The Draughthorses, Mules, And Asses, Of The
Peasants, Are So Meagre, As To Excite Compassion.
There is not a
dog to be seen in tolerable case; and the cats are so many
emblems of famine, frightfully thin, and dangerously rapacious.
I
wonder the dogs and they do not devour young children. Another
proof of that indigence which reigns among the common people, is
this: you may pass through the whole South of France, as well as
the county of Nice, where there is no want of groves, woods, and
plantations, without hearing the song of blackbird, thrush,
linnet, gold-finch, or any other bird whatsoever. All is silent
and solitary. The poor birds are destroyed, or driven for refuge,
into other countries, by the savage persecution of the people,
who spare no pains to kill, and catch them for their own
subsistence. Scarce a sparrow, red-breast, tomtit, or wren, can
'scape the guns and snares of those indefatigable fowlers. Even
the noblesse make parties to go a la chasse, a-hunting; that is,
to kill those little birds, which they eat as gibier, or game.
The great poverty of the people here, is owing to their religion.
Half of their time is lost in observing the great number of
festivals; and half of their substance is given to mendicant
friars and parish priests. But if the church occasions their
indigence, it likewise, in some measure, alleviates the horrors
of it, by amusing them with shows, processions, and even those
very feasts, which afford a recess from labour, in a country
where the climate disposes them to idleness. If the peasants in
the neighbourhood of any chapel dedicated to a saint, whose day
is to be celebrated, have a mind to make a festin, in other
words, a fair, they apply to the commandant of Nice for a
license, which costs them about a French crown. This being
obtained, they assemble after service, men and women, in their
best apparel, and dance to the musick of fiddles, and pipe and
tabor, or rather pipe and drum. There are hucksters' stands, with
pedlary ware and knick-knacks for presents; cakes and bread,
liqueurs and wine; and thither generally resort all the company
of Nice. I have seen our whole noblesse at one of these festins,
kept on the highway in summer, mingled with an immense crowd of
peasants, mules, and asses, covered with dust, and sweating at
every pore with the excessive heat of the weather. I should be
much puzzled to tell whence their enjoyment arises on such
occasions; or to explain their motives for going thither, unless
they are prescribed it for pennance, as a fore-taste of
purgatory.
Now I am speaking of religious institutions, I cannot help
observing, that the antient Romans were still more superstitious
than the modern Italians; and that the number of their religious
feasts, sacrifices, fasts, and holidays, was even greater than
those of the Christian church of Rome. They had their festi and
profesti, their feriae stativae, and conceptivae, their fixed and
moveable feasts; their esuriales, or fasting days, and their
precidaneae, or vigils.
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