'Yes, I can prove to you,' said Mrs. Villars, 'that Leonora has forgiven you. It is she who has given you the prize; it was she who persuaded Louisa to give you her vote. I went to see her a little while ago; and perceiving, by her countenance, that something was the matter, I pressed her to tell me what it was.

'"Why, madam," said she, "Leonora has made me promise to give my sh.e.l.l to Cecilia. Now I don't love Cecilia half so well as I do Leonora.

Besides, I would not have Cecilia think I vote for her because she gave me a Flora." Whilst Louisa was speaking,' continued Mrs. Villars, 'I saw this silver box lying on the bed. I took it up, and asked if it was not yours, and how she came by it. "Indeed, madam," said Louisa, "I could have been almost certain that it was Cecilia's; but Leonora gave it me, and she said that she bought it of the peddler this morning. If anybody else had told me so, I could not have believed them, because I remember the box so well; but I can't help believing Leonora." "But did not you ask Cecilia about it?" said I. "No, madam," replied Louisa; "for Leonora forbade me." I guessed her reason. "Well," said I, "give me the box, and I will carry your sh.e.l.l in it to Cecilia." "Then, madam," said she, "if I must give it her, pray do take the Flora, and return it to her first, that she may not think it is for that I do it."'

'Oh, generous Leonora!' exclaimed Cecilia; 'but, indeed, Louisa, I cannot take your sh.e.l.l.'

'Then, dear Cecilia, accept of mine instead of it! you cannot refuse it; I only follow your example. As for the bracelet,' added Leonora, taking Cecilia's hand, 'I a.s.sure you I don't wish for it, and you do, and you deserve it.' 'No,' said Cecilia, 'indeed I do not deserve it. Next to you, surely Louisa deserves it best.'

'Louisa! oh yes, Louisa,' exclaimed everybody with one voice.

'Yes,' said Mrs. Villars, 'and let Cecilia carry the bracelet to her; she deserves that reward. For one fault I cannot forget all your merits, Cecilia, nor, I am sure, will your companions.' 'Then, surely, not your best friend,' said Leonora, kissing her.

Everybody present was moved. They looked up to Leonora with respectful and affectionate admiration.

'Oh, Leonora, how I love you! and how I wish to be like you!' exclaimed Cecilia--'to be as good, as generous!'

'Rather wish, Cecilia,' interrupted Mrs. Villars, 'to be as just; to be as strictly honourable, and as invariably consistent. Remember, that many of our s.e.x are capable of great efforts--of making what they call great sacrifices to virtue or to friendship; but few treat their friends with habitual gentleness, or uniformly conduct themselves with prudence and good sense.'

THE LITTLE MERCHANTS

CHAPTER I

_Chi di gallina nasce, convien che rozole._ As the old c.o.c.k crows, so crows the young.

Those who have visited Italy give us an agreeable picture of the cheerful industry of the children of all ages in the celebrated city of Naples. Their manner of living and their numerous employments are exactly described in the following 'Extract from a Traveller's Journal.'[18]

[18] _Varieties of Literature_, vol. i. p. 299.

'The children are busied in various ways. A great number of them bring fish for sale to town from Santa Lucia; others are very often seen about the a.r.s.enals, or wherever carpenters are at work, employed in gathering up the chips and pieces of wood; or by the seaside, picking up sticks, and whatever else has drifted ash.o.r.e, which, when their basket is full, they carry away.

'Children of two or three years old, who can scarcely crawl along upon the ground, in company with boys of five or six, are employed in this petty trade. Hence they proceed with their baskets into the heart of the city, where in several places they form a sort of little market, sitting round with their stock of wood before them. Labourers, and the lower order of citizens, buy it of them to burn in the tripods for warming themselves, or to use in their scanty kitchens.

'Other children carry about for sale the water of the sulphurous wells, which, particularly in the spring season, is drunk in great abundance.

Others again endeavour to turn a few pence by buying a small matter of fruit, of pressed honey, cakes, and comfits, and then, like little peddlers, offer and sell them to other children, always for no more profit than that they may have their share of them free of expense.

'It is really curious to see how an urchin, whose whole stock and property consist in a board and a knife, will carry about a water-melon, or a half-roasted gourd, collect a troup of children round him, set down his board, and proceed to divide the fruit into small pieces among them.

'The buyers keep a sharp look-out to see that they have enough for their little piece of copper; and the Lilliputian tradesmen act with no less caution as the exigencies of the case may require, to prevent his being cheated out of a morsel.'

The advantages of truth and honesty, and the value of a character for integrity, are very early felt amongst these little merchants in their daily intercourse with each other. The fair dealer is always sooner or later seen to prosper. The most cunning cheat is at last detected and disgraced.

Numerous instances of the truth of this common observation were remarked by many Neapolitan children, especially by those who were acquainted with the characters and history of Piedro and Francisco, two boys originally equal in birth, fortune, and capacity, but different in their education, and consequently in their habits and conduct. Francisco was the son of an honest gardener, who, from the time he could speak, taught him to love to speak the truth, showed him that liars are never believed--that cheats and thieves cannot be trusted, and that the shortest way to obtain a good character is to deserve it.

Youth and white paper, as the proverb says, take all impressions. The boy profited much by his father's precepts, and more by his example; he always heard his father speak the truth, and saw that he dealt fairly with everybody. In all his childish traffic, Francisco, imitating his parents, was scrupulously honest, and therefore all his companions trusted him--'As honest as Francisco,' became a sort of proverb amongst them.

'As honest as Francisco,' repeated Piedro's father, when he one day heard this saying. 'Let them say so; I say, "As sharp as Piedro"; and let us see which will go through the world best.' With the idea of making his son _sharp_ he made him cunning. He taught him, that to make a _good bargain_ was to deceive as to the value and price of whatever he wanted to dispose of; to get as much money as possible from customers by taking advantage of their ignorance or of their confidence. He often repeated his favourite proverb--'The buyer has need of a hundred eyes; the seller has need but of one.'[19] And he took frequent opportunities of explaining the meaning of this maxim to his son. He was a fisherman; and as his gains depended more upon fortune than upon prudence, he trusted habitually to his good luck. After being idle for a whole day, he would cast his line or his nets, and if he was lucky enough to catch a fine fish, he would go and show it in triumph to his neighbour the gardener.

[19] Chi compra ha bisogna di cent' occhi; chi vende n' ha a.s.sai di uno.

'You are obliged to work all day long for your daily bread,' he would say. 'Look here; I work but five minutes, and I have not only daily bread, but daily fish.'

Upon these occasions, our fisherman always forgot, or neglected to count, the hours and days which were wasted in waiting for a fair wind to put to sea, or angling in vain on the sh.o.r.e.

Little Piedro, who used to bask in the sun upon the sea-sh.o.r.e beside his father, and to lounge or sleep away his time in a fishing-boat, acquired habits of idleness, which seemed to his father of little consequence whilst he was _but a child_.

'What will you do with Piedro as he grows up, neighbour?' said the gardener. 'He is smart and quick enough, but he is always in mischief.

Scarcely a day has pa.s.sed for this fortnight but I have caught him amongst my grapes. I track his footsteps all over my vineyard.' '_He is but a child_ yet, and knows no better,' replied the fisherman. 'But if you don't teach him better now he is a child, how will he know when he is a man?' said the gardener. 'A mighty noise about a bunch of grapes, truly!' cried the fisherman; 'a few grapes more or less in your vineyard, what does it signify?' 'I speak for your son's sake, and not for the sake of my grapes,' said the gardener; 'and I tell you again, the boy will not do well in the world, neighbour, if you don't look after him in time.' 'He'll do well enough in the world, you will find,'

answered the fisherman, carelessly. 'Whenever he casts my nets, they never come up empty. "It is better to be lucky than wise."'[20]

[20] E meglio esser fortunato che savio.

This was a proverb which Piedro had frequently heard from his father, and to which he most willingly trusted, because it gave him less trouble to fancy himself fortunate than to make himself wise.

'Come here, child,' said his father to him, when he returned home after the preceding conversation with the gardener; 'how old are you, my boy?--twelve years old, is not it?' 'As old as Francisco, and older by six months,' said Piedro. 'And smarter and more knowing by six years,'

said his father. 'Here, take these fish to Naples, and let us see how you'll sell them for me. Venture a small fish, as the proverb says, to catch a great one.[21] I was too late with them at the market yesterday, but n.o.body will know but what they are just fresh out of the water, unless you go and tell them.'

[21] b.u.t.ta una sardella per pigliar un luccio.

'Not I; trust me for that; I'm not such a fool,' replied Piedro, laughing; 'I leave that to Francisco. Do you know, I saw him the other day miss selling a melon for his father by turning the bruised side to the customer, who was just laying down the money for it, and who was a raw servant-boy, moreover--one who would never have guessed there were two sides to a melon, if he had not, as you say, father, been told of it?'

'Off with you to market. You are a droll chap,' said his father, 'and will sell my fish cleverly, I'll be bound. As to the rest, let every man take care of his own grapes. You understand me, Piedro?'

'Perfectly,' said the boy, who perceived that his father was indifferent as to his honesty, provided he sold fish at the highest price possible.

He proceeded to the market, and he offered his fish with a.s.siduity to every person whom he thought likely to buy it, especially to those upon whom he thought he could impose. He positively a.s.serted to all who looked at his fish that they were just fresh out of the water. Good judges of men and fish knew that he said what was false, and pa.s.sed him by with neglect; but it was at last what he called _good luck_ to meet with the very same young raw servant-boy who would have bought the bruised melon from Francisco. He made up to him directly, crying, 'Fish!

Fine fresh fish! fresh fish!'

'Was it caught to-day?' said the boy.

[Ill.u.s.tration: _'I saw him the other day miss selling a melon for his father by turning the bruised side to the customer.'_]

'Yes, this morning; not an hour ago,' said Piedro, with the greatest effrontery.

The servant-boy was imposed upon; and being a foreigner, speaking the Italian language but imperfectly, and not being expert at reckoning the Italian money, he was no match for the cunning Piedro, who cheated him not only as to the freshness but as to the price of the commodity.

Piedro received nearly half as much again for his fish as he ought to have done.

On his road homewards from Naples to the little village of Resina, where his father lived, he overtook Francisco, who was leading his father's a.s.s. The a.s.s was laden with large panniers, which were filled with the stalks and leaves of cauliflowers, cabbages, broccoli, lettuces, etc.--all the refuse of the Neapolitan kitchens, which are usually collected by the gardeners' boys, and carried to the gardens round Naples, to be mixed with other manure.

'Well-filled panniers, truly,' said Piedro, as he overtook Francisco and the a.s.s. The panniers were indeed not only filled to the top, but piled up with much skill and care, so that the load met over the animal's back.

'It is not a very heavy load for the a.s.s, though it looks so large,'

said Francisco. 'The poor fellow, however, shall have a little of this water,' added he, leading the a.s.s to a pool by the roadside.

'I was not thinking of the a.s.s, boy; I was not thinking of any a.s.s, but of you, when I said, "Well-filled panniers, truly!" This is your morning's work, I presume, and you'll make another journey to Naples to-day, on the same errand, I warrant, before your father thinks you have done enough?'