Tuesday, 4th.
After breakfast yesterday my mother took me, as she had promised, to the
Infant Asylum in the Corso Valdocco, in order to recommend to the
directress a little sister of Precossi. I had never seen an asylum. How
much amused I was! There were two hundred of them, boy-babies and
girl-babies, and so small that the children in our lower primary schools
are men in comparison.
We arrived just as they were entering the refectory in two files, where
there were two very long tables, with a great many round holes, and in
each hole a black bowl filled with rice and beans, and a tin spoon
beside it. On entering, some grew confused and remained on the floor
until the mistresses ran and picked them up. Many halted in front of a
bowl, thinking it was their proper place, and had already swallowed a
spoonful, when a mistress arrived and said, "Go on!" and then they
advanced three or four paces and got down another spoonful, and then
advanced again, until they reached their own places, after having
fraudulently disposed of half a portion. At last, by dint of pushing and
crying, "Make haste! make haste!" they were all got into order, and the
prayer was begun. But all those on the inner line, who had to turn their
backs on the bowls for the prayer, twisted their heads round so that
they could keep an eye on them, lest some one might meddle; and then
they said their prayer thus, with hands clasped and their eyes on the
ceiling, but with their hearts on their food. Then they set to eating.
Ah, what a charming sight it was! One ate with two spoons, another with
his hands; many picked up the beans one by one, and thrust them into
their pockets; others wrapped them tightly in their little aprons, and
pounded them to reduce them to a paste. There were even some who did not
eat, because they were watching the flies flying, and others coughed and
sprinkled a shower of rice all around them. It resembled a poultry-yard.
But it was charming. The two rows of babies formed a pretty sight, with
their hair all tied on the tops of their heads with red, green, and blue
ribbons. One teacher asked a row of eight children, "Where does rice
grow?" The whole eight opened their mouths wide, filled as they were
with the pottage, and replied in concert, in a sing-song, "It grows in
the water." Then the teacher gave the order, "Hands up!" and it was
pretty to see all those little arms fly up, which a few months ago were
all in swaddling-clothes, and all those little hands flourishing, which
looked like so many white and pink butterflies.
Then they all went to recreation; but first they all took their little
baskets, which were hanging on the wall with their lunches in them. They
went out into the garden and scattered, drawing forth their provisions
as they did so,--bread, stewed plums, a tiny bit of cheese, a
hard-boiled egg, little apples, a handful of boiled vetches, or a wing
of chicken. In an instant the whole garden was strewn with crumbs, as
though they had been scattered from their feed by a flock of birds. They
ate in all the queerest ways,--like rabbits, like rats, like cats,
nibbling, licking, sucking. There was one child who held a bit of rye
bread hugged closely to his breast, and was rubbing it with a medlar, as
though he were polishing a sword. Some of the little ones crushed in
their fists small cheeses, which trickled between their fingers like
milk, and ran down inside their sleeves, and they were utterly
unconscious of it. They ran and chased each other with apples and rolls
in their teeth, like dogs. I saw three of them excavating a hard-boiled
egg with a straw, thinking to discover treasures, and they spilled half
of it on the ground, and then picked the crumbs up again one by one with
great patience, as though they had been pearls. And those who had
anything extraordinary were surrounded by eight or ten, who stood
staring at the baskets with bent heads, as though they were looking at
the moon in a well. There were twenty congregated round a mite of a
fellow who had a paper horn of sugar, and they were going through all
sorts of ceremonies with him for the privilege of dipping their bread in
it, and he accorded it to some, while to others, after many prayers, he
only granted his finger to suck.
[Illustration: "THE BOYS HAD DAUBED THEIR HANDS WITH
RESIN."--Page 202.]
In the meantime, my mother had come into the garden and was caressing
now one and now another. Many hung about her, and even on her back,
begging for a kiss, with faces upturned as though to a third story, and
with mouths that opened and shut as though asking for the breast. One
offered her the quarter of an orange which had been bitten, another a
small crust of bread; one little girl gave her a leaf; another showed
her, with all seriousness, the tip of her forefinger, a minute
examination of which revealed a microscopic swelling, which had been
caused by touching the flame of a candle on the preceding day. They
placed before her eyes, as great marvels, very tiny insects, which I
cannot understand their being able to see and catch, the halfs of corks,
shirt-buttons, and flowerets pulled from the vases. One child, with a
bandaged head, who was determined to be heard at any cost, stammered out
to her some story about a head-over-heels tumble, not one word of which
was intelligible; another insisted that my mother should bend down, and
then whispered in her ear, "My father makes brushes."
And in the meantime a thousand accidents were happening here and there
which caused the teachers to hasten up. Children wept because they could
not untie a knot in their handkerchiefs; others disputed, with scratches
and shrieks, the halves of an apple; one child, who had fallen face
downward over a little bench which had been overturned, wept amid the
ruins, and could not rise.
Before her departure my mother took three or four of them in her arms,
and they ran up from all quarters to be taken also, their faces smeared
with yolk of egg and orange juice; and one caught her hands; another her
finger, to look at her ring; another tugged at her watch chain; another
tried to seize her by the hair.
"Take care," the teacher said to her; "they will tear your clothes all
to pieces."
But my mother cared nothing for her dress, and she continued to kiss
them, and they pressed closer and closer to her: those who were nearest,
with their arms extended as though they were desirous of climbing; the
more distant endeavoring to make their way through the crowd, and all
screaming:--
"Good by! good by! good by!"
At last she succeeded in escaping from the garden. And they all ran and
thrust their faces through the railings to see her pass, and to thrust
their arms through to greet her, offering her once more bits of bread,
bites of apple, cheese-rinds, and all screaming in concert:--
"Good by! good by! good by! Come back to-morrow! Come again!"
As my mother made her escape, she passed her hand once more over those
hundreds of tiny outstretched hands as over a garland of living roses,
and finally arrived safely in the street, covered with crumbs and spots,
rumpled and dishevelled, with one hand full of flowers and her eyes
swelling with tears, and happy as though she had come from a festival.
And inside there was still audible a sound like the twittering of birds,
saying:--
"Good by! good by! Come again, _madama_!"