Giorgio

“ He tries again. "Giorgio, I have made her coat damp. It will help you stick on. Now, run the best race of your life." He unties her from the iron ring. "Here, she is yours. I have done all I can. Now rules Fate, the Queen of the Palio."
Giorgio takes the reins and studies the mare from pricked ears to tail. Her neck is frosted with foam, her nostrils distended, her eyes darkly intent. He does not answer the groom. He has just himself to answer. ”

“ And he could not use the reply he had rehearsed awake and asleep: "Signore, I am honored deeply to ride in the Palio for your contrada."
When the day of August the sixteenth came and the bell in the Mangia Tower began tolling, Giorgio forgot he was man-grown. With all his clothes on, even his high-laced country boots, he went to bed like a child and pulled the covers up over his head. But still he could hear the bell, sonorous and deep; could see the pageant unfold in his mind, telling the beads of history. The solemn tolling went on and on. ”

“ Where the streets narrow, the people flatten themselves against the buildings, then come forward again, like waters rushing, receding, rushing.
Giorgio sways along on his mount like a sailor on a flat-bottom boat. The paddling gait of the warhorse is never in step with the beat of the drum; it gives him a seasick feeling. Or is the churning in his stomach a mixture of fear and joy? He glances back at Gaudenzia. She is jibbing her head, actually lifting the groom off his feet as if he were a puppet on a string. She too wants the race to start, and even now wants Giorgio's hand on her leadstrap. ”

“ You soon recognise that it is not only the many-twinkling lagoon you behold from a habitation on the Riva; you see a little of everything Venetian. Straight across, before my windows, rose the great pink mass of San Giorgio Maggiore, which has for an ugly Palladian church a success beyond all reason. It is a success of position, of colour, of the immense detached Campanile, tipped with a tall gold angel. I know not whether it is because San Giorgio is so grandly conspicuous, with a great deal of worn, faded-looking brickwork ”

“ A night when San Giorgio stands on tip-toe, Narcissus-like, to drink in his own beauty mirrored in the silent sea; when the angel crowning the Campanile sleeps with folded wings, lost in the countless stars; when the line of the city from across the wide lagoons is but a string of lights buoying golden chains that sink into the depths; when the air is a breath of heaven, and every sound that vibrates across the never-ending wave is the music of another world.
No pen can give this beauty, no brush its color, no tongue its delight. ”

“ Giorgio began to shake all over. The Captain was making a half turn toward him, was facing him now, speaking to him, and the force of his breath caused the hairs on Giorgio's head to quiver. "Fate is Queen of the Palio!" the voice rolled on. "We can prepare for victory, morally and materially, but never certainly. Only Fate and the fantino can decide between victory and defeat.
"Some tasks," he concluded, "need a big man. Others, a small one. Some fantinos are big and strong, but some are bird-light and think more of their mount than of their own safety. Giorgio Terni, you are such a one." ”

“ And then Giorgio overheard, "Would you wish to draw her for your contrada?"
A whole chorus answered, "No! No!" It was as if her tortured limping in last year's Palio was a memory too fresh to be wiped out.
Giorgio himself flinched at the recollection. He touched his heels to Gaudenzia and hurried her through the crowd. "How they feel about you, I do not care," he told himself. "It is better so. Popular horses are nearly killed by too many sweets, too much petting and pulling of tail-hairs for souvenir. I believe, and the Chief believes!" ”

“ This stern devotion to a cause had cast a gloom upon Giorgio's old age. It cast a gloom because the cause seemed lost. Too many kings and emperors flourished yet in the world which God had meant for the people. He was sad because of his simplicity. Though always ready to help his countrymen, and greatly respected by the Italian emigrants wherever he lived (in his exile he called it) , he could not conceal from himself that they cared nothing for the wrongs of down-trodden nations. ”

“ The whistles and the shouts are strong. "Up with Montone! Up with Montone! Up with Ivan!"
"Istrice, the Porcupine, eight!
"Giraffa, nine!"
The nine wait tensely for the final call. Giorgio tries to conceal his joy. He will be number ten! He knows the rules, revels in them. The number ten horse starts behind the others. With a rush she will come up to the rope and trigger the race.
The starter raises his megaphone. His voice shrills: "Number ten, Onda! Come on!"
Giorgio's heart beats with a wild gladness. Now it is! The time for action! He lifts Gaudenzia's head; she leaps forward. ”

“ More often she lipped the back of his sweater, in the way a dam gently nibbles along the neck of her colt.
Giorgio lived all day—digging and planting—for the night. He might have been sticking faggots in the earth for all he knew. His mind was everywhere else: on the calendar in the stable, taking the curves of the mountain, putting on his helmet for the race. Trumpets and drums beat like blood in his ears. Unconsciously he began whistling the "March of the Palio." It made Babbo and all the other men work better, happier. ”

“ Finally, Francesco being about to set out for Rome, Giorgio, as his friend, reminded him that, being rich, advanced in years, weak in health, and little fitted for more fatigues, he should think of living in peace and shun strife and contention, which he would have been able to do with ease, having acquired honour and property in plenty, if he had not been too avaricious and desirous of gain. ”

“ Giorgio stopped eating and sat silent. After a moment he said, "And the fourth colt? Dead, too?"
"No. Not him. He will make big stout plow horse when he is grown. He is no more like Farfalla than bull is like deer."
The mother, who had been listening all this while, now plucked at Giorgio's sleeve. "Farfalla is the one...." she whispered softly. "She is the one born in Magliano Toscano on the day Bianca...."
Giorgio felt the hairs on his skin prickle. So this Arab mare, fastened with ropes to the traces of a shabby cart, was Bianca's successor! ”

“ After the Umbrella Man left, there was a sense of urgency in the way Giorgio lived and worked. If he was to become a fantino in the Palio, or a horse trainer, or only a groom, he must grow hard, wiry, quick; and stronger than boys twice his size. ”

“ Farfalla, with her groom sitting smug and superior, was executing a series of perfect half-turns down the center of the road. Every time their paths crossed, the man sniped at Giorgio with a sharp insult. "Hey, you! To teach a donkey, is necessary the teacher is less donkey than the donkey. Ha! Ha!"
Giorgio usually ignored the quips and jibes, but this one cut deep because it was overheard by two important-looking men beckoning him to the side of the road. One, a dignified man with balding head, introduced himself as Signor de Santi, an attorney, and captain of the Contrada Nicchio, the Shell. ”

“ Now Cristofano, having made Giorgio's acquaintance at the Borgo in the year 1528, when he went to see Rosso in that place, where he had shown him much [Pg 119] kindness, resolved that he would attach himself to Vasari and thus find much more opportunity for giving attention to art than he had done in the past. Giorgio, then, after a year's intercourse with him as his companion, finding that he was likely to make an able master, and that he was pleasant and gentle in manners and a man after his own heart, conceived an extraordinary affection for him. ”

“ Antonio, if you wish little Giorgio not to become backward, by all means let him learn to draw, for, even were he to devote himself to letters, design cannot be otherwise than helpful, honourable, and advantageous to him, as it is to every gentleman. ”

“ A strange, deep voice commanded: "Hold there, Giorgio! Let up! Street fighting is for boys. You face the real battle, the battle of the Palio."
Giorgio looked into the eyes of a gentleman. At once he recognized the man. He had just seen him on the platform with all the officials. "You!" he gulped for air. "You are General Barbarulli, leader of the Onda!"
The General smiled. Then he linked his arm into Giorgio's, and above the din spoke into his ear: "The Chief-of-the-Town-Guards tells me it is you who trained Gaudenzia." ”

“ There was in old Giorgio an energy of feeling, a personal quality of conviction, something they called "terribilità." "An old lion," they used to say of him. Some slight incident, a chance word, would set him off talking on the beach to the Italian fishermen of Maldonado, in the little shop he kept afterwards (in Valparaiso) , to his countrymen customers; of an evening, suddenly, in the café at one end of the Casa Viola (the other was reserved for the English engineers) ; to the select clientèle of engine-drivers and foremen of the railway shops. ”

“ The Palio is war. Contradas form alliances as countries do, to help each other fight a common enemy."
Giorgio sat silent at the desolating words.
"But of course"—the Monsignore took off his spectacles, and now he spoke eagerly, earnestly—"the unforeseen can happen! Have you forgotten," he asked, "the grand element of uncertainty? The horse knows nothing of the clouds of intrigue gathering while he eats happily his grain. He knows only that he is the servant of man, who sometimes betrays him." ”

“ Maestro Giorgio’s manner of decoration consists of foliated scrolls and other ornaments terminating in dolphins, eagles, and human heads, trophies, masks, etc.; in the drawing of which he exhibited considerable power, with great facility of invention. These ‘grotesche’ differ materially from those of Urbino and Faenza, approaching more to the style of some of the Castel-Durante designs. In the drawing of figures, and of the nude, Giorgio cannot be ranked as an artist of the first class. ”

“ The multitude waits. Inside the courtyard Giorgio wants an end to things. It seems a hundred hours, a hundred days, a hundred years since the fateful orders were imposed. All right, then, let's go. Change costumes! Put on the little jacket, the coarse pants. Eye your opponents. Swing up, bareback. Take the hard nerbo in your hard hand. Line up! Remember, it's war! Contrada against contrada! Not rider, not mount, not flesh and blood, but symbols.... Eagle against Owl, Dragon against Panther, Snail against Wave, Giraffe against me. ”

“ Giorgio knows the way."
"They are going the long and easy way, while we are going the short and steep way," Giorgio said, with much motioning. "If these donkeys are not too lazy, we shall be there first," and he gave them each another quick rap on their backs with his hand.
"You should not strike your donkeys, Giorgio," Molly said. "We can make them go without your help."
"All right," said Giorgio, laughing. "You may try it, but you will never reach Anacapri."
"Oh, yes, we shall!" answered Molly. "Just watch us. Come on, May!" ”

“ The General and Captain Tortorelli welcomed Giorgio with cordial handshakes. Nervously, he felt for his speech in the place where his pocket should be, but his hand felt cotton, not wool, and he looked down and saw he had no pocket! He remembered now he was wearing the uniform of the Wave, the white-and-blue fantino uniform which the contrada had sent over. His speech was still in his room, in the pocket of his good suit hanging on the peg!
The Captain shook his hand a second time. "Do not worry," he said encouragingly. "All good fantinos are nervous. Those who joke have a gross heart." ”

“ It made the Onda dinner more important and exciting. Giorgio as her fantino in the first race received a command invitation from General Barbarulli.
And so, on the twenty-sixth day of September, at eight o'clock in the evening, he set out full of eagerness, and in his good suit, for the Contrada of the Onda. On all sides he was met and joined by happy contradaioli going his way.
As he climbed the steep, cobbly streets, an old saying of his father's jumped into his mind. "An end is just a beginning. The dog chases his tail, and that is the way of life; the end and the beginning, they meet!" ”

“ The months of winter passed, not in days and weeks, but in developing Gaudenzia's wind and stamina. When Giorgio came home each night, mud-spattered and hungry, his mother reheated the soup and stood by as he drank it. One night when his hair was wet with snow, and his jacket sagging and sopping, she cried, "Giorgio, Giorgio, Giorgio, why can't you let up?"
The boy stopped eating. "Mamma, I can't!" he said firmly. "Have you forgot the Palio? Three times around Il Campo is four and a half kilometers. She must go the whole way and still be strong at the finish!" ”

“ Two days Giorgio with more gladness than if he had been his brother, as was indeed due to one by whom Vasari knew himself to be so much beloved, and who desired nothing more earnestly than to pass the rest of his life beside him. From Arezzo they both then proceeded to Florence, where Cristofano instantly went to kiss the hand of the Duke, who was much pleased with him, and not a little surprised also, for whereas he had expected to see some great ruffianly bravo, he beheld before him the most good-natured looking little man in the world. ”