hard heart not to be touched by the sight of a youth who by his daily
presence was a reproach over a year of his life wasted.

So Placido went in, not on tiptoe as was his custom, but noisily on his
heels, and only too well did he succeed in his intent! The professor
stared at him, knitted his brows, and shook his head, as though to say,
"Ah, little impudence, you'll pay for that!"





CHAPTER XIII

THE CLASS IN PHYSICS


The classroom was a spacious rectangular hall with large grated
windows that admitted an abundance of light and air. Along the two
sides extended three wide tiers of stone covered with wood, filled
with students arranged in alphabetical order. At the end opposite the
entrance, under a print of St. Thomas Aquinas, rose the professor's
chair on an elevated platform with a little stairway on each side. With
the exception of a beautiful blackboard in a narra frame, scarcely
ever used, since there was still written on it the _viva_ that had
appeared on the opening day, no furniture, either useful or useless,
was to be seen. The walls, painted white and covered with glazed tiles
to prevent scratches, were entirely bare, having neither a drawing
nor a picture, nor even an outline of any physical apparatus. The
students had no need of any, no one missed the practical instruction