Page:Manzoni - The Betrothed, 1834.djvu/457

 when he least expected it, that voice! that voice itself! And to see her there! But then her vow! It exists no longer. And his violent hatred against Don Roderick, which had augmented his grief, and shed its venom over his hopes! That also was gone. Indeed, had it not been for his uncertainty concerning Agnes, his anxiety about Father Christopher, and the consciousness that the pestilence still existed, his happiness would have been without alloy.

He arrived at Sesto in the evening; the rain had as yet no appearance of ceasing. But Renzo did not stop, his only inconvenience was an extraordinary appetite, which the vicinity of a baker's shop enabled him to mitigate the violence of. When he passed through Monza it was dark night; he succeeded, however, in leaving it by the right road; but what a road! buried between two banks, almost like the bed of a river, it might then, indeed, have been called a river, or rather, an aqueduct; in numerous places were deep holes, from which Renzo could with difficulty extricate himself. But he did as well as he could, without impatience or regret. He reflected that every step brought him nearer to the end of his journey; that the rain would cease when God should please; that day would come in its own time; and that in the mean time the road he had passed over he should not have to travel again. At the break of day he found himself near the Adda. It had not ceased raining; there was still a drizzling shower; the light of the dawn enabled Renzo to see around him. He was in his own country! Who can express his sensations? Those mountains, the Resegone, the territory of Lecco, appeared to belong to him, to be his own! But, looking at himself, he felt that his outward aspect was rather at variance with the exuberant joyousness of his heart; his clothes were wet and clinging to his body, his hat bent out of shape and full of water; his hair hanging straight about his face; while his lower man was encased in a dense covering of mud.

He reached Pescate; travelled along the Adda, giving a melancholy glance at Pescarenico; passed the bridge, and crossed the fields, to the house of his friend, who, just