Full resolution (JPEG) - On this page / på denna sida - Book II - X. Falco Falcone
<< prev. page << föreg. sida << >> nästa sida >> next page >>
Below is the raw OCR text
from the above scanned image.
Do you see an error? Proofread the page now!
Här nedan syns maskintolkade texten från faksimilbilden ovan.
Ser du något fel? Korrekturläs sidan nu!
This page has never been proofread. / Denna sida har aldrig korrekturlästs.
102 228 . the miracles of antichrist
In this house Falco Falcone was born, and his
parents were only poor working people. But it was
in this poor home that Falco learned to be proud.
Falco’s mother was an unhappy woman, who,
during the first years of her marriage, only bore
daughters into the world. Her husband and all her
neighbors despised her.
This woman longed for a son. When she was
expecting her fifth child, she strewed salt daily on her
threshold, and sat spying who would be first to tread
over it. Would a man come or a woman ? Would
she bear a son or a daughter?
Every day she sat counting. She counted the
letters in the month when the child would be born. She
counted the letters in her own name and her
husband’s. She added and subtracted. The result was
even numbers. Consequently she should bear a son.
The next day she counted over again. " Perhaps I
counted wrong yesterday," she said.
When Falco was born, his mother was so honored
that she loved him more on that account than all the
rest of her children. When the father came in to see
the child, he took off his cap and bowed low. Over
the door of the house was placed a hat, as a mark of
honor, and the child’s bathing-water was poured out
over the threshold and allowed to run down the
street. When Falco was carried to the church, he
was laid on his grandmother’s right arm ; when the
women neighbors came to see his mother, they
curtesied to the child, where it lay slumbering in its
cradle.
It was also larger and stronger than children
usually are. Falco had from the first coarse hair, and
<< prev. page << föreg. sida << >> nästa sida >> next page >>
