Page:Under the shadow of Etna; Sicilian stories from the Italian of Giovanni Verga (IA undershadowofetn00vergrich).pdf/178

150 "Anything you'll give me! Cursed be he and the saint who made him!" replied massaro Cirino. "Now we haven't any more bread to eat, or fodder to give the beast."

"Ill give you fifteen lire for it, seeing that you are ruined, but the ass isn't worth so much, for it won't last out more than six months! See how thin it is!"

"You might have got more than that," grumbled massaro Cirino's wife, after the bargain was settled. Compare Luciano's mule 's dead, and he had n't money enough to buy another. Now if he hadn't bought our Saint Joseph's ass, he would n't have known what to do with his cart and harnesses; you'll see that ass 'll' be a fortune to him."

The ass was set to work drawing the cart, but the shafts of it were much too high for it, and brought all the weight on its shoulders, so that it would not have survived even six months; for it went limping along over the hilly roads under