pencil--only I can not sign my name--it meant one hundred, two hundred
thousand francs to go into the world. And now he must leave his house
and Rome. What will he do, Excellency, I ask you?" With a shake of his
head he added: "He should reconstruct his fortune abroad. We have this
saying: 'He who squanders gold with his hands will search for it with his
feet.' But Sabatino is coming! She has been as nimble as a cat."

The good man's invaluable mimetic art, his proverbs, the story of the
fete of St. Joseph, the original evocation of the heir of the Castagnas
continually signing and signing, the coarse explanation of his ruin--very
true, however--everything in the recital had amused Dorsenne. He knew
enough Italian to appreciate the untranslatable passages of the language
of the man of the people. He was again on the verge of laughter, when
the fresco madonna, as he sometimes designated the young girl, handed him
an envelope the address upon which soon converted his smile into an
undisguised expression of annoyance. He pushed aside the day's bill of
fare which the old cook presented to him and said, brusquely: "I fear I
can not remain to breakfast." Then, opening the letter: "No, I can not;
adieu." And he went out, in a manner so precipitate and troubled that
the uncle and niece exchanged smiling glances. Those typical Southerners
could not think of any other trouble in connection with so handsome a man
as Dorsenne than that of the heart.

"Chi ha l'amor nel petto," said Signorina Sabatina.

"Ha lo spron nei fianchi," replied the uncle.

That naive adage which compares the sharp sting which passion drives into
our breasts to the spurring given the flanks of a horse, was not true of
Dorsenne. The application of the proverb to the circumstance was not,