Soon afterwards there was a stir in the cave. From their various lurking-places the robbers came forth, to partake of their morning meal, and prepare for their expedition. Enrico carefully avoided his brother; and Raphael, who never joined the banditti at their feasts, left the cave to follow the daily avocations by which he earned his scanty subsistence.
The robbers seemed to be aware that the expected travelers were not likely to be early on the route, or they lingered in their haunt till past noonday. Horace was, as before, exposed to their coarse jests and rude banter. Beppo, in particular, took pleasure in trying his mettle, and raising apprehensions in his mind. The robber described with a minuteness which almost sickened his hearer, barbarities exercised upon former prisoners; his memory was well stored with horrors, and he took care that Horace should have the full benefit of their recital. Beppo dwelt especially on the miserable fate of Carlo, one of the band who had attempted to break from the rest, and who had perished by the hand of the captain.
Horace noticed that Beppo, while telling the tale, often glanced meaningly at Enrico. Raphael's unhappy brother assumed a defiant, half-scornful air, boldly commended the murderous deed, and seemed eager to cast from himself the slightest suspicion of an intention to follow the example of Carlo.
Right glad was the prisoner when at length the robbers arose, looked to their guns, examined the priming, and after quaffing large bumpers to the success of their man-hunt, left him to his quiet solitude.
There is natural elasticity in the mind of the young. As soon as the form of the last of the band had disappeared behind the trees, Horace breathed more freely, and the relief which he felt made his spirit rebound into hope.
"I shall have but three days more of this to endure," thought he; "the worst half of the trial is ended, and oh, how glorious it will be to fling these fetters aside, and tread the earth once more as a free man! To leave behind, once and for ever, this den of misery and horror! I shall not care to stay longer in Italy; I shall hate the very sound of the language in which I have heard such things as I have been compelled to listen to here.
"But I cannot part with Raphael; no! He has quite long enough held his hopeless post, teaching those who will not learn, pleading with those who will not hear; he has quite long enough risked his life for the sake of a worthless brother. With his talents and his earnestness of purpose, what a glorious career is before him! If his light has shone even in this dark den, what a luster will it shed in some high position, where the world can see its brightness! Raphael is so unlike all other men whom I have met with; wherever he be, he will exercise power, and that power will be exerted for good. I am sure that my mother would pay for his expenses at one of our universities. The Christian soldier will then have a wider battle-field before him; he has been trained in these wild mountains by hardship and danger for deeds which, if I mistake not, will one day make his name renowned."
From forming projects for his friend, it was an easy transition to make some for himself.
But Horace's castles in the air were different now from what they had been in the days of his careless boyhood. Adversity is a powerful teacher, and when its lessons are enforced by their visible influence upon another, when example shows how in the fiery furnace the pure gold shines more brightly, to a generous spirit, like that of Horace, its lessons are seldom in vain.
Young Cleveland now thought less of commanding his fellow-creatures than of serving them; of being a victor in earthly warfare than of approving himself as a good soldier of the cross. He saw that his first post of duty must be home—the second, the circle of his school companions; he felt that his pride and self-will, the sins which most easily beset him, must be resisted and overcome there. Obedience to his parent would be the test of his obedience to God. His wild, undisciplined spirit must be brought into cheerful subjection.