"Mamma, mamma, I don't want any
supper to-night; I don't! I don't!" _Poverino_! he was growing and
strong, and so hungry. Fausta and Flavia and little Teresa said the
same, but it hurt them less, and they did not cry. And then little
Teresa spoke up,--she was always as wise as a little angel:

"Mamma," says she, "the baby must have her supper, mustn't she?"

"_Poverina!_ what would you have?" says La Mamma. "Yes, the poor baby
must have her supper, indeed. She knows nothing, poor little one, of the
sorrow in the house, or she would not grudge Babbo a taper any more than
the rest of you."

Little Teresa smiled, "Then, mamma, I've baby's supper for her," says
she. "I did not eat my bread all day, and you can have it now to make a
_pappa_ for her."

So La Mamma took me in her arms and went into the kitchen, and then Marc
Antonio held me while she and Fausta and Flavia and Teresa made the
_pappa_; and then each one took it in turn to feed me. You cannot know,
signora, how often I have lain awake and cried to think that I should
have been the only one of us all to eat like a pig that night, while
dear Babbo lay dead in the house and the rest were sad and hungry.
_Pazienza_! we need patience in this world, even with ourselves
sometimes.

When the funeral was over, La Mamma put the house in order, and then she
took out all her papers and accounts and counted over all she had. Just
a little of the money that Babbo had saved was left,--enough, if she
never touched it, to bring in seventy-three francs a year,--that is,
twenty centimes [four cents] a day. She made up her mind that she would
never touch it, so that each day, as long as we lived, we might have at
least a piece of bread bought with Babbo's money. Then there was the
parish, which gave her some help. The guardians of the poor widows
appointed a guardian for us,--the Conte Bertoli, a good man, God rest
his soul,--and he applied to the poor widows' fund for La Mamma and got
her an allowance of fifty centimes [ten cents] a day until Marc Antonio
should be fifteen and able to work; and then the Signor Conte himself
added to that twenty centimes more, so that altogether La Mamma had a
franc a day. But there were six of us. Thankful enough she was to have
the franc; but still, as you may suppose, signora, she had to think a
good deal and work hard to keep us. The elder children had all been put
to a school near by, a nice school, but where Babbo had had to pay for
the