of
mountains; alone, in couples, in groups, in long files, all with
their books under their arms, clad in a thousand ways, speaking a
thousand tongues, from the most remote schools in Russia. Almost
lost in the ice to the furthermost schools of Arabia, shaded by
palm-trees, millions and millions, all going to learn the same
things, in a hundred varied forms. Imagine this vast, vast throng
of boys of a hundred races, this immense movement of which you form
a part, and think, if this movement were to cease, humanity would
fall back into barbarism; this movement is the progress, the hope,
the glory of the world. Courage, then, little soldier of the
immense army. Your books are your arms, your class is your
squadron, the field of battle is the whole earth, and the victory
is human civilization. Be not a cowardly soldier, my Enrico.

THY FATHER.

THE LITTLE PATRIOT OF PADUA.

(_The Monthly Story._)

Saturday, 29th.

I will not be a _cowardly soldier_, no; but I should be much more
willing to go to school if the master would tell us a story every day,
like the one he told us this morning. "Every month," said he, "I shall
tell you one; I shall give it to you in writing, and it will always be
the tale of a fine and noble deed performed by a boy. This one is
called _The Little Patriot of Padua_. Here it is. A French steamer set
out from Barcelona, a city in Spain, for Genoa; there were on board
Frenchmen, Italians, Spaniards, and Swiss. Among the rest was a lad of
eleven, poorly clad, and alone, who always held himself aloof, like a
wild animal, and stared at all with gloomy eyes. He had good reasons for
looking at every one with forbidding eyes. Two years previous to this
time his parents, peasants in the neighborhood of Padua, had sold him to
a company of mountebanks, who, after they had taught him how to perform
tricks, by dint of blows and kicks and starving, had carried him all
over France and Spain, beating him continually and never giving him
enough to eat. On his arrival in Barcelona, being no longer able to
endure ill treatment and hunger, and being reduced to a pitiable
condition, he had fled from his slave-master and had betaken himself for
protection to the Italian consul, who, moved with compassion, had placed
him on board of this steamer, and had given him a letter to the
treasurer of Genoa, who was to send the boy back to his parents-