The Adventures of Pinocchio
now? What is done cannot be undone, you know. Fate has decreed that all
lazy boys who come to hate books and schools and teachers and spend all
their days with toys and games must sooner or later turn into donkeys.”
“But is it really so?” asked the Marionette, sobbing bitterly.
“I am sorry to say it is. And tears now are useless. You should have
thought of all this before.”
“But the fault is not mine. Believe me, little Dormouse, the fault is
all Lamp-Wick’s.”
“And who is this Lamp-Wick?”
“A classmate of mine. I wanted to return home. I wanted to be obedient.
I wanted to study and to succeed in school, but Lamp-Wick said to me,
‘Why do you want to waste your time studying? Why do you want to go to
school? Come with me to the Land of Toys. There we’ll never study again.
There we can enjoy ourselves and be happy from morn till night.’”
“And why did you follow the advice of that false friend?”
“Why? Because, my dear little Dormouse, I am a heedless
Marionette--heedless and heartless. Oh! If I had only had a bit of
heart, I should never have abandoned that good Fairy, who loved me
so well and who has been so kind to me! And by this time, I should no
longer be a Marionette. I should have become a real boy, like all these
friends of mine! Oh, if I meet Lamp-Wick I am going to tell him what I
think of him--and more, too!”
After this long speech, Pinocchio walked to the door of the room. But
when he reached it, remembering his donkey ears, he felt ashamed to show
them to the public and turned back. He took a large cotton bag from a
shelf, put it on his head, and pulled it far down to his very nose.
Thus adorned, he went out. He looked for Lamp-Wick everywhere, along the
streets, in the squares, inside the theatres, everywhere; but he was
not to be found. He asked everyone whom he met about him, but no one had
seen him. In desperation, he returned home and knocked at the door.
“Who is it?” asked Lamp-Wick from within.
“It is I!” answered the Marionette.
“Wait a minute.”
After a full half hour the door opened. Another surprise awaited
Pinocchio! There in the room stood his friend, with a large cotton bag
on his head, pulled far down to his very nose.
At the sight of that bag, Pinocchio felt slightly happier and thought to
himself:
“My friend must be suffering from the same sickness that I am! I wonder
if he, too, has donkey fever?”
But pretending he had seen nothing, he asked with a smile:
“How are you, my dear Lamp-Wick?”
“Very well. Like a mouse in a Parmesan cheese.”
“Is that really true?”
“Why should I lie to you?”
“I beg your pardon, my friend, but why then are you wearing that cotton
bag over your ears?”
“The doctor has ordered it because one of my knees hurts. And you, dear
Marionette, why are you wearing that cotton bag down to your nose?”
“The doctor has ordered it because I have bruised my foot.”
“Oh, my poor Pinocchio!”
“Oh, my poor Lamp-Wick!”
An embarrassingly long silence followed these words, during which time
the two friends looked at each other in a mocking way.
Finally the Marionette, in a voice sweet as honey and soft as a flute,
said to his companion:
“Tell me, Lamp-Wick, dear friend, have you ever suffered from an
earache?”
“Never! And you?”
“Never! Still, since this morning my ear has been torturing me.”
“So has mine.”
“Yours, too? And which ear is it?”
“Both of them. And yours?”
“Both of them, too. I wonder if it could be the same sickness.”
“I’m afraid it is.”
“Will you do me a favor, Lamp-Wick?”
“Gladly! With my whole heart.”
“Will you let me see your ears?”
“Why not? But before I show you mine, I want to see yours, dear
Pinocchio.”
“No. You must show yours first.”
“No, my dear! Yours first, then mine.”
“Well, then,” said the Marionette, “let us make a contract.”
“Let’s hear the contract!”
“Let us take off our caps together. All right?”
“All right.”
“Ready then!”
Pinocchio began to count, “One! Two! Three!”
At the word “Three!” the two boys pulled off their caps and threw them
high in air.
And then a scene took place which is hard to believe, but it is all too
true. The Marionette and his friend, Lamp-Wick, when they saw each other
both stricken by the same misfortune, instead of feeling sorrowful and
ashamed, began to poke fun at each other, and after much nonsense, they
ended by bursting out into hearty laughter.
They laughed and laughed, and laughed again--laughed till they
ached--laughed till they cried.
But all of a sudden Lamp-Wick stopped laughing. He tottered and almost
fell. Pale as a ghost, he turned to Pinocchio and said:
“Help, help, Pinocchio!”
“What is the matter?”
“Oh, help me! I can no longer stand up.”
“I can’t either,” cried Pinocchio; and his laughter turned to tears as
he stumbled about helplessly.
They had hardly finished speaking, when both of them fell on all fours
and began running and jumping around the room. As they ran, their arms
turned into legs, their faces lengthened into snouts and their backs
became covered with long gray hairs.
This was humiliation enough, but the most horrible moment was the one
in which the two poor creatures felt their tails appear. Overcome with
shame and grief, they tried to cry and bemoan their fate.
But what is done can’t be undone! Instead of moans and cries, they burst
forth into loud donkey brays, which sounded very much like, “Haw! Haw!
Haw!”
At that moment, a loud knocking was heard at the door and a voice called
to them:
“Open! I am the Little Man, the driver of the wagon which brought you
here. Open, I say, or beware!”
CHAPTER 33
Pinocchio, having become a Donkey, is bought by the owner of a Circus,
who wants to teach him to do tricks. The Donkey becomes lame and is sold
to a man who wants to use his skin for a drumhead.
Very sad and downcast were the two poor little fellows as they stood
and looked at each other. Outside the room, the Little Man grew more and
more impatient, and finally gave the door such a violent kick that
it flew open. With his usual sweet smile on his lips, he looked at
Pinocchio and Lamp-Wick and said to them:
“Fine work, boys! You have brayed well, so well that I recognized your
voices immediately, and here I am.”
On hearing this, the two Donkeys bowed their heads in shame, dropped
their ears, and put their tails between their legs.
At first, the Little Man petted and caressed them and smoothed down
their hairy coats. Then he took out a currycomb and worked over them
till they shone like glass. Satisfied with the looks of the two little
animals, he bridled them and took them to a market place far away from
the Land of Toys, in the hope of selling them at a good price.
In fact, he did not have to wait very long for an offer. Lamp-Wick was
bought by a farmer whose donkey had died the day before. Pinocchio went
to the owner of a circus, who wanted to teach him to do tricks for his
audiences.
And now do you understand what the Little Man’s profession was? This
horrid little being, whose face shone with kindness, went about the
world looking for boys. Lazy boys, boys who hated books, boys who wanted
to run away from home, boys who were tired of school--all these were his
joy and his fortune. He took them with him to the Land of Toys and let
them enjoy themselves to their heart’s content. When, after months of
all play and no work, they became little donkeys, he sold them on the
market place. In a few years, he had become a millionaire.
What happened to Lamp-Wick? My dear children, I do not know. Pinocchio,
I can tell you, met with great hardships even from the first day.
After putting him in a stable, his new master filled his manger with
straw, but Pinocchio, after tasting a mouthful, spat it out.
Then the man filled the manger with hay. But Pinocchio did not like that
any better.
“Ah, you don’t like hay either?” he cried angrily. “Wait, my pretty
Donkey, I’ll teach you not to be so particular.”
Without more ado, he took a whip and gave the Donkey a hearty blow
across the legs.
Pinocchio screamed with pain and as he screamed he brayed:
“Haw! Haw! Haw! I can’t digest straw!”
“Then eat the hay!” answered his master, who understood the Donkey
perfectly.
“Haw! Haw! Haw! Hay gives me a headache!”
“Do you pretend, by any chance, that I should feed you duck or chicken?”
asked the man again, and, angrier than ever, he gave poor Pinocchio
another lashing.
At that second beating, Pinocchio became very quiet and said no more.
After that, the door of the stable was closed and he was left alone. It
was many hours since he had eaten anything and he started to yawn from
hunger. As he yawned, he opened a mouth as big as an oven.
Finally, not finding anything else in the manger, he tasted the hay.
After tasting it, he chewed it well, closed his eyes, and swallowed it.
“This hay is not bad,” he said to himself. “But how much happier I
should be if I had studied! Just now, instead of hay, I should be eating
some good bread and butter. Patience!”
Next morning, when he awoke, Pinocchio looked in the manger for more
hay, but it was all gone. He had eaten it all during the night.
He tried the straw, but, as he chewed away at it, he noticed to his
great disappointment that it tasted neither like rice nor like macaroni.
“Patience!” he repeated as he chewed. “If only my misfortune might serve
as a lesson to disobedient boys who refuse to study! Patience! Have
patience!”
“Patience indeed!” shouted his master just then, as he came into the
stable. “Do you think, perhaps, my little Donkey, that I have brought
you here only to give you food and drink? Oh, no! You are to help me
earn some fine gold pieces, do you hear? Come along, now. I am going
to teach you to jump and bow, to dance a waltz and a polka, and even to
stand on your head.”
Poor Pinocchio, whether he liked it or not, had to learn all these
wonderful things; but it took him three long months and cost him many,
many lashings before he was pronounced perfect.
The day came at last when Pinocchio’s master was able to announce an
extraordinary performance. The announcements, posted all around the
town, and written in large letters, read thus:
GREAT SPECTACLE TONIGHT
LEAPS AND EXERCISES BY THE GREAT ARTISTS
AND THE FAMOUS HORSES
of the
COMPANY
First Public Appearance
of the
FAMOUS DONKEY
called
PINOCCHIO
THE STAR OF THE DANCE
----
The Theater will be as Light as Day
That night, as you can well imagine, the theater was filled to
overflowing one hour before the show was scheduled to start.
Not an orchestra chair could be had, not a balcony seat, nor a gallery
seat; not even for their weight in gold.
The place swarmed with boys and girls of all ages and sizes, wriggling
and dancing about in a fever of impatience to see the famous Donkey
dance.
When the first part of the performance was over, the Owner and Manager
of the circus, in a black coat, white knee breeches, and patent leather
boots, presented himself to the public and in a loud, pompous voice made
the following announcement:
“Most honored friends, Gentlemen and Ladies!
“Your humble servant, the Manager of this theater, presents himself
before you tonight in order to introduce to you the greatest, the most
famous Donkey in the world, a Donkey that has had the great honor in his
short life of performing before the kings and queens and emperors of all
the great courts of Europe.
“We thank you for your attention!”
This speech was greeted by much laughter and applause. And the applause
grew to a roar when Pinocchio, the famous Donkey, appeared in the circus