Year: 1878

Wnlte bneep-uOBS OF the cOuulIy-uOBs lnht
would adon palace, and might lie on n
queens robes dogs that are the very beau
idedl of their race, brave, gentle, generous,
aud full of grace preUr cdecdherS Of dogs,
such as would become the idols Of Fashion,
were that Lady of Caprice ever to wander up
our solitary pine-clad crests and through our
high climbing olive orchards.


Facllo and Pastore had passed many n hap
py year together On working days, side by
side they walked into the town. through ff-
teen miles of dust or mud. When Faello
went into place of business, Pastore sat out
side by the mules head to guard the cart and
the carts load. At evening they went back
again. inside the cart that time at night Pas
tore slept in the mules stable, and guarded
mules and master. When there were no
vases to be carried, they went higher up into
the woods and loaded the cart with the fire
wood cut there, or the bracken and ling which
laborers and brick makers burn in their ovens
and carried these down into the town for the
foresters. At other seasons they would take
loads of hay or straw but whatever the sea-
son was. one of the mules and Faello and
Pastore went down the long, stony steep hill
every day together, for it was only thus that
they could keep the soup pot full and the
vol from the door The wolf was terribly
near sometimes, especially when the fresh
grist tax came and the hand of the state
snatched at the bread of the poorest poor
But the wolf never came quite indoors. ut
is the blessed Marriage Plate, said Giudetta
1T is the mules and me, " thought Faelo and
then was afraid that the thought was wicked
for he was reverential and dutiful lad. A
handsome lad, too, as Giudetta thought proud
ly, when she looked at him in his clean saints
day shirt with flower behind his eur, and
the sun shining in his large brown eyes and
on his cleaning auburn locks.


Girls thought so too, and cast their glances
up at him as they went by with bent heads,
plating their tresses of straw. lie did not
look in return these faucies had not touched
him he was always hard at work lie had
his sisters for hand-maidens, and for compan-
ion and friend, Pastore.


when l am going TO mass. Pastore never
stirs he looks at my feet and knows that l
have my boots on" Facllo would say, with
PRIDE of his playfellOw. Faelo never COM
mitted the foolish extravaganza of boots, ex-
cept as a mark of respect to the high altar.
His firm and shapely feet trod the earth un-
ilinching but from his boots they hinched
very much.


1t would seem to the great world a life
dreary enough, to go day after day, all the
year round. in sunshine and storms, in foul
weather and fair, up and down Il long hilly
road with a mule and its load. But it was
not dreary to Faello. He had u sort of soul
in him, this boy who could not read or write !;
the awful rose of dawn which he saw well
| from his hillside home was beautiful to him
he loved to hear the deep bells of the monas-
terry as lac passed underneath its pile he had
n vague perception of the loveliness of the
flower he put behind his ear, of the canes he
cut by the brooksde Of the silence of the
woods as he gathered his load. 1t was not
much, but it was enough to make him half sad,
half happy enough to keep him from guile
and folly and then, in time to preserve him
| from both of these. or at least from the last,
at an age when it might have assailed him,
old Guidetta died almost suddenly, the
very old do, the light going out like the low
flame of lamp that is spent.


She was sitting on her settle by the fire at
| Ceppo (Christmas-tide) and fell back never 10
| rise again.


As Faello caught her, and the terrified chill
dren clustered round her. she lifted her trem-
bling finger to the wall where the Marriage
| Plate hung.


Never move it," she muttered. Never
move it. Promise"


II promise" niurmured Faello, paralyzed
with the awe of that strange look which ht
saw on her face, and which yet he did moi
| know was death.


Giudetta nodded her head, and her hand.
clasped her rosary of wooden beads, and
moved feebly about them. Then she opened
her eyes with effort, and struggled to speak


Unless the dear God were TO wish it
she said.


She was afraid to seem TO wish what Goo
did not and at that moment, as Faello kissed
her, she died and thus ended another of the
innumerable simple, cleanly, honest toilsom,
lives of pain and love that are swept away
like the dead leaves by the winds in autumn


Faello was just eighteen.


He had been born on Christmas-day.
All night long he sobbed on his rough bed
The next night the body was borne up tn,
hill to its grave the children bearing torches
that blew about in the chill windy air, anC
shed their red gleam on the snow.


On the morrow lie rose and harnessed th'
mules The poor have no time for the luxu
ry of grief.


Without the brave old pious spirit in hi
house. Faello felt lost The little there was
Le and his sisters inherited. The cottag,
they rented but the things in it, and the car
and the mules were their own. Candidi
and Vina, the two elder girls were oil,
enough to keep domestic matters as they hat
been but to Faello nothing seemed the same
The honest, brown, homely face, withere'
like winter apple, had been before hin
from his birth. Faello missing it, would &
|
very heart out, with his arms round the necl
of Pastore Pastore understood him bette
than his sisters


The little maidens were good children, AM
had sorowed sincerely, yet they We're hal
glad to be alone, to have the dignity of house
wives. to have no one to scold them wheI
they fingered at the well or did their plating
badly; and Candida put on the brass anC
glass bead necklace which the peddler ha
given her at last autumn's fair, and whcl
her grandmother had forbidden her to wear


For two weeks and more Faello never nc
ticed it upon her, When he did at last h
went up quietly. unclasped it, and threw it i
the well.


"Shall we cease to obey M NOHHd becaus
she is dead ~ he said. 'See Pastore," h
added, more gently; ''he never comes neare
the fire than she allowed him and when h
is wet dries himself in the straw before Ii
enters, AS she taught HIM Shall we thin
less of her than he thinks


The child wept. Pastore got up from hi
corner and rubbed his soft white chee
against hers to dry her tears


Pastore loved them all with that infnit
forgiving tenderness of which dogs and fe'
women are capable. They were good to him


He very often, indeed, had not enough to eat
but then they themselves had not either
They were very gentle with him, and he live
in the house like one of them seeing hi
brethren beaten, kicked, starved, chaineC
and left out in the bitter snow-storms of tn
winter nights, Pastore, in his dogs way
, thought his home was heaven.


And his young master loved him with
p great love. Whenever he had had a holida
in any of the nine years since Pastore fir
had came to him-a round ball of white WOO
> three months old-Pastore had been his play
mate and comrade in preference to any Othe
and had THmbled with him along the chain {
t hills, covered with oak and sweet chestn,


scrub, and with the tall pines spreading the
green plumes against the blue sky. Now Fl
T clio had no heart for any holiday he felt I'll
burden of life on his young shoulders; Will
his grandmother lived he had never know
r care. Now night and day he was alway
| thinking, IF can not earn enough to kee
the children always as she didI" For the Ii
5 tie maidens were five in number, and wante
/ | more and more as they grew older and olde