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.