My mother wept bitterly when I went away, but my
father only thought of the money."
Filippo and Giacomo were from the same town in Calabria. They
were the sons of Italian peasants who had been unable to resist
the offers of the padrone, and for less than a hundred dollars
each had sold his son into the cruelest slavery. The boys were
torn from their native hills, from their families, and in a
foreign land were doomed to walk the streets from fourteen to
sixteen hours in every twenty-four, gathering money from which
they received small benefit. Many times, as they trudged through
the streets, weary and hungry, sometimes cold, they thought with
homesick sadness of the sunny fields in which their earliest
years had been passed, but the hard realities of the life they
were now leading soon demanded their attention.
Naturally light-hearted, Filippo, or Phil, bore his hard lot more
cheerfully than some of his comrades. But Giacomo was more
delicate, and less able to bear want and fatigue. His livelier
comrade cheered him up, and Giacomo always felt better after
talking with Phil.
As the two boys were walking together, a heavy hand was laid on
the shoulder of each, and a harsh voice said: "Is this the way
you waste your time, little rascals?"
Both boys started, and looking up, recognized the padrone.
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