These thoughts naturally recurred to the youth when he found himself on the spot where such truths had been taught, with his mind imbued with the sad memories of the past. Intent, however, on the object of his visit to the old place, he walked directly towards the church, across the piazza or square, and leaving the ancient pile on his right, he turned into a narrow street, and entered a doorway of a two-story building.

He mounted the broken stone steps to the first floor, and pulling at a little piece of string which evidently had a sheep-bell at the end of it, from the sound it gave forth, he waited for the door to be opened. This was done in about half a minute by an old woman who, through a pair of spectacles with a broad bone frame, peered at her visitor. Discovering, however, who it was after a few seconds' examination, her wrinkled face brightened with a genial smile, and seizing Paul's hand, which she covered with kisses, she drew him into the room with the exclamation :

"Dio lo benedica! è Signor Pavolo." ("God bless him! it is Mr. Paul.")

"And so, Signor Pavolo," said the old woman, after they had been seated for a few minutes, and had exchanged the usual compliments of the day, "and so you are going to leave us at last. What will Pietrino do without you?"

And the old woman removed her spectacles to wipe her eyes.

“Oh, Pietrino is a man now," said Paul, “and he will soon be getting married and having children

of his own to look after. He'll not forget me, I know."

"No, indeed!" interrupted the old woman, with unusual energy.

"But," continued Paul, not heeding the interruption, "he will think of me as a friend-at least I hope so-who is forced to leave him, but who will always be ready to do him a service, though ever so many miles away. Besides, mother," added Paul, who always called the old woman by that name, “in a few years I shall be able to come back again—and I mean to come back, I assure you, for I love Florence and all I leave here too well to forsake them altogether. I only look upon my departure as going on a journey from which I shall one day return here, as to my home."

The old woman looked fondly at the boy as he thus spoke, his face animated with the feelings expressed by his words. She believed that he spoke precisely as he felt, but she was seventy years old, and she knew that we propose many things to ourselves in this world which we are never able to accomplish; so she slightly shook her head when he had done.

At the same moment a rapid step was heard outside, mounting the staircase at a bound, and directly after, the sheep-bell, which hung inside the door, began dancing as if it were mad.

The old woman rose from her chair, but Paul was up before her, and drawing back the bolt, stood behind the door, whilst the visitor, not seeing him, came in.

The new comer was a youth of eighteen or nineteen, like the mistress of the house, very cleanly in person, and like her, too, in features, notwithstanding the difference of sex and age. If she had resembled him as much in her own youth, she must have been remarkably handsome, for the young man was particularly so.

It was her son, Pietrino, her only child, the child of her old age, for she had not been married till she was fifty, and her husband had left her a widow three years after; and from that time she had devoted herself to her boy, who had grown up all that she could wish, and more than she could have hoped.

An accident had brought Paul and Pietrino together. The former, in one of his rambles about the ruins of Fiesole, had fallen and sprained his andle Pietring then a stranger, playing near, found him writhing with pain upon the ground. No run for assistance had him conveyed to his mother's house hand him on his own bed, and set eto communicate the intelligence to Fact's parents, Ale boed were she dia

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YOUNG PIETRINO,

17

exploring the romantic ruins which are yet found scattered in the outskirts of that ancient city.

Paul returned this service in a way which proved of the greatest advantage to his friend. Although so much younger than himself, he had had all the advantages of a liberal education; he could read and write English, French, and Italian, and had eagerly studied many books of geography and history. These things were unknown to Pietrino. He could read a little, it is true, and write less, and that was all. Under Paul's tuition, however—for Paul loved to teach him, and Pietrino loved to learn -he soon acquired an insight into things which had hitherto been hidden from him. Supplied with books by his young friend, he read, and thought, and studied, until, a few months before our story opens, through the very knowledge which he owed in great part to Paul, he had been admitted into the office of old Dr. Ferri, the notary, as his clerk, at a salary which, though small, contributed not a little to the comforts of the old woman and her son.

It would have been indeed surprising if Pietrino and his mother had not felt gratitude to Paul.

"Has Signor Pavolo been here, mother?" were Pietrino's first words as he came into the room, when following the direction of the old woman's eyes, he espied his friend still standing by the door.

In a moment the two youths were hand in hand, and asking and answering many questions in a breath.

"I can't tell you, Paul," said Pietrino at last, in

C

a broken voice, "how much I have feared this day. When the thought of it has sometimes crossed my mind, I have driven it away, because I would not have the pain near me to make me sad before the fatal time. I have put it off and off, but it has come at last."

And here the poor fellow regularly broke down, and Paul was not less affected. As for the old woman, she suddenly found out that something required attending to in the kitchen, and abruptly left the room.

"But all this is very selfish," said Pietrino, recovering himself. "You have a career to follow, you have your education to complete, to make you fitted for your station, and it must be in your own country that you learn what is necessary for the conduct of a gentleman. When there, dear Paul, when you have made fresh friends and have found a new home, do not let the new faces drive the old ones from your memory. You will not let them do that, I am sure?"

Paul's heart was too full to speak, but he shook his head, and Pietrino went on

Though I know you to be so good and true, yet I was afraid you might, so to refresh your memory I got an acquaintance of mine, who is very clever at miniatures, to paint my portrait ; see, here it is.” And he drew from his pocketa small case, which contained a faithful representation of his expressive features. "I was vos rich enough to have it mounted, so that you might wear it; but you, ouro Pavolo,