anslation of a
translation of it. The first translation was into Greek and the second
into Latin. This is the letter after which the children are baptized.
It is to be hoped they have another translation ready in Sicilian, or
perhaps in Tuscan, to take its place in case anything should happen to
it. Letterio could not tell me the contents of the letter, but he knew
it was in the Duomo and was his padrona, and was sure that, though only a
translation, the meaning of the original had been religiously preserved.

Peppino never spoke a word to Letterio; he talked to me and gesticulated.
When he held out one hand flat and patted it with the other, I did not
pay much attention to the gesture, assuming that he was merely
emphasizing what he was saying to me, and that Letterio brought cutlets
because it was time for them. When he tumbled his hands rapidly one over
the other and Letterio brought salad, I did not see that it was cause and
effect. But when he put his hand to his mouth as though drinking and
Letterio brought another bottle of wine, I saw that Peppino had not been
saying everything twice over to me, once with words and once with
gestures, as a Sicilian usually does, but that he had been carrying on
two independent conversations with two people simultaneously.

Talking about Letterio's name naturally led us to talk about baptisms,
and so we returned to the subject of marriage. Another friend of
Peppino's was to be married that evening--yes, poor man! The church was
to bless the union at four o'clock next morning, after which the happy
pair would drive down to the station in a cart, the side panels painted
with scenes from the story of Orlando out of the marionette theatre, and
the back panel with a ballet girl over the words "Viva la Divina
Provvidenza." Then they would take the train to Palermo for a honeymoon
of three days. The interval between the two ceremonies was to be spent
in dancing and, if I liked, Peppino would take me to see it.

So in the evening we went to a house at the other end of the town, "far
away--beyond the Cappucini," as Peppino said. We entered by a back door
which led directly into a small bedroom containing the music: one
clarionet, a quartet of Saxhorns, and one trombone. The room also
contained four babies in one bed, and two more on a mattress on the
floor, all peacefully sleeping. These were the babies that had succumbed
to the late hour, their mothers having brought them be