h the good sense of a man.
"Others have gone thither," he said; "and smaller boys than I, too. Once
on board the ship, I shall get there like anybody else. Once arrived
there, I only have to hunt up our cousin's shop. There are plenty of
Italians there who will show me the street. After finding our cousin, my
mother is found; and if I do not find him, I will go to the consul: I
will search out that Argentine family. Whatever happens, there is work
for all there; I shall find work also; sufficient, at least, to earn
enough to get home." And thus little by little he almost succeeded in
persuading his father. His father esteemed him; he knew that he had good
judgment and courage; that he was inured to privations and to
sacrifices; and that all these good qualities had acquired double force
in his heart in consequence of the sacred project of finding his mother,
whom he adored. In addition to this, the captain of a steamer, the
friend of an acquaintance of his, having heard the plan mentioned,
undertook to procure a free third-class passage for the Argentine
Republic.

And then, after a little hesitation, the father gave his consent. The
voyage was decided on. They filled a sack with clothes for him, put a
few crowns in his pocket, and gave him the address of the cousin; and
one fine evening in April they saw him on board.

"Marco, my son," his father said to him, as he gave him his last kiss,
with tears in his eyes, on the steps of the steamer, which was on the
point of starting, "take courage. Thou hast set out on a holy
undertaking, and God will aid thee."

Poor Marco! His heart was strong and prepared for the hardest trials of
this voyage; but when he beheld his beautiful Genoa disappear on the
horizon, and found himself on the open sea on that huge steamer thronged
with emigrating peasants, alone, unacquainted with any one, with that
little bag which held his entire fortune, a sudden discouragement
assailed him. For two days he remained crouching like a dog on the bows,
hardly eating, and oppressed with a great desire to weep. Every
description of sad thoughts passed through his mind, and the saddest,
the most terrible, was the one which was the most persistent in its
return,--the thought that his mother was dead. In his broken and painful
slumbers he constantly beheld a strange face, which surveyed him with an
air of compassion, and whispered in his ear, "Your mother is dead!" And
then he awoke, stifling a shriek.