The old Pigna, holding the hand of his son’s son, a boy of eight years, led him for the first time home-Boniface to see the pictures of the battles of Napoleon, to show him what it was war.

The captain gave the necessary explanations. Andrea with the little nose in the air, amazed eyes, open mouth, looking now at the battles and now the captain, and was no longer afraid of him, gesticulating furiously, that the armies fighting in the square between the dead and wounded.

Maria came to take the hand of the little Andrea, who was about his age, and led him to deliver them from the attacks in the garden of his grandfather.

The old Pigna rubbed his hands in sign of joy, thinking that the new government would have reduced taxes and the price of salt, hoping that the war would increase the value of wheat, oats, wine, hay, as during the war in the Crimea.

Every moment some new strange came for news of Lombardy. The captain did not greet anyone, but threw his cap into the air, and put it on top of the stick, raising it as a sign of rejoicing, and told Zecchini:

-The time has come for blood-letting!

He assured all forthcoming liberation, and exclaimed:

-L ‘Austria is over !…. soon we will be in Vienna! … Hurrah for Napoleon’s!