"
"If my sinews are old and stiffened, Signor Mask, they are long used to
toil. As to shame, if it is a shame to be below the rest of mankind in
fortune, it will not now come for the first time. A heavy sorrow hath
befallen me, and this race may lighten the burden of grief. I shall not
pretend that I hear this laughter, and all these scornful speeches, as
one listens to the evening breeze on the Lagunes--for a man is still a
man, though he lives with the humblest, and eats of the coarsest. But
let it pass, Sant' Antonio will give me heart to bear it."
"Thou hast a stout mind, fisherman, and I would gladly pray my patron
to grant thee a stronger arm, but that I have much need of this victory
myself. Wilt thou be content with the second prize, if, by any manner of
skill, I might aid thy efforts? for, I suppose, the metal of the third
is as little to thy taste as it is to my own."
"Nay, I count not on gold or silver."
"Can the honor of such a struggle awaken the pride of one like thee?"
The old man looked earnestly at his companion, but he shook his head
without answer. Fresh merriment, at his expense, caused him to bend his
face towards the scoffers, and he perceived they were just then passing
a numerous group of his fellows of the Lagunes, who seemed to feel that
his unjustifiable ambition reflected, in some degree, on the honor of
their whole body.
"How now, old Antonio!" shouted the boldest of the band, "is it not
enough that thou hast won the honors of the net, but thou would'st have
a golden oar at thy neck?"
"We shall yet see him of the senate!" cried a second.
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