Soon after, however, the fiddle disappeared, and never
made its appearance again.
Often, when they were together, the man would begin to sing
softly,--softly at first, then more and more distinctly as he became
more interested, and the boy know the words, he could at least follow
the tune. The father sang Italian always; and the child understood a
great deal, but not well enough to sing. One tune, however, he knew
better than any other, for his father had repeated it many hundred
times. It was part of a long song, and began in this wise:--
"One evening In Peschiera."
It was a sad melody that some one had arranged to a pretty ballad, and
it particularly pleased the lad, so that he always sang it with pleasure
and with a feeling of awe; and it sounded very sweetly, for the lad had
a clear, bell-like voice, that harmonized beautifully with his father's
strong basso. And each time after they had sung this song from beginning
to end, his father clapped the boy kindly on the shoulder, saying, "Well
done, Henrico! well done!" This was the way his father called him, but
he was called "Rico" only by everybody else.
There was a cousin who lived in the cottage with them, and who mended
and cooked and kept the house in order. In the winter she sat by the
stove and spun, and Rico had to consider how he could enter the room,
very carefully; for as soon as he had opened the door, his cousin called
out, "Do let that door alone, or we shall have it cold enough in the
room here.
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