Alidoro

Alidoro, a champion Mastiff who first appears as Pinocchio’s pursuer, becomes his rescuer after Pinocchio saves him from drowning. Their brief relationship is built around two sharply reversed encounters: the dog who nearly catches Pinocchio in the sea later carries him from mortal danger on land. Through Alidoro, a pursuit becomes an exchange of aid, and the story’s maxim about kindness takes the form of action returned.

Identity and First Appearance

Alidoro enters the story as the Carabineers’ answer to Pinocchio’s escape. Judging that Pinocchio would be difficult to catch, they send a large Mastiff after him, a dog who has won first prize in every dog race. The chase becomes a public spectacle: people lean from windows or gather in the street, but the speed of both runners raises so much dust that the onlookers cannot see its end.

The narrative first describes him by his size, speed, and role in the pursuit, then supplies his name as Pinocchio nears the shore. Alidoro is not merely an obstacle in the chase. His speed brings him close enough for Pinocchio to hear his labored breathing and feel his hot breath, making the danger immediate just as the sea offers an escape.

The Pursuit and Pinocchio’s Rescue

At the beach, Pinocchio leaps into the water. Alidoro cannot stop in time and plunges in after him, but the champion runner cannot swim. He beats the water with his paws, sinks despite his efforts, and calls out that he is drowning. Pinocchio, already safely at a distance, initially answers from afar and asks whether Alidoro will promise to stop chasing him if he helps.

Alidoro promises, and Pinocchio hesitates before remembering the advice his father had given him: a kind deed is never lost. He swims back, catches Alidoro by the tail, and drags him to shore. The rescue reverses the chase’s balance: the pursuer is now dependent on the one he had almost caught. Alidoro is too weak to stand and has swallowed so much seawater that he is swollen like a balloon.

Pinocchio does not treat the promise as proof that the danger has passed. Wary of trusting Alidoro too much, he throws himself back into the sea and swims away, calling a farewell. The scene therefore joins compassion with caution: Pinocchio saves the dog, but does not remain within reach of the animal who had just pursued him.

The Rescue Returned

Alidoro reappears when Pinocchio is in danger in a cave. The dog has been lying on the sand, nearly dead, when the smell of fried fish draws him toward the fisherman who is holding Pinocchio, covered in flour, over boiling oil. Pinocchio calls for help, and Alidoro recognizes his voice despite the flour-covered bundle concealing him.

The response is immediate. Alidoro leaps, takes Pinocchio lightly between his teeth, and runs out through the door. The fisherman gives chase but has to turn back after a fit of coughing stops him. Once he reaches the road leading to the village, Alidoro halts and sets Pinocchio gently on the ground. The scene echoes the first rescue while reversing the roles: this time Alidoro is the active rescuer, and Pinocchio is the helpless figure carried away from danger.

When Pinocchio thanks him, Alidoro explains that Pinocchio saved him once and that aid should be returned; he adds that beings in the world are there to help one another. He also tells Pinocchio why he reached the cave: hungry and nearly lifeless on the sand, he followed the appetizing smell of fried fish. His rescue is thus both a repayment and an act arising from his own immediate need for food; the story makes the repayment explicit without making Alidoro’s arrival seem planned.

Character and Narrative Role

Alidoro’s two appearances form a compact arc of reversal. At first, he is the fast, formidable agent of pursuit, sent to catch Pinocchio; the sea exposes a limitation his speed cannot overcome. Later, hunger brings him to the cave, where his strength and speed make him capable of interrupting the fisherman’s attempt to cook Pinocchio. In both scenes, physical circumstance changes what the dog can do: first he needs rescue, then he can provide it.

The bond between the two is established not through a long acquaintance but through remembered action. Pinocchio’s decision to turn back in the sea makes Alidoro’s later intervention intelligible as reciprocal kindness. Their exchanges also give the episode its comic contrast: a dog celebrated for racing cannot swim, while the puppet he chases is able to pull him to shore; later, the dog who had been carried by circumstance carries Pinocchio away. Alidoro’s narrative importance lies in this reversal, which makes the story’s moral principle visible as a sequence of concrete rescues rather than an abstract lesson.