The Argosy — page 305: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

288 A freak of fortune. looking anything but carnivalesque. She was come to ask me to go with her to buy damask table-linen, which her husband considered in- dispensable for their greatness. She shed tears over the silken-textured material ; deploring that she could now neither starch nor iron, to say nothing of washing ; and then over the thought of her poor little Pépina, who was so consumata, wasted away to nothing ; whilst the worthy Gia- como Fioretti—whose father was a sensible man, adding vineyard to vineyard —had been insulted in their own house, friend of the family as he had been for years, by Zuccone himself. And as to poor Beli- sario—here was another trouble ! he had suffered all sorts of indignities at the college; had run away, and was now at Monte del Caccia ; had come whilst his father was at the Carnival, who, therefore, knew nothing of it. But Belisario declared he would not go back ; he would enlist for a soldier ; do anything rather than be made a fine gentleman of. Finally came the grand trouble of all: Zuccone was an altered man ; he spent and spared nothing ; his only thought was to do as the nobility did; his vineyard and his olive-ground, which had hitherto been his pride, were now neglected ; he walked about in his Sunday coat every day in the week, and did nothing, because he was il Cavaliere ! It was not a merry Carnival to the poor Signora. Though she was allowed to visit her daughter in the convent, that only increased her trouble ; for Pépina’s eyes were red with weeping, and she could not tell her grief to her mother, because Sister Loretta would not leave them together fora minute. How, therefore, could it be a merry Carnival ? V. AGAIN it was summer (said Signora Giulia, raising from her lap the letter which had first reminded her of this family history, and which she had been holding between her fingers all the time). This letter is directed to the Benconosciuto Scultore Grunwald, nm Rome. The writer, il Cavaliere Zuccone, addressing him as the egregio signore, says that ; regarding it as needful, considering his rank in life, to prepare his family tomb or monument ; he desires to have his bust taken and executed in marble by the said egregio signore, hoping that five hogsheads of his best wine, that is to say of the vintage of 1846, would be considered as an equivalent. My husband was so incensed by the arrogance and presumption of the writer that he threw the letter aside in indignation, and certainly would have taken no notice of it, had not a little note, in the poorest of handwriting ; which, however, I recognized as that of Signora Mariana ;' been left at our house a day or two afterwards by the veritable Salvini, of noted charcoal memory. This note entreated my husband as a Christian to take Zuccone’s bust, seeing that things were - going on very badly at the villa. Her husband, she said, had obstinately Gomicbooks.co