to gymnastics with apparatus in the garden.

Garrone was in the head-master's office yesterday when Nelli's mother,
that blond woman dressed in black, came in to get her son excused from
the new exercises. Every word cost her an effort; and as she spoke, she
held one hand on her son's head.

"He is not able to do it," she said to the head-master. But Nelli showed
much grief at this exclusion from the apparatus, at having this added
humiliation imposed upon him.

"You will see, mamma," he said, "that I shall do like the rest."

His mother gazed at him in silence, with an air of pity and affection.
Then she remarked, in a hesitating way, "I fear lest his companions--"

What she meant to say was, "lest they should make sport of him." But
Nelli replied:--

"They will not do anything to me--and then, there is Garrone. It is
sufficient for him to be present, to prevent their laughing."

And then he was allowed to come. The teacher with the wound on his neck,
who was with Garibaldi, led us at once to the vertical bars, which are
very high, and we had to climb to the very top, and stand upright on the
transverse plank. Derossi and Coretti went up like monkeys; even little
Precossi mounted briskly, in spite of the fact that he was embarrassed
with that jacket which extends to his knees; and in order to make him
laugh while he was climbing, all the boys repeated to him his constant
expression, "Excuse me! excuse me!" Stardi puffed, turned as red as a
turkey-cock, and set his teeth until he looked like a mad dog; but he
would have reached the top at the expense of bursting, and he actually
did get there; and so did Nobis, who, when he reached the summit,
assumed the attitude of an emperor; but Votini slipped back twice,
notwithstanding his fine new suit with azure stripes, which had been
made expressly for gymnastics.

In order to climb the more easily, all the boys had daubed their hands
with resin, which they call colophony, and as a matter of course it is
that trader of a Garoffi who provides every one with it, in a powdered
form, selling it at a soldo the paper hornful, and turning a pretty
penny.

Then it was Garrone's turn, and up he went, chewing away at his bread as
though it were nothing out of the common; and I believe that he would
have been capable of carrying one of us up on his shoulders, for he is
as muscular and strong as a young bull.

After Garrone came Nelli. No sooner did the boys see him grasp the