"It cannot be done in one day," replied his mother. "Write to your friends that you will come on Thursday."
So on Thursday he bade his mother good-bye and started on his journey. He was taken to the station in his little boat, poled by his friend Nicolo; and his last words to Nicolo as he left the boat were, "I am so glad to go!"
CHAPTER X
GATHERING GRAPES IN TUSCANY
To Madre Mia in Venice:—
I am still glad! Yet it would not be so if you were not also glad for me.
It was the joy of the morning to find a letter from you to-day. Two letters have I now had in my life, and both from Italy. I had thought we Italians had letters from nobody but "friends in America," as Paolo, the fruit-man, always says.
And you say that Nicolo wishes to buy my boat; and that he will pay for it after he has carried many passengers under the three bridges of the Grand Canal, and to the Lido.