Page:De Amicis - Heart, translation Hapgood, 1922.djvu/203

Rh o'clock, we went to his house, to go with the funeral to the church.

They live on the ground floor. Many boys of the upper primary, with their mothers, all holding candles, were there. Five or six teachers and several neighbors were already collected in the courtyard. The mistress with the red feather and Mistress Delcati had gone inside, and through an open window we beheld them weeping. We could hear the mother of the child sobbing loudly. Two ladies, mothers of two school companions of the dead child, had brought garlands of flowers.

Exactly at five o'clock we set out. In front went a boy carrying a cross, then a priest, then the coffin,—a very, very small coffin, poor child!—covered with a black cloth, and round it were wound the garlands brought by the two ladies. On the black cloth, on one side, were fastened the medal and honorable mentions which the little boy had won in the course of the year. Garrone, Coretti, and two boys from the courtyard bore the coffin. Behind the coffin first came mistress Delcati, who wept as though the little dead boy were her own; behind her the other schoolmistresses; and behind the mistresses, the boys, among whom were some very little ones, who carried bunches of violets in one hand, and who stared wonderingly at the bier, while their other hand was held by their mothers, who carried candles. I heard one of them say, “And shall I not see him at school again?”

When the coffin came from the court, a despairing cry was heard from the window. It was the child's mother; but they made her draw back into the room