Page:Scottishartrevie01unse.djvu/400

346 lawiij or e'er the point of dawn, sat sinij)ly chatting in elude, because they drop on their poor ragged knees a rustic row ' — in the mud to kiss some rude, almost grotesque, effigy ' Perhaps their loves, or else their sheep, of the Crucified, or some gaudy tinselled Madonna, Are all that do their silly thoughts so busy keep.' that therefore they are in gross darkness, that there-

Add to these an eternal refrain or chorus of ' Soldi ! fore the constant acts of charity and kindness that

Soldi ! Soldi !' and I fear we have a fairly correct view adorn many of their hard monotonous lives are not in-

of an Italian pastoral mental interioi-. s])ired by Him wliose effigy they kiss ; or that the calm It would be but cheap and wretched cynicism to call and serene hopefulness visible in some of the oldest of their religion superstitious, vulgar, and haiial ; to con- them is not a direct illumination from the ' Light that