whether she would like that entertainment just now. But persevering looks make themselves felt at last. Romola did presently turn away her eyes from the distance and met Lillo’s impatient dark gaze with a brighter and brighter smile. He shuffled along the floor, still keeping the book on his lap, till he got close to her and lodged his chin on her knee.
“What is it, Lillo?” said Romola, pulling his hair back from his brow. Lillo was a handsome lad, but his features were turning out to be more massive and less regular than his father’s. The blood of the Tuscan peasant was in his veins.
“Mamma. Romola, what am I to be?” he said, well contented that there was a prospect of talking till it would be too late to con “ Spirto gentil ” any longer.
“What should you like to be, Lillo? You might be a scholar. My father was a scholar, you know, and taught me a great deal. That is the reason why I can teach you.”
“Yes,” said Lillo, rather hesitatingly. “But he is old and blind in the picture. Did he get a great deal of glory?”
“Not much, Lillo. The world was not always very kind to him, and he saw meaner men than himself put into higher places, because they could flatter and say what was false. And then his dear son thought it right to leave him and become a monk; and after that, my father, being blind and lonely, felt unable to do the things that would have made his learning of greater use to men, so that he might still have lived in his works after he was in his grave.”
“I should not like that sort of life,” said Lillo. “I should like to be something that would make me a great man, and very happy besides—something that would not hinder me from having a good deal of pleasure.”