There, you see that it is quite unlike anything you ever saw before. Look at those figures in the foreground, how picturesque and yet how
simple their costume is! Well, but to proceed: the village where I was
staying, when the fact that I am about to relate occurred, was one of
the sort you see here. Ah! here is a sketch of the very place, and there
is the name of it written underneath. I remember that it had a certain
celebrity in the country round about it, as the cathedral (!) in the
chief piazza or square boasted of a miraculous picture of the Madonna,
that had the reputation of turning up its eyes, and in this manner
contrived to heal great numbers among the faithful who were blind, deaf
and dumb, maimed, halt, or lame. I cannot say that I ever witnessed one of these miracles, but that may
have been from my want of faith; yet the tales that I heard of
miraculous cures from persons of some repute, the arch-priest of the
parish amongst the number, were most startling. I had taken up my quarters in a comfortable rustic inn, not in the town
itself, but on a separate hill in an isolated spot, being built in its
own grounds, fertile with olive trees, which grew up the sides of the
hill nearly to the door of the house. The inn was frequented almost entirely by artists. Sometimes we were a
large company, composed of all nations, when we would dine together "al
fresco" under the shade of the vine which formed a verandah on one side
of the house. At other times I would be left alone in the inn. The hill
on which I lived commanded an extensive view of the surrounding
mountains, including the township with its old ivy-grown tower
overlooking all, and which appeared as if it were sliding down the
mountain side. I experienced an indescribable feeling of delight in rambling alone
through this romantic scenery on a hot summer's day, beneath a perfectly
cloudless sky, without a breath of wind to rustle the leaves of the
shady trees, amidst a solitude like that of the desert, and a silence
unbroken save by the chirping of the birds and the chattering of the
cicala, or at intervals, perchance, the distant shepherd's pipe, or the
wild barbaric chant of the mountaineer. With what rapture, I remember,
would I step from crag to crag, trampling the bush and bramble under my
feet, and startling away the green lizards in my path! Quaffing the
beauties of nature at every step, the dreamy influence of the balmy
atmosphere intensifying my feelings for the beautiful to an abnormal
degree. It was on one of these sultry days during my rambles that I was taking
shelter from the burning sun under the shade of a wide-spreading oak,
reclining lazily on the soft moss, and listening to the chirping of the
grass-hoppers, when my ear was attracted by the sound of the bleating of
goats, and shortly afterwards I heard the voices of two peasants which
seemed familiar to me. They were discoursing together in the dialect of
their own village, a very different lingo from the pure Tuscan, and
perfectly unintelligible to one lately coming from Rome, yet a prolonged
stay in these parts rendered it familiar to me. I recognised the voices
as belonging, one of them to a goatherd who supplied me with milk in the
morning, the other to a peasant who possessed a vineyard, a small barrel
of whose wine I had bought the day before. "Ohè! Antonio," cried Guiseppe, the goatherd, to his friend, "so I hear
you have sold a _quarteruolo_ of wine to the Signor Inglese (the English
gentleman) who lives on the hill." "Well, Compar,"[8] said his friend, "and what of that?" "I suppose you made him pay well for it, eh?" demanded the goatherd. "Well," answered Antonio, "I make my friends pay sixteen pauls the
_quarteruolo_, but he, being an Englishman, I charged double." "What!" exclaimed the goatherd, "thirty-two pauls for a _quarteruolo_!" "Ay, and he paid me money down without haggling about the price, like
one of our '_paini_. '[9] These Englishmen are real gentlemen--they let
themselves be cheated without wincing. Those are the sort of men I like
to deal with. I was quite angry with myself afterwards at not having
asked four times the sum; he would be sure to have paid me." "_Accidente!_ what a swindler!" exclaimed Guiseppe. "Well, they tell me
these English roll in wealth; that gold is as common in their country as
beans here. They say the streets are paved with it. How I should like to
go to those parts, and come back with my pockets filled with the gold
that these idiots throw away like dross. I wouldn't fatigue myself all
day long in the mountains for a piece of '_maritozza_'[10] or a dish of
'_polenta_. '"[11]

"Ha! ha!" laughed Antonio, "I've no doubt of it. I should like to see
_you_ with money, friend Peppe. You'd make a rare use of it." "_Per Bacco!_ wouldn't I?" answered the goatherd; "you wouldn't catch me
sober again until the day of my death. If I could sell my milk to the
Englishman at the rate you sell your wine, I'd soon make my fortune." "Well," said Antonio, "I would try it on if I were you. Perhaps milk
isn't to be had in his country." "Perhaps not," said the goatherd, musingly. "It must be a curious
country from all accounts. They tell me they never see the sun from one
year's end to the other, and, indeed, how can they, when the sun is here
all day? I hear, too, that the fog is so thick that you are obliged to
cut it through with a knife as you go along the streets, and that the
inhabitants are obliged to burn lamps all day long." "Yes, I have heard so, too," answered Antonio, "and that they have no
wine in their country. Well, upon the whole, I'd sooner live where I
am." "Ah, but the gold that is to be found about the streets," said Guiseppe,
"you forget that." "What would be the good of all the gold, if there is no wine to buy with
it?" replied Antonio. "I am very well content to live by the sale of my
wine----"

"At the rate you sell it to Englishmen, I've no doubt," broke in Peppe,
with a laugh. "Well, my friend, of course we all try to get what we can, where we can,
and how we can," pleaded Antonio. "That's only business. I'd be a fool
if I didn't." "Well, Compar, I suppose we are all much alike in that; but don't you
think that after having cheated the Englishman out of all that money,
you could lend me three pauls? "[12]

"Ah, Peppe, you rascal, I thought that was coming," laughed Antonio. "What! lend _you_ three pauls! Why, when do you think you would be able
to pay me?" "Well, I make two pauls a day by the sale of my milk and go halves with
my _padrone_. [13] That is a paul a day for us apiece. In three days,
therefore, I shall be able to pay you the entire sum. If I can manage to
gull the Englishman, I may pay you sooner," responded the goatherd. "Ah! Peppe," said Antonio, "I know you to be a slippery customer. How am
I to be sure you will pay me within that time?" "I give you my word of honour," cried Peppe. "Ho! ho! what is that worth?" laughed his friend. "May I die of an accident, if I don't!