Page:Life in the Old World - Vol. II.djvu/367

Rh old woman has stroked caressingly the child-like, delicate face of my young friend, has chucked her under the chin, or has touched the soft, brown locks, with a half sigh. Although the people seem poor, rather than otherwise, yet there are but few beggars. Ten or twelve old men and women are continually in their places on the square, like sparrows which are fed upon the fallen grain. Their entreaties for qualche cosa, are never pertinacious, and, if you give them any thing, you are saluted by the exclamation, “Dieci mila anni,” or “Cento mila anni!” which perhaps implies a wish of liberation for so many years from the fire of purgatory; or else we are saluted with a melodious, “La Madonna v'accompagna!”

The Madonna is the divinity of Sorrento. Yesterday, the great festival of La Madonna de Carmine was held here. A fair, mountebanks, marionettes, illuminations, air-balloons, fireworks, music, nothing was wanting. The air-balloon ascended from the square; raised by the fire which was lighted within, it rose like a colossal pear of fire, above the city, and vanished in space. We were most amused by some sellers of ices and sherbet, who, shouting and singing, offered their wares in small glasses, one “gran” each. A great many people were assembled in the square, but amongst them all there were merely two or three fellows who were a little unsteady on their legs, and stole silently aside, as if ashamed of their own condition. Fathers and mothers carried their little children on their shoulders, by holding fast one arm of the child, over their heads, which had an extremely pretty and picturesque effect. This mode of carrying the children seems to be common here.