Se n'è come meritate That 'tis so unworthy thee, Lady kind, now pardon me, And, dear old man, repose thee now, How queenly is thy gait, in sooth! There is a very happy touch of nature in this verse. The gipsy's start of surprise is aptly represented by the sudden change in her address from the blessed Virgin to St. Joseph. As also in the next, where her fortune-telling inclination bursts forth, no longer to be. restrained. Se ti piace o mia Signora Ecco pazza d' allegrezza Let it please thee, lady mine, But what shall I dare tell to thee, At Bethl'hem, little Lady dear, Through twenty-four verses the gipsy then tells in familiar words the history of our Lord's birth and early years, interspersing her narrative with the natural cant phrases of her people, such as 'N'è il vero, bella Signora?' ('Am I not right, pretty Lady?') &c., to call attention to her success in the art of divining. As she proceeds, she gets more enthusiastic, and finally exclaims, Ora bella signora mia And now, thou pretty Lady mine, The Child, thy Son, and our Saviour. The Madonna turns to St. Joseph, and says, Datemi o caro sposo Lo tuo figlio grazioso Give to me, my husband dear, Then she proceeds, as if desirous that the glorious truth should be proclaimed in a more worthy way than by the dark whispers of the poor heathen woman. Then in another score of verses she predicts the Baptism and Temptation, the Entrance into Jerusalem, the Last Supper, and all the details of the Agony, the Betrayal, the Judgment-hall; and concludes: Questo figlio accarezzato This little tender Son caress'd, Thou must see to death distress'd. On a cruel cross and hard, Must see His beauty bruised and marred. The most striking music the cultus of the blessed Virgin evokes, however, is that of the Pfifferari, the fleece-clothed musicians, who come up to Rome every winter, chiefly from the district of Sora, in Terra di Lavoro, to celebrate the festivals of Christmas and the Conception of the Virgin. Their lays are rustic in metre, but not without considerable poetic *This tradition, as well as many of the others, is equally common in Spain, where, however, in one version I have seen, it winds up with a stroke of deep pathos. After predicting all the sufferings the Divine Infant has to encounter, the Gipsy adds La mas cruel de tus penas Será que en tus redimitos Señor, hallaras ingratos! But Thy hardest pang, I ween, † Readers must not regard this as an attempt at poetry, but simply an English rendering of the original, line by line. beauty; and though they are themselves also rough and uncultivated in appearance, the uncovered heads, uplifted eyes, and decent seriousness with which they go through their performance, as well as the dignity and earnestness with which they utter their benedictions on you when you have spoken with them, show that their simple function is sacred in their eyes. About a hundred couples come up to Rome every Christmas; the rest of the year they gain a frugal living by tending sheep, or sowing or reaping, for not all are shepherds. 'How come you to sing the novenas?' I said to a pair of brothers, who owned to greater conversance with field than pastoral labour. We learnt it from the shepherds: may we not praise the Madonna too?' they replied apologetically. Some of them are adventurous fellows, however, and have made the tour of Europe, all on foot, earning their living as they go by their minstrelsy, and bringing home a small amount of savings against their marriage, or a rainy day.' One owned to having made twenty scudi, another to fifty scudi between four; but then he was a jollier subject, and had probably spent more by the way. Their general plan seems to make for Paris in the first instance, spending some two months, and wearing out on the journey half a dozen pair of cioccie, or pieces of leather cut to the shape of the foot, and turned up all round it by means of leather thongs, disposed in many elaborate coils round the calf of the leg, forming a very easy and inexpensive style of shoe. The sack of their bagpipe they renew likewise frequently for themselves, out of the skin of a young sheep or goat, the wool or hair shorn short, and turned inside. It lasts, under ordinary circumstances, about two months; but during constant playing, such as that of this season, for example, it gets worn out in a novena. Arrived at Calais, they are obliged, reluctantly, to accept a place in the steamer, in lieu of their natural means of locomotion, which they gladly resume at Dover. Partly by tradition, from those who have preceded them in the adventure, and partly by necessity, they pick up enough of the language of each country for their simple needs. A glass of beer,' 'a loaf of bread,' 'the way to next large village?' are sentences which they repeat with the glee of a parrot. Belgium, Holland, Prussia, Bavaria, are visited in turn on the way home; but England suits them. best, because there alone they have nothing to pay for a licence to perform in the streets. Berlin they find the most restrictive city in Europe. The English beer, too, seems to be remembered with enthusiasm ; and the English sheep has taken a prominent place in their fancy. Their fabulous recitals of its perfections contain the force of a whole treatise on the way in which myths and legends arise. It was very amusing to listen to their glowing descriptions of an object so familiar to oneself; that it would take three or four men to lift one; that they stood as high as a small horse; and many similar compliments. London, with its noise and bustle, seems to excite more surprise than 6 admiration; and the 'big church, with a cupola like that of the Holy Father,' did not escape their notice. 'But I didn't want to go into it,' said one of them, when they said it was Protestant; and I found plenty of good priests who could talk our language.' That of "atona gardenna,' (under which appellation, after several repetitions, I recognized Hatton Garden,) they seemed to think as fine as some in Rome, but that it was so very white. After this roving life, they seem generally to settle down again very quietly in the monotony of their native valleys; though I think looking forward to the Christmas expedition to Rome is the bright ray of their existence, cheering the rest of the year. There was one, however, who had only married after his return from his second expedition to England, being apparently nearly thirty, which is very late in life for a Roman marriage. If he went on his travels again, he said, 'he should not take her-women were made for staying at home, men for roaming the world.' Their language is as rustic as their instruments; and as many of their expressions are dialectic, it is not very easy always to understand their meaning. It was not till after I had made many attempts, that by collating fragments gathered from a number of different individuals, I was able to put together the following, as the text of their two chief ditties: one for the festival of the eighth, and the other for that of the twenty-fifth, December. I have altered the wording as little as possible; for though it is clear the process of tradition has greatly modified the original, it is interesting to have the opportunity of tracing this process; it is apparent, chiefly, in the rude forms and contractions of words, and even more in the abrupt changes of tense, and the sudden transition from narrative to address, and from address back to narrative. I. FOR THE 25TH DECEMBER. E la Vergine la figlia di Santa Anna E gli angeli chiamano venite santi! A visitare Gesù Bambino il nostro Signore.' Gesù Bambino mio sia laudato Laudiamo la Santissima Trinità E San Guiseppe che era in compagnia Si è trovato in parto di Maria. La notte di Natale è notte santa Allo Padre al' Figliuolo e allo Spirito Santo; Questa orazione che abbiamo cantata A Gesù Bambino si è rappresentata. |