She is a pupil of mine, and I go to their house in the Corso and give her lessons." "And then ?" asked Nino impatiently.
"Who goes slowly goes surely," said the maestro sententiously; and he stopped to light a cigar as black and twisted as his moustache.

Then he continued, standing still in the middle of the piazza to talk at his ease, for it had stopped raining and the air was moist and sultry, "They are Prussians, you must know.

The old man is a colonel, retired, pensioned, everything you like, wounded at Koeniggratz by the Austrians.

His wife was delicate, and he brought her to live here long before he left the service, and the signorina was born here.

He has told me about it, and he taught me to pronounce the name Koeniggratz, so--Conigherazzo," said the maestro proudly, "and that is how I know." "Capperi! What a mouthful," said I.
"You may well say that, Sor Conte, but singing teaches us all languages.