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154 A lost war.

And if we had not lost that illusion, would not some other have vanished in its place?

of myself and say: "How far it is from nineteen to twenty-five!"

Wherever I went, then, I was the youngest, since boys under nineteen don't mix on equal terms with men; and I knew that whoever I met envied me three things: my youth, my hopes, and my light-heartedness. And now, wherever I go, I meet young fellows who look at me and speak to me with the deference shown to an elder brother; and, as I talk to them, I am conscious of making an effort to appear as cheery as they, and even find myself wondering what stuff they are made of.

The other day, looking at a friend's child, a little girl of six, I said to him, half laughing, "Who knows?"

"Isn't there rather too much disparity of age?" he answered.

I was silent, half-startled; then, counting up the years on my fingers, I murmured sadly, "Yes."

At nineteen I could say of any little maid I met, that one day she might become my wife; the rising generation belonged to me; but now