Military life in Italy : sketches - Societa italiana di storia militare

DEPARTURE AND RETURN.
REMINISCENCE OF 1866.
MY dear friend Alberto, I am going to copy several pages
from your reminiscences ;
do not be annoyed at this, for if
these pages do not give you honor as a literary personage, they
certainly will not show you to disadvantage as son and soldier.
Permit me to take this liberty, and rest assured of my
discretion, because if I were really desirous of abusing our intimacy,
I could publish many others of your secrets.
AT HOME.
I.
After parting with the joys and illusions of youth, when
nought but the comfort of recording them remains to me, I
shall think more frequently and with greater emotion of the
last days of April and the first ones of May in 1866 than of any
others during my entire life.
I had never seen Turin so gay and beautiful. The imminent
outbreak of the national war which had been invoked and
expected for so many years, had suddenly aroused all the generous
and warlike characteristics of that city. It was sufficient
to pass an evening in one of the principal streets, to become
aware by the bustle, the unusual attitude of persons in general,
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