The name of his natal village, a mere hamlet, has slipped my memory. I
only know that we moved at daybreak up the valley behind Levanto and
presently turned to our right past a small mill of some kind; olives,
then chestnuts, accompanied the path which grew steeper every moment,
and was soon ankle-deep in slush from the melted snow. This was his
daily walk, he explained. An hour and a half down, in the chill twilight
of dawn; two hours' trudge home, always up hill, dead tired, through mud
and mire, in pitch darkness, often with snow and rain.

"Do you wonder," he added, "at my preferring to be with you?"

"I wonder at my fortune, which gave me such a charming friend. I am not
always so lucky."

"Luck--it is the devil. We have had no news from my father in America
for two years. No remittances ever come from him. He may be dead, for
all we know. Our land lies half untilled; we cannot pay for the hire of
day labourers. We live from hand to mouth; my mother is not strong; I
earn what I can; one of my sisters is obliged to work at Levanto. Think
what that means, for us! Perhaps that is why you call me thoughtful. I
am the oldest male in the family; I must conduct myself accordingly.
Everything depends on me. It is enough to make anyone thoughtful. My
mother will tell you about it."

She doubtless did, though I gleaned not so much as the drift of her
speech. The mortal has yet to be born who can master all the dialects of
Italy; this one seemed to bear the same relation to the Tuscan tongue
which that of the Basses-Pyrenees bears to French--it was practically
another language. Listening to her, I caught glimpses, now and then, of
familiar Mediterranean sounds; like lamps shining through a fog, they