Antonio, returned limping to his house.




[Illustration]

CHAPTER III

GEPPETTO NAMES HIS PUPPET PINOCCHIO


Geppetto lived in a small ground-floor room that was only lighted from
the staircase. The furniture could not have been simpler--a rickety
chair, a poor bed, and a broken-down table. At the end of the room there
was a fireplace with a lighted fire; but the fire was painted, and by
the fire was a painted saucepan that was boiling cheerfully and sending
out a cloud of smoke that looked exactly like real smoke.

As soon as he reached home Geppetto took his tools and set to work to
cut out and model his puppet.

[Illustration: A Little Chicken Popped Out, Very Gay and Polite]

"What name shall I give him?" he said to himself; "I think I will call
him Pinocchio. It is a name that will bring him luck. I once knew a
whole family so called. There was Pinocchio the father, Pinocchia the
mother, and Pinocchi the children, and all of them did well. The
richest of them was a beggar."