e
honours her own heart had long since rendered to the dead. She looked
upon it all as upon something she had seen and known years ago. How
beautiful she still was, I thought; and that not merely because of the
noble curves that time had not yet wholly swept from brow and cheek,
nor because of the eyes, which once had been the loveliest in the town,
and indeed were so even when I knew her thirteen years before, in spite
of the many tears they had shed. But more than all this, was the halo
of truth and purity that surrounded her form, her movements, her face,
her expression. This was as visible to the beholder as light itself,
and like the light it transfigured what it touched. Treachery and
deceit felt its influence the moment they came beneath her glance, and
before she had had occasion to utter a syllable.

Never shall I forget the meeting between her and her sons. Both young
men embraced and kissed her. She held each of them clasped in her arms
for some moments as if she were praying over them. A deep hush fell on
the spectators, and several men mechanically bared their heads. The
younger Mansana, whom his mother had embraced first, drew back with his
handkerchief at his eyes. The elder brother stood rooted to the spot
when she had released him from her clasp. She looked long and intently
upon him. Following her eyes, the gaze of the whole multitude was
riveted upon him, while his cheek crimsoned under the ordeal. Her
expression was full of an unfathomable insight, a sorrow beyond the
reach of words. How often have I recalled it since! But the son, even
while he reddened, relaxed no whit the stern directness of his gaze at
her, and it was clear enough that she felt obliged to avert her own
eyes lest they should rouse him to defiant anger. Here, in sharp
antithesis to one another, the two divergent tendencies and contrasted
characteristics of their family stood revealed.

CHAPTER II

By the scene which I had witnessed my memory was long haunted; but not
so much by a recollection of the impressive part which the mother had
played, as by the defiant countenance, the tall, muscular figure, and
the athletic bearing, of the young officer of the Bersaglieri. I was
curious to learn something of his history, and discovered, to my
surprise, that it was the daring exploits of this son, which, by
recalling attention to the father, were responsible for the tardy
honours now accorded to the