cia-trees, and the sharp scream of swallows wheeling in air, mingle
with the monotonous chant that always rises from the country-people at
their toil. Here and there on points of vantage, where the hill-slopes
sink into the plain, cluster white villages with flower-like
campanili. It is there that the veglia, or evening rendezvous of
lovers, the serenades and balls and feste, of which one hears so much
in the popular minstrelsy, take place. Of course it would not be
difficult to paint the darker shades of this picture. Autumn comes,
when the contadini of Lucca and Siena and Pistoja go forth to work in
the unwholesome marshes of the Maremma, or of Corsica and Sardinia.
Dismal superstitions and hereditary hatreds cast their blight over a
life externally so fair. The bad government of centuries has perverted
in many ways the instincts of a people naturally mild and cheerful and
peace-loving. But as far as nature can make men happy, these
husbandmen are surely to be reckoned fortunate, and in their songs we
find little to remind us of what is otherwise than sunny in their lot.

A translator of these _Volkslieder_ has to contend with difficulties
of no ordinary kind. The freshness of their phrases, the spontaneity
of their sentiments, and the melody of their unstudied cadences, are
inimitable. So again is the peculiar effect of their frequent
transitions from the most fanciful imagery to the language of prose.
No mere student can hope to rival, far less to reproduce, in a foreign
tongue, the charm of verse which sprang untaught from the hearts of
simple folk, which lives unwritten on the lips of lovers, and which
should never be dissociated from singing.[29] There are, besides,
peculiarities in the very structure of the popular rispetto. The
constant repetition of the same phrase with slight variations,
especially in the closing lines of the _ripresa_ of the Tuscan
rispetto, gives an antique force and flavour to these ditties, like
that which we appreciate in our own ballads, but which may easily, in
the translation, degenerate into weakness and insipidity. The Tuscan
rhymester, again, allows himself the utmost licence. It is usual to
find mere assonances like _bene_ and _piacere, oro_ and _volo, ala_
and _alata_, in the place of rhymes; while such remote resemblances of
sound as _colli_ and _poggi_, _lascia_ and _piazza_, are far from
uncommon. To match these rhymes by joining 'home' and 'alone,' 'time'
and 'shine,' &c, wou