VII.

Well, well-those are the mournful imaginings of rainy days.  When the sun reappears, the soul grows clear like the sky, and there succeeds to my brief discouragement a state of mind in which it appears to me so foolish and so cowardly to fret because I see a change in my face, to mourn the careless light-heartedness of my youth, to rebel against the laws of nature in a burst of angry regret, that I am overcome with shame.  I rouse myself, I scramble to my feet, I seize hold of my faith, my hopes, my intentions, I set to work again with a resolution full of joyful pride.  At such moments I feel strong enough to face the approach of my thirtieth year, to await with serenity disillusionments, white hairs, sorrows. infirmities, and old age, my mind’s eye fixed upon a far-off point of light that seems to grow larger as I advance.  I march on with renewed courage; and to the noisy and drunken crew calling out to me to join them, I answer, No!—­and to the knights of the doleful countenance, who shake their heads and say, “What if it were not true?” —­I answer, without turning my eyes from that distant light, No!—­and to the grave, proud men who point to their books and writings, and say with a smile of pity and derision, “It is all a dream!”—­I answer, with my eyes still upon that far-off light, and the great cry of a man who sees a ghost in his path, No!  Ah, at such moments, what matters it that I must grow old and die?  I toil, I wait, I believe!

VIII.

Most of my classmates have undergone the same change.  Their faces have grown older, or sadder, as Leopardi would have us say; but with the faces the souls have grown graver also.  I have spoken of certain changes in my friends that saddened me; but there are others which make me glad.  Now and then it has happened to me to come across some of the most careless, happy-go-lucky of my classmates, and to be filled with wonder when I hear them speak of their country, of their work, of the duties to be performed, of the future to be prepared for.  Owing, perhaps, to the many and great events of these last years, their characters have been suddenly and completely transformed.  Some ruling motive—­ambition, family cares, or the mere instinctive love of study—­has gathered together and focused their vague thoughts and scattered powers; has brought about the habit of reflection, and turned their thoughts towards the great problem of life; has given to all a purpose, and a path to travel, and left them no time to mourn the vanished past.  We have all entered upon our second youth, with some disillusionments, with a little experience, and with the conviction that happiness—­what little of it is given to us on earth—­is not obtained by struggling, storming, and clamoring to heaven and earth we must have it!—­but is slowly distilled from the inmost depths of the soul by the long persistence of quiet toil.  Humble hopes have succeeded to our splendid visions; steady resolves, to our grand designs; and the dazzling vision of war, the goddess promising glory and delirium, has been replaced by the image of Italy, our mother, who promises only—­and it is enough—­the lofty consolation of having loved and served her.