ter the coming of Falcone to
Mondolfo.

That the old man-at-arms should have exerted a strong attraction upon
my young mind, you will readily understand. His intimate connection with
that dimly remembered father, who stood secretly in my imagination in
the position that my mother would have had St. Augustine occupy, drew me
to his equerry like metal to a lodestone.

And this attraction was reciprocal. Of his own accord old Falcone sought
me out, lingering in my neighbourhood at first like a dog that looks for
a kindly word. He had not long to wait. Daily we had our meetings and
our talks and daily did these grow in length; and they were stolen hours
of which I said no word to my mother, nor did others for a season, so
that all was well.

Our talks were naturally of my father, and it was through Falcone that
I came to know something of the greatness of that noble-souled, valiant
gentleman, whom the old servant painted for me as one who combined with
the courage of the lion the wiliness of the fox.

He discoursed of their feats of arms together, he described charges
of horse that set my nerves a-tingle as in fancy I heard the blare
of trumpets and the deafening thunder of hooves upon the turf. Of
escalades, of surprises, of breaches stormed, of camisades and ambushes,
of dark treacheries and great heroisms did he descant to fire my
youthful fancy, to fill me first with delight, and then with frenzy when
I came to think that in all these things my life must have no part, that
for me another road was set--a grey, gloomy road at the end of which was
dangled a reward which did not greatly interest me.

And then one day from fighting as an endeavour, as a pitting of force
against force and astuteness against astuteness, he came to talk of
fighting as an art.

It was from old Falcone that first I heard of Marozzo, that
miracle-worker in weapons, that master at whose academy in Bologna the
craft of swordsmanship was to be acquired, so that from fighting with
his irons as a beast with its claws, by sheer brute strength and brute
instinct, man might by practised skill and knowledge gain advantages
against which mere strength must spend itself in vain.

What he told me amazed me beyond anything that I had ever heard, even
from himself, and what he told me he illustrated, flinging himself into
the poises taught by Marozzo that I might appreciate the marvellous
science of the thing.

Thus was it that for the first time I ma