Looking Like Death,
And Suffering Great Torture; And That We Were Confidently Supposed
To Have Encountered Some Worse Accident.
So 'well returned, and Heaven be praised!' as the cheerful
Vetturino, who has borne us company all the way from Pisa, says,
with all his heart!
And away with his ready horses, into sleeping
Naples!
It wakes again to Policinelli and pickpockets, buffo singers and
beggars, rags, puppets, flowers, brightness, dirt, and universal
degradation; airing its Harlequin suit in the sunshine, next day
and every day; singing, starving, dancing, gaming, on the sea-
shore; and leaving all labour to the burning mountain, which is
ever at its work.
Our English dilettanti would be very pathetic on the subject of the
national taste, if they could hear an Italian opera half as badly
sung in England as we may hear the Foscari performed, to-night, in
the splendid theatre of San Carlo. But, for astonishing truth and
spirit in seizing and embodying the real life about it, the shabby
little San Carlino Theatre--the rickety house one story high, with
a staring picture outside: down among the drums and trumpets, and
the tumblers, and the lady conjurer--is without a rival anywhere.
There is one extraordinary feature in the real life of Naples, at
which we may take a glance before we go--the Lotteries.
They prevail in most parts of Italy, but are particularly obvious,
in their effects and influences, here. They are drawn every
Saturday. They bring an immense revenue to the Government; and
diffuse a taste for gambling among the poorest of the poor, which
is very comfortable to the coffers of the State, and very ruinous
to themselves.
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