ovisatore famous in
his village, or to one of those professional rhymesters whom the
country-folk employ in the composition of love-letters to their
sweethearts at a distance.[25] Tommaseo, in the preface to his 'Canti
Popolari,' mentions in particular a Beatrice di Pian degli Ontani,
whose poetry was famous through the mountains of Pistoja; and Tigri
records by name a little girl called Cherubina, who made rispetti by
the dozen as she watched her sheep upon the hills. One of the songs in
his collection (p. 181) contains a direct reference to the village
letter-writer:--

Salutatemi, bella, lo scrivano;
Non lo conosco e non so chi si sia.
A me mi pare un poeta sovrano,
Tanto gli e sperto nella poesia.[26]

While I am writing thus about the production and dissemination of
these love-songs, I cannot help remembering three days and nights
which I once spent at sea between Genoa and Palermo, in the company of
some conscripts who were going to join their regiment in Sicily. They
were lads from the Milanese and Liguria, and they spent a great
portion of their time in composing and singing poetry. One of them had
a fine baritone voice; and when the sun had set, his comrades gathered
round him and begged him to sing to them 'Con quella patetica tua
voce.' Then followed hours of singing, the low monotonous melodies of
his ditties harmonising wonderfully with the tranquillity of night, so
clear and calm that the sky and all its stars were mirrored on the
sea, through which we moved as if in a dream. Sometimes the songs
provoked conversation, which, as is usual in Italy, turned mostly upon
'le bellezze delle donne.' I remember that once an animated discussion
about the relative merits of blondes and brunettes nearly ended in a
quarrel, when the youngest of the whole band, a boy of about
seventeen, put a stop to the dispute by theatrically raising his eyes
and arms to heaven and crying, 'Tu sei innamorato d' una grande Diana
cacciatrice nera, ed io d' una bella Venere bionda.' Though they were
but village lads, they supported their several opinions with arguments
not unworthy of Firenzuola, and showed the greatest delicacy of
feeling in the treatment of a subject which could scarcely have failed
to reveal any latent coarseness.

The purity of all the Italian love-songs collected by Tigri is very
remarkable.[27] Although the passion expressed in them is Oriental in
its vehemence, not a word falls which could offend a vi