📚 Felice Benuzzi:

To be perfectly honest, there were occasions when the thought of our impending adventure made me frightened. Sometimes, returning late to my barrack on a cold and rainy night, I thought what it would be like lying out in the dark, wet forest; dead tired, exhausted by hunger, drenched to the bone, in imminent danger of being attacked by wild beasts. That prospect I compared with the warm blankets in my bunk, the familiar oil-lamp and the good book I was now preparing to read.

At such moments it was the thought of the security offered by a regular even though an unpleasant life, the spirit which dooms the canary bird to its caged existence, a natural tendency to follow the line of least resistance, that predominated.

On the other hand, standing in the ranks at morning roll call and seeing Batian beckoning me with its shimmering glaciers, I sometimes felt like running away on the spot, to seek and to meet adventure halfway.

We poor mortals are made like this, a mixture of contrasts, shade and light, fears and exaltations.