Eugenius. Not while incomplete; no half-virgin will do.
Filippo. But there knelt Lucrezia! there she knelt! first looking with devotion at the Madonna, then with admiring wonder and grateful delight at the artist. Could so little a heart be divided? ’Twere a pity! There was enough for me; there is never enough for the Madonna. Resolving on a sudden that the object of my love should be the object of adoration to thousands, born and unborn, I swept my brush across the maternal face, and left a blank in heaven. The little girl screamed; I pressed her to my bosom.
Eugenius. In the chapel?
Filippo. I knew not where I was; I thought I was in Paradise.
Eugenius. If it was not in the chapel, the sin is venial. But a brush against a Madonna’s mouth is worse than a beard against her votary’s.
Filippo. I thought so too, Holy Father!
Eugenius. Thou sayest thou hast forty zecchins; I will try in due season to add forty more. The fisherman must not venture to measure forces with the pirate. Farewell! I pray God my son Filippo, to have thee alway in His holy keeping.
FOOTNOTE:
[9] Little boys, wearing clerical habits, are often called abbati.