master, but my absurd
vanity could not hold out against his last words.

"You're a good boy," I said; "my money is your money; you earn it also,
and more than I, very often. You can take as many lessons as you like,
and I'll take them with you."

The master, the _real_ master that we required, was not a villager, but
an _artiste_, a great _artiste_, such as might be found only in
important towns. Consulting our map we found that the next big town was
Mendes.

It was already night when we reached Mendes and, as we were tired out,
we decided that we could not take a lesson that evening. We asked the
landlady of the inn where we could find a good music master. She said
that she was very surprised that we asked such a question; surely, we
knew Monsieur Espinassous!

"We've come from a distance," I said.

"You must have come from a very great distance, then?"

"From Italy," replied Mattia.

Then she was no longer astonished, and she admitted that, coming from so
far then, we might not have heard of M. Espinassous.

"Is this professor very busy?" I asked, fearing that such a celebrated
musician might not care to give just one lesson to two little urchins
like ourselves.

"Oh, yes, I should say he is busy; how couldn't he be?"

"Do you think that he would receive us to-morrow morning?"

"Sure! He receives every one, when they have money in their pockets ...
naturally."

We understood that, of course.

Before going to sleep, we discussed all the questions that we intended
asking the celebrated professor the next day. Mattia was quite elated
at our luck in finding just the kind of musician we wanted.

Next morning we took our instruments, Mattia his violin and I my harp,
and set out to find M. Espinassous. We did not take Capi, because we
thought that it would not do to call on such a celebrated person with a
dog. We tied him up in the inn stables. When we reached the house which
our landlady indicated was the professor's, we thought that we must have
made a mistake, for before the house two little brass plaques were
swinging, which was certainly not the sign of a music professor. The
place bore every appearance of a barber's shop. Turning to a man, who
was passing, we asked him if he could direct us to M. Espinassous'
house.

"There it is," he said, pointing to the barber's shop.

After all, why should not a professor live with a barber? We entered.
The shop was partitioned off into two equal parts. On the