Old Calabria

made up in the craftiness, malizia, born of long love of the soil. The ground was baked hard; but there was still a chance of rain, and the

e had not childre

you!" he replied, shaking

grandch

icans (em

ing to Africa for corals, to Holland and France; yes, and to England also. But

kept on repeating. "And lately," he added, "America has been disc

r unvarying tasks and rewards. None save a Cincinnatus or Garibaldi can be ennobled by the spade. In spleenful moments, it seems to me that the most depraved of city-dwellers has flashes of enthusiasm and self-abnegation never experienced by this shifty, retrogressive a

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easily invested with a halo of martyrdom; it is delightful to sympathize with men who combine the manners of Louis Quatorze with the profiles of Augustus or Plato, and who still recall, in many of their traits, the pristine

e speculations are often ruined by a single stroke of the human pen in the shape of new regulations or tariffs, are a different thing; their curses are loud and long. But the bean-growers, dependent chiefly on wind and weather, only speak of God's will. They have the same forgiveness for the shortcomings of nature as for a wayward child. And no wonde

are becoming extinct; for the patriarchal system of C

ally sound ones. It does even more; it teaches the conscripts to read and write, so that it is no longer as dangerous to have dealings with a man who possesses these ac

ontinual coming and going; two-thirds of the adolescent and adult male populatio

of the

ancs; parental authority over boys is relaxed, and the girls, ever qui

amble and drink, waiting their turn to sail. If I were to tell you the beatings we used to get, sir, you wouldn't believ

of less fortunate speculators. Meanwhile the land suffers. The carob-tree is an instance. This beautiful and almost eternal growth, the "hope of the southern Apennines" as Professor Savastano calls it, whose pods constitute an important article of commerce and whose thick-clustering leaves yield a cool shelter, comparable to that of a rocky cave, in the noonday heat, used to cover

ts left in one year alone (1906); in the province of Basilicata the exodus exceeds the birthrate. I do not know the

onal stage the demoralizing effects of the new system should be more apparent than its inevitable ben

, who has covered large stretches of bad land with this tree.

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en, once a dire calamity, is now the soundest of investments. Soon after their arrival in America they begin sending home rations of money to their parents; the old

ll then tell you, "but

; it was little short of slavery. The roles are now reversed, and while landlords are impoverished, the rich emigrant buys up the farms or makes his own terms for work to be done, wages

hange is

whom I watched gathering figs last year, informed me that the fig-tree was innamorato delle pietre e cisterne--enamoured of stones and cisterns; meaning, that its roots are searchingly destructive to ma

st be eaten fresh; the fico coretorto (" wry-heart "--from its shape), which has the most leathery skin of all and is often destroyed by grubs after rain; the fico troiano; the fico arzano; and the fico vescovo, which appears when all the others are over, a

of the

y grubs, but grows to a large size every two or three years; the fico pascarello is good up till Christmas; the fico natalino; lastly, the fico ----, whose name I will not record, though it would be an admirable illustrat

nd, even in winter, retained its peculiar "faccia" (face), but that some varieties are more easy to distinguish than others. I enquired into the mysteries of caprification, and learned that artificial ripening by means of

apted to their present needs. They are specialists for things of the grain-giving earth; it is a pleasure to watch them grafting vines and olives and

olour-blinded, in fact; or from negligence, attention to this matter not bringing with it any material advantage? Excepting that sign-language which is profoundly interesting from an artistic and ethnological point of view--why does not some scholar bring old lorio's

ld Ca

to be "quite white." I once asked a lad as to the colour of the sea which, at the

colore morto" (a s

escribed to me as black. "Rosso" does not mean red, but rather dun or dingy; earth is rosso. When our red is to be signified, they will use the word "turco," which came in with the well-known dye-stuff of which the Turks once monopolized the secret. Thus there are "Turkish" apples and "Turkish" potatoes. But "turco" may also mean black--in accordance with the tradition that the Turks, the Saracens, were a black race. Snakes, generally greyish-brown in these parts, are described as either whit

h he lives from the cradle to the grave. That is why these people have no "nerves"; terrific bursts of din, such as the pandemonium of Piedigrotta, stimulate them in the same way that others might be stimulated by a quartette of Brahms. And if they who are so concerned about the massacre of small

of the

he says, "parce que les coups de fusil flattent son oreille." * This ingenuous l

esis, might be called Greek: of delicate build and below the average height, small-eared and straight-nosed, with curly hair that varies from blonde to what Italians call castagno chiaro. It differs not only from the robuster and yet fairer northern breed, but also from the darker sur

, song and gesture than these regions, which are still rich in pure latinisms of speech, such as surgere (to arise); scitare (excitare--to arouse); è (est--yes); fetare (foetare); trasete (transitus--passage of quails); titillare (to tickle); craje (cras--to-morrow); pastena (a plantation of young vines; Ulpian has "pastinum instituere"). A woman is called "muliera," a girl "figliola," and children speak of t

appearing under the standardizing influence of

Jos. Blanc's "Bibliographi

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e a thing of the past. I shall be sorry to see i

a cont

ch are always tumbling down and being repaired again; or O'Sciacquariello (acqua--a leaking--one whose money leaks from his pocket--a spendthrift); or San Pietro, from his saintly appearance; O'Civile, who is so uncivilized, or Cristoforo Colombo, because he is so very wideawake. But eighty per cent of them are quite obscure even to their owners, going back, as they do, to some forgot

is surname means nothing to the inhabitants, and his Christian name is shared by a hundred others. For they have an amazing lack of inventiveness in this matter; f

AZARDS OF T

. It is simple enough. You want to speak to Luigi So-and-so. A good-natured in

an wants Lui

uggestion of such a thing; they all smile.

. . Now which Lui

of the

voice. It produces no effect, b

-Luigi.

s O'Zoc

s O'Set

lio d' O'Zi

in all the Luigis he can find. After half an hour they begin to arrive, one by o

it hopes will last till bedtime. You are getting bewildered; new people flock

egin again. "Now, whic

O'Marza

Cuccol

dividual. "Here, boy, run and tell O'Cuccolillo th

h time; no--he is Luigi, of course, but not the right Luigi, which he regrets considerably. Then the joke is ma

e O'Sciab

glio d' O'

O'Busciardiel

s de

ll, then it must be the husba

But how about O

ered hag croaks

gentleman wan

of vi

doesn't

o, this is not your Luigi, he is another Luigi. You are ready to sink into the earth, but there i

Cala

. Let me see. It

sillo, mo

It's O'Spe

says a well-known voice. "

Cicere

rgeni

abolon

just arrived on the scene. "See here, I live fifteen years in Brooklyn; damn fine! 'Ave a gl

advice

urname, anyho

lain on

anding right in front of you! He's Luigi, and that's his

the good-natured

(he was ill for a week afterwards); another one devoured two small birds alive, with beaks, claws and feathers. Such deeds are sternly reprobated as savagery; still, they occur, and nearly always as the result of wagers. I wish I could couple t

oys, they mix into their food small fishes which have been devoured by larger ones and taken from their stomachs--the underlying idea being that these half-digested fry are thoroughly familiar with the storms and

of the

e said, that "its fundamental conception is identical with that

separation from the new-born, buy a certain kind of puppy there, bring them home, and nourish them in loco infantis. These puppies cost a franc apiece, and are generally destroyed after performing their duties; it is they who are cooked for curing the scrofulous tendencies of other children. Swallows' hearts are also used for another purpose; so is the blood of tortoises--fo

These legendary and gracious beasts, that inspired poets and artists and glyptic engravers--thes

otism of Spanish Viceroys and Bourbons. They, the Spaniards, fostered and perhaps imported the Camorra, that monster of many heads which has established itself in nearly every town of the south. Of the deterioration in taste coincident with this period, I lately came across this little bit of evidence, curious and conclusive:--

Cala

to that of the present time, when Maria, Lucia, and about four others of the most

mestic utensils; their habits of living in penury and of buying their daily food by farthings, as though one never knew what the next day might bring; their dread of going out of doors by night (they have a proverb which runs, di notte, non parlar forte; di giorno,

--imported direct from Egypt, the classic home of witchcraft--commingled with those of the West. A foreigner is at an unfortunate disadvantage; if he asks questions, he will only get

ful in the magics that the Bishop of Pozzuoli, among hundreds of other clients, was wont to drive up to her door once a week for a consultation. These

s are in vogue; the virtues of the male fern, the rue, sabina and (home-made) ergot of rye are well known but not employed to the extent they are in Russia, where a large progeny is a d

of the

only difference being that the Mother of God, and not the natural mother of the

Altogether, the moon plays a considerable part in their lore, as might be expected in a country where she used to be worshipped under so many forms. The dusky markings on her surface are explained by saying that the mo

s that they cease to care whether a thing be true or false, if it only amuses for the moment. That is what makes them an ideal prey for the quack physician. They will believe anything so long as it is strange and complicated; a straightforward doctor is not listened to; they want that mystery-maki

s elsewhere. They are too wise to believe them, and too shrewd to discourage the

survived ; a wholesale massacre. These 853 murdered children were carried forward in the books as still living, and the institution, which has a yearly revenue of over 600,000 francs, was debited with their maintenance, while 42 doctors (instead of the prescribed nu

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ments or the Trinity. Violently acquisitive, of course, like most southerners. I know a parish priest, a son of poor parents, who, by dint of sheer energy, has amassed a fortune of half a millio

rments and thereby closed my lips to all evil-speaking (seizing his cassock and displaying half a yar

survivals, that look well enough in the landscape, but are not tak

ere the old gods of Greece. Children do not know the meaning of "Inferno"; they call it "casa del diavolo" (the devil's house); and if they are naughty, the mother says

general and suggesting improvements in the world-scheme. He thought himself cleverer even

s to collect all those miserable little ol

lways does, you know, with those improvements of yours." And, sure enough, one of these

so," said

t the saints in Heaven took their food

of the

asked. "Does the

an

scene, but the effort was too much for my hereditary Puritan leanings. Unable to r

st servi