Even though they had not reached Genoa, the lads had tasted the salt of adventure. Giuseppe's father boarded the Red Dragon, and, treating the whole matter as a summer's lark, helped the young sailors to bring their boat about, and tacking across toward Monaco and then out to the deeper sea, gave them a lesson in sailing that made them quickly forget that they were going back to Nice.
On that sail home the father learned a good deal about Giuseppe. He heard the boys talk freely to each other, and as he listened he realized that this son of his was not the quiet type of boy who would make a good priest, but that he craved the roving life of the sea, descended as he was from generations of sailors. He himself knew the perils of the sea only too well, how hard a man must work in its service, and how little he might gain, and how much securer was the life on shore. But he also knew that when once the sea called to a boy of Nice it was useless to try to make him forget the call. Giuseppe would not make a good priest, and he might make a good sailor. So the watchful father decided, as he brought the little boat back to shore, to let his son follow his natural bent.
After their adventure Giuseppe and his two friends went quietly on with their school life. Giuseppe's father had promised to teach him something about navigation in the evenings, and had told him that, if he would only be patient and wait a short time, he should make a cruise in earnest. One day, as the boy and his father were coming home from church a tall, black-haired man stepped up to them, and, holding out his hand, said, "Signor, will you give us something for the refugees of Italy?" Giuseppe's father gave the man a few coins, which he received with the greatest thanks. As they walked on the boy kept turning back to look at the tall gaunt-faced man they had met. Finally he said, "Who was he, father, and what did he mean by the refugees of Italy?"
The father looked down into the boy's eager eyes. "Our poor country," said he, "has been thrown to the ground, and different people have been beating her and trying to keep her down, but chiefly the big, white-coated Austrians, Giuseppe boy. Every once in a while some of our men band together and try to do something to help Italy get to her feet again. That man who asked for money was such a man."
"But why did he look so sad and white, father, and why did he say the refugees?"
"Our men are very few, Giuseppe, and have poor arms, and the enemy's army is very large and their men are veteran soldiers, so that we always lose. Then those who fought, like that poor fellow, have to fly and seek refuge out of Italy until the storm blows past."
Giuseppe clasped his hands behind his back, and his face grew very thoughtful. "So that man has been to war," he said, "and for us, and the money you gave him is going to help them the next time?"
"Exactly," said the father, with a smile at the boy's serious manner. Giuseppe was not usually very thoughtful.
"How long do you think the refugees will have to go on fighting, father, before the enemy are finally driven out of our land?"
"Oh, they'll have to fight for years and years, and perhaps they'll never win, for the enemy is much stronger than we Italians."