my friend garrone.

friday, 4th.

there had been but two days of vacation, yet it seemed to me as though i had been a long time without seeing garrone. the more i know him, the better i like him; and so it is with all the rest, except with the overbearing, who have nothing to say to him, because he does not permit them to exhibit their oppression. every time that a big boy raises his hand against a little one, the little one shouts, “garrone!” and the big one stops striking him. his father is an engine-driver on the railway; he has begun school late, because he was ill for two years. he is the tallest and the strongest of the class; he lifts a bench with one hand; he is always eating; and he is good. whatever he is asked for,—a pencil, rubber, paper, or penknife,—he lends or gives it; and he neither talks nor laughs in school: he always sits perfectly motionless on a bench that is too narrow for him, with his spine curved forward, and his big head between his shoulders; and when i look at him, he smiles at me with his eyes half closed, as much as to say, “well, enrico, are we friends?” he makes me laugh, because, tall and broad as he is, he has a jacket, trousers, and sleeves which are too small for him, and too short; a cap which will not stay on his head; a threadbare cloak; coarse[25] shoes; and a necktie which is always twisted into a cord. dear garrone! it needs but one glance in thy face to inspire love for thee. all the little boys would like to be near his bench. he knows arithmetic well. he carries his books bound together with a strap of red leather. he has a knife, with a mother-of-pearl handle, which he found in the field for military manœuvres, last year, and one day he cut his finger to the bone; but no one in school envies him it, and no one breathes a word about it at home, for fear of alarming his parents. he lets us say anything to him in jest, and he never takes it ill; but woe to any one who says to him, “that is not true,” when he affirms a thing: then fire flashes from his eyes, and he hammers down blows enough to split the bench. saturday morning he gave a soldo to one of the upper first class, who was crying in the middle of the street, because his own had been taken from him, and he could not buy his copy-book. for the last three days he has been working over a letter of eight pages, with pen ornaments on the margins, for the saint’s day of his mother, who often comes to get him, and who, like himself, is tall and large and sympathetic. the master is always glancing at him, and every time that he passes near him he taps him on the neck with his hand, as though he were a good, peaceable young bull. i am very fond of him. i am happy when i press his big hand, which seems to be the hand of a man, in mine. i am almost certain that he would risk his life to save that of a comrade; that he would allow himself to be killed in his defence, so clearly can i read his eyes; and although he always seems to be grumbling with that big voice of his, one feels that it is a voice that comes from a gentle heart.