A Heaving Ebb And Flow Of Humanity Fills The Eye;
Fires Are Flickering Before Extempore Shelters, And An Ungodly Amount
Of
food is being consumed, as traditionally prescribed for such
occasions - "si mangia per divozione." On all sides picturesque groups
Of
dancers indulge in the old peasants' measure, the percorara, to the
droning of bagpipes - a demure kind of tarantella, the male capering
about with faun-like attitudes of invitation and snappings of fingers,
his partner evading the advances with downcast eyes. And the church
meanwhile, is filled to overflowing; orations and services follow one
another without interruption; the priests are having a busy time of it.
The rocky pathway between this chapel and the meadow is obstructed by
folk and lined on either side with temporary booths of green branches,
whose owners vociferously extol the merits of their wares - cloths,
woollens, umbrellas, hot coffee, wine, fresh meat, fruit, vegetables
(the spectre of cholera is abroad, but no one heeds) - as well as gold
watches, rings and brooches, many of which will be bought ere to-morrow
morning, in memory of to-night's tender meetings. The most interesting
shops are those which display ex-votos, waxen reproductions of various
ailing parts of the body which have been miraculously cured by the
Virgin's intercession: arms, legs, fingers, breasts, eyes. There are
also entire infants of wax. Strangest of all of them is a many-tinted
and puzzling waxen symbol which sums up all the internal organs of the
abdomen in one bold effort of artistic condensation; a kind of heraldic,
materialized stomache-ache. I would have carried one away with me, had
there been the slightest chance of its remaining unbroken. [Footnote: A
good part of these, I dare say, arc intended to represent the enlarged
spleen of malaria. In old Greece, says Dr. W. H. D. Rouse, votives of
the trunk are commonest, after the eyes - malaria, again.]
These are the votive offerings which catch the visitor's eye in southern
churches, and were beloved not only of heathendom, but of the neolithic
gentry; a large deposit has been excavated at Taranto; the British
Museum has some of marble, from Athens; others were of silver, but the
majority terra-cotta. The custom must have entered Christianity in early
ages, for already Theo-doret, who died in 427, says, "some bring images
of eyes, others of feet, others of hands; and sometimes they are made of
gold, sometimes of silver. These votive gifts testify to cure of
maladies." Nowadays, when they become too numerous, they are melted down
for candles; so Pericles, in some speech, talks of selling them for the
benefit of the commonwealth.
One is struck with the feast of costumes here, by far the brightest
being those of the women who have come up from the seven or eight
Albanian villages that surround these hills. In their variegated array
of chocolate-brown and white, of emerald-green and gold and flashing
violet, these dames move about the sward like animated tropical flowers.
But the Albanian girls of Civita stand out for aristocratic
elegance - pleated black silk gowns, discreetly trimmed with gold and
white lace, and open at the breast. The women of Morano, too, make a
brave show.
Night brings no respite; on the contrary, the din grows livelier than
ever; fires gleam brightly on the meadow and under the trees; the
dancers are unwearied, the bagpipers with their brazen lungs show no
signs of exhaustion. And presently the municipal music of Castrovillari,
specially hired for the occasion, ascends an improvised bandstand and
pours brisk strains into the night. Then the fireworks begin,
sensational fireworks, that have cost a mint of money; flaring wheels
and fiery devices that send forth a pungent odour; rockets of many hues,
lighting up the leafy recesses, and scaring the owls and wolves for
miles around.
Certain persons have told me that if you are of a prying disposition,
now is the time to observe amorous couples walking hand in hand into the
gloom - passionate young lovers from different villages, who have looked
forward to this night of all the year on the chance of meeting, at last,
in a fervent embrace under the friendly beeches. These same stern men
(they are always men) declare that such nocturnal festivals are a
disgrace to civilization; that the Greek Comedy, long ago, reprobated
them as disastrous to the morals of females - that they were condemned by
the Council of Elvira, by Vigilantius of Marseilles and by the great
Saint Jerome, who wrote that on such occasions no virgin should wander a
hand's-breadth from her mother. They wish you to believe that on these
warm summer nights, when the pulses of nature are felt and senses
stirred with music and wine and dance, the Gran Madre di Dio is adored
in a manner less becoming Christian youths and maidens, than heathens
celebrating mad orgies to Magna Mater in Daphne, or the Babylonian
groves (where she was not worshipped at all - though she might have been).
In fact, they insinuate that - - -
It may well be true. What were the moralists doing there?
Festivals like this are relics of paganism, and have my cordial
approval. We English ought to have learnt by this time that the
repression of pleasure is a dangerous error. In these days when even
Italy, the grey-haired cocotte, has become tainted with
Anglo-Pecksniffian principles, there is nothing like a little
time-honoured bestiality for restoring the circulation and putting
things to rights generally. On ethical grounds alone - as
safety-valves - such nocturnal feasts ought to be kept up in regions such
as these, where the country-folk have not our "facilities." Who would
grudge them these primordial joys, conducted under the indulgent
motherly eye of Madonna, and hallowed by antiquity and the starlit
heavens above? Every one is so happy and well-behaved. No bawling, no
quarrelsomeness, no staggering tipplers; a spirit of universal good
cheer broods over the assembly. Involuntarily, one thinks of the
drunkard-strewn field of battle at the close of our Highland games; one
thinks of God-fearing Glasgow on a Saturday evening, and of certain
other aspects of Glasgow life.
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