a phrase in his mind; and now he solves problems, writes correctly, and sings his lessons like a song. And his iron will can be divined from the seeing how he is made, so very thickset and squat, with a square head and no neck, with short, thick hands, and coarse voice. He studies even on scraps of newspaper, and on theatre bills, and every time that he has ten soldi, he buys a book; he has already collected a little library, and in a moment of good humor he allowed the promise to slip from his mouth that he would take me home and show it to me. He speaks to no one, he plays with no one, he is always on hand, on his bench, with his fists pressed to his temples, firm as a rock, listening to the teacher. How he must have toiled, poor Stardi! The master said to him this morning, although he was impatient and in a bad humor, when he bestowed the medals:--

"Bravo, Stardi! he who endures, conquers." But the latter did not appear in the least puffed up with pride--he did not smile; and no sooner had he returned to his seat, with the medal, than he planted his fists on his temples again, and became more motionless and more attentive than before. But the finest thing happened when he went out of school; for his father, a blood-letter, as big and squat as himself, with a huge face and a huge voice, was there waiting for him. He had not expected this medal, and he was not willing to believe in it, so that it was necessary for the master to reassure him, and then he began to laugh heartily, and tapped his son on the back of the neck, saying energetically, "Bravo! good! my dear pumpkin; you'll do!" and he stared at him, astonished and smiling. And all the boys around him smiled too, except Stardi. He was already ruminating the lesson for to-morrow morning in that huge head of his.

GRATITUDE.

Saturday, 31st.

Your comrade Stardi never complains of his teacher; I am sure of
that. "The master was in a bad temper, was impatient,"--you say it
in a tone of resentment. Think an instant how often you give way to
acts of impatience, and towards whom? towards your father and your
mother, towards whom your impatience is a crime. Your master has
very good cause to be impatient at times! Reflect that he has been
laboring for boys these many years, and that if he has found many
affectionate and noble individuals among them, he has also found
many ungrateful ones, who have abused his kindness and ignored his
toils; and that, between you all, you cause him far more bitterness
than satisfaction. Reflect, that the most holy man on earth, if
placed in his position, would allow himself to be conquered by
wrath now and then. And then, if you only knew how often the
teacher goes to give a lesson to a sick boy, all alone, because he
is not ill enough to be excused from school and is impatient on
account of his suffering, and is pained to see that the rest of you
do not notice it, or abuse it! Respect, love, your master, my son.
Love him, also, because your father loves and respects him; because
he consecrates his life to the welfare of so many boys who will
forget him; love him because he opens and enlightens your
intelligence and educates your mind; because one of these days,
when you have become a man, and when neither I nor he shall be in
the world, his image will often present itself to your mind, side
by side with mine, and then you will see certain expressions of
sorrow and fatigue in his honest countenance to which you now pay
no heed: you will recall them, and they will pain you, even after
the lapse of thirty years; and you will feel ashamed, you will feel
sad at not having loved him, at having behaved badly to him. Love
your master; for he belongs to that vast family of fifty thousand
elementary instructors, scattered throughout all Italy, who are the
intellectual fathers of the millions of boys who are growing up
with you; the laborers, hardly recognized and poorly recompensed,
who are preparing in our country a people superior to those of the
present. I am not content with the affection which you have for me,
if you have it not also for all those who are doing you good, and
among these, your master stands first, after your parents. Love him
as you would love a brother of mine; love him when he caresses and
when he reproves you; when he is just, and when he appears to you
to be unjust; love him when he is amiable and gracious; and love
him even more when you see him sad. Love him always. And always
pronounce with reverence that name of "teacher," which, after that
of your father, is the noblest, the sweetest name which one man can
apply to another man.

THY FATHER.

JANUARY.

THE ASSISTANT MASTER.

Wednesday, 4th.

MY father was right; the master was in a bad humor because he was not well; for the last three days, in fact, the assistant has been coming in his stead,--that little man, without a beard, who seems like a youth. A shameful thing happened this morning. There had been an uproar on the first and second days, in the school, because the assistant is very patient and does nothing but say, "Be quiet, be quiet, I beg of you."

But this morning they passed all bounds. Such a noise arose, that his words were no longer audible, and he admonished and besought; but it was a mere waste of breath. Twice the head-master appeared at the door and looked in; but the moment he disappeared the murmur increased as in a market. It was in vain that Derossi and Garrone turned round and made signs to their comrades to be good, so that it was a shame. No one paid any heed to them. Stardi alone remained quiet, with his elbows on the bench, and his fists to his temples, meditating, perhaps, on his famous library; and Garoffi, that boy with the hooked nose and the postage-stamps, who was wholly occupied in making a catalogue of the subscribers at two centesimi each, for a lottery for a pocket inkstand. The rest chattered and laughed, pounded on the points of pens fixed in the benches, and snapped pellets of paper at each other with the elastics of their garters.

The assistant grasped now one, now another, by the arm, and shook him; and he placed one of them against the wall--time wasted. He no longer knew what to do, and he entreated them. "Why do you behave like this? Do you wish me to punish you by force?" Then he thumped the little table with his fist, and shouted in a voice of wrath and lamentation, "Silence! silence! silence!" It was difficult to hear him. But the uproar continued to increase. Franti threw a paper dart at him, some uttered cat-calls, others thumped each other on the head; the hurly-burly was indescribable; when, all of a sudden, the beadle entered and said:--

"Signor Master, the head-master has sent for you." The master rose and went out in haste, with a gesture of despair. Then the tumult began more vigorously than ever. But suddenly Garrone sprang up, his face all convulsed, and his fists clenched, and shouted in a voice choked with rage:--

"Stop this! You are brutes! You take advantage of him because he is kind. If he were to bruise your bones for you, you would be as abject as dogs. You are a pack of cowards! The first one of you that jeers at him again, I shall wait for outside, and I will break his teeth,--I swear it,--even under the very eyes of his father!"

All became silent. Ah, what a fine thing it was to see Garrone, with his eyes darting flames! He seemed to be a furious young lion. He stared at the most daring, one after the other, and all hung their heads. When the assistant re-entered, with red eyes, not a breath was audible. He stood in amazement; then, catching sight of Garrone, who was still all fiery and trembling, he understood it all, and he said to him, with accents of great affection, as he might have spoken to a brother, "I thank you, Garrone."

STARDI'S LIBRARY.

I have been home with Stardi, who lives opposite the schoolhouse; and I really experienced a feeling of envy at the sight of his library. He is not at all rich, and he cannot buy many books; but he preserves his schoolbooks with great care, as well as those which his relatives give him; and he lays aside every soldo that is given to him, and spends it at the bookseller's. In this way he has collected a little library; and when his father perceived that he had this passion, he bought him a handsome bookcase of walnut wood, with a green curtain, and he has had most of his volumes bound for him in the colors that he likes. Thus when he draws a little cord, the green curtain runs aside, and three rows of books of every color become visible, all ranged in order, and shining, with gilt titles on their backs,--books of tales, of travels, and of poetry; and some illustrated ones. And he understands how to combine colors well: he places the white volumes next to the red ones, the yellow next the black, the blue beside the white, so that, viewed from a distance, they make a very fine appearance; and he amuses himself by varying the combinations. He has made himself a catalogue. He is like a librarian. He is always standing near his books, dusting them, turning over the leaves, examining the bindings: it is something to see the care with which he opens them, with his big, stubby hands, and blows between the pages: then they seem perfectly new again. I have worn out all of mine. It is a festival for him to polish off every new book that he buys, to put it in its place, and to pick it up again to take another look at it from all sides, and to brood over it as a treasure. He showed me nothing else for a whole hour. His eyes were troubling him, because he had read too much. At a certain time his father, who is large and thickset like himself, with a big head like his, entered the room, and gave him two or three taps on the nape of the neck, saying with that huge voice of his:--

"What do you think of him, eh? of this head of bronze? It is a stout head, that will succeed in anything, I assure you!"

And Stardi half closed his eyes, under these rough caresses, like a big hunting-dog. I do not know, I did not dare to jest with him; it did not seem true to me, that he was only a year older than myself; and when he said to me, "Farewell until we meet again," at the door, with that face of his that always seems wrathful, I came very near replying to him, "I salute you, sir," as to a man. I told my father afterwards, at home: "I don't understand it; Stardi has no natural talent, he has not fine manners, and his face is almost ridiculous; yet he suggests ideas to me." And my father answered, "It is because he has character." And I added, "During the hour that I spent with him he did not utter fifty words, he did not show me a single plaything, he did not laugh once; yet I liked to go there."

And my father answered, "That is because you esteem him."

THE SON OF THE BLACKSMITH-IRONMONGER.

Yes, but I also esteem Precossi; and to say that I esteem him is not enough,--Precossi, the son of the blacksmith-ironmonger,--that thin little fellow, who has kind, melancholy eyes and a frightened air; who is so timid that he says to every one, "Excuse me"; who is always sickly, and who, nevertheless, studies so much. His father returns home, intoxicated with brandy, and beats him without the slightest reason in the world, and flings his books and his copy-books in the air with a backward turn of his hand; and he comes to school with the black and blue marks on his face, and sometimes with his face all swollen, and his eyes inflamed with much weeping. But never, never can he be made to acknowledge that his father beats him.

"Your father has been beating you," his companions say to him; and he instantly exclaims, "That is not true! it is not true!" for the sake of not dishonoring his father.

"You did not burn this leaf," the teacher says to him, showing him his work, half burned.

"Yes," he replies, in a trembling voice; "I let it fall on the fire."

But we know very well, nevertheless, that his drunken father overturned the table and the light with a kick, while the boy was doing his work. He lives in a garret of our house, on another staircase. The portress tells my mother everything: my sister Silvia heard him screaming from the terrace one day, when his father had sent him headlong down stairs, because he had asked for a few soldi to buy a grammar. His father drinks, but does not work, and his family suffers from hunger. How often Precossi comes to school with an empty stomach and nibbles in secret at a roll which Garrone has given him, or at an apple brought to him by the schoolmistress with the red feather, who was his teacher in the first lower class. But he never says, "I am hungry; my father does not give me anything to eat." His father sometimes comes for him, when he chances to be passing the schoolhouse,--pallid, unsteady on his legs, with a fierce face, and his hair over his eyes, and his cap awry; and the poor boy trembles all over when he catches sight of him in the street; but he immediately runs to meet him, with a smile; and his father does not appear to see him, but seems to be thinking of something else. Poor Precossi! He mends his torn copy-books, borrows books to study his lessons, fastens the fragments of his shirt together with pins; and it is a pity to see him performing his gymnastics, with those huge shoes in which he is fairly lost, in those trousers which drag on the ground, and that jacket which is too long, and those huge sleeves turned back to the very elbows. And he studies; he does his best; he would be one of the first, if he were able to work at home in peace. This morning he came to school with the marks of finger-nails on one cheek, and they all began to say to him:--

"It is your father, and you cannot deny it this time; it was your father who did that to you. Tell the head-master about it, and he will have him called to account for it."

But he sprang up, all flushed, with a voice trembling with indignation:--

"It's not true! it's not true! My father never beats me!"

But afterwards, during lesson time, his tears fell upon the bench, and when any one looked at him, he tried to smile, in order that he might not show it. Poor Precossi! To-morrow Derossi, Coretti, and Nelli are coming to my house; I want to tell him to come also; and I want to have him take luncheon with me: I want to treat him to books, and turn the house upside down to amuse him, and to fill his pockets with fruit, for the sake of seeing him contented for once, poor Precossi! who is so good and so courageous.

A FINE VISIT.

Thursday, 12th.

This has been one of the finest Thursdays of the year for me. At two o'clock, precisely, Derossi and Coretti came to the house, with Nelli, the hunchback: Precossi was not permitted by his father to come. Derossi and Coretti were still laughing at their encounter with Crossi, the son of the vegetable-seller, in the street,--the boy with the useless arm and the red hair,--who was carrying a huge cabbage for sale, and with the soldo which he was to receive for the cabbage he was to go and buy a pen. He was perfectly happy because his father had written from America that they might expect him any day. Oh, the two beautiful hours that we passed together! Derossi and Coretti are the two jolliest boys in the school; my father fell in love with them. Coretti had on his chocolate-colored tights and his catskin cap. He is a lively imp, who wants to be always doing something, stirring up something, setting something in motion. He had already carried on his shoulders half a cartload of wood, early that morning; nevertheless, he galloped all over the house, taking note of everything and talking incessantly, as sprightly and nimble as a squirrel; and passing into the kitchen, he asked the cook how much we had to pay a myriagramme for wood, because his father sells it at forty-five centesimi. He is always talking of his father, of the time when he was a soldier in the 49th regiment, at the battle of Custoza, where he served in the squadron of Prince Umberto; and he is so gentle in his manners! It makes no difference that he was born and brought up surrounded by wood: he has nobility in his blood, in his heart, as my father says. And Derossi amused us greatly; he knows geography like a master: he shut his eyes and said:--

"There, I see the whole of Italy; the Apennines, which extend to the Ionian Sea, the rivers flowing here and there, the white cities, the gulfs, the blue bays, the green islands;" and he repeated the names correctly in their order and very rapidly, as though he were reading them on the map; and at the sight of him standing thus, with his head held high, with all his golden curls, with his closed eyes, and all dressed in bright blue with gilt buttons, as straight and handsome as a statue, we were all filled with admiration. In one hour he had learned by heart nearly three pages, which he is to recite the day after to-morrow, for the anniversary of the funeral of King Vittorio. And even Nelli gazed at him in wonder and affection, as he rubbed the folds of his apron of black cloth, and smiled with his clear and mournful eyes. This visit gave me a great deal of pleasure; it left something like sparks in my mind and my heart. And it pleased me, too, when they went away, to see poor Nelli between the other two tall, strong fellows, who carried him home on their arms, and made him laugh as I have never seen him laugh before. On returning to the dining-room, I perceived that the picture representing Rigoletto, the hunchbacked jester, was no longer there. My father had taken it away in order that Nelli might not see it.

THE FUNERAL OF VITTORIO EMANUELE.

January, 17th.

To-day, at two o'clock, as soon as we entered the schoolroom, the master called up Derossi, who went and took his place in front of the little table facing us, and began to recite, in his vibrating tones, gradually raising his limpid voice, and growing flushed in the face:--