ied unconverted; poor devils who worshiped wine
and women, and knew nothing better in this world. And who is their
mourner? A great, brawny, tawny, steeple-crowned hat, blue-breeched,
two-fisted fish-huckster; and he is trying to sell, by yelling as if his
heart would break, a basket of fish not so long as your finger. If he
cries so over anchovies, what would he do if he had a whale for sale?

Another _primo basso profundo_ trolls off a wheelbarrow and a fearful
cry at the same time; not in unison with his merchandise, for he has
birds--quail, woodcock, and snipe--for sale, besides a string of dead
nightingales, which he says he will 'sell cheap for a nice stew.' Think
of stewed nightingales! One would as soon think of eating a boiled
Cremona violin.

But out of the way! Here comes, blocking up the narrow street, a
_contadino_, a countryman from the Campagna. His square wooden cart is
drawn by a donkey about the size of, and resembling, save ears, a singed
Newfoundland dog; his voice, strong for a vegetarian,--for he sells
onions and broccoli, celery and tomatoes, _finocchio_ and mushrooms,--is
like tearing a firm rag: how long can it last, subjected to such use?

It is in the game and meat market, near the Pantheon, that you can more
fully become acquainted with the street cries of Rome; but the Piazza
Navona excels even this. Passing along there one morning, Caper heard
such an extraordinary piece of vocalization, sounding like a Sioux
war-whoop with its back broken, that he stopped to see what it was all
about. There stood a butcher who had exposed for sale seven small stuck
pigs, all one litter; and if they had been his own children, and died
heretics, he could not have howled over them in a more heart-rending
manner.

About sunrise, and even before it,--for the Romans are early
risers,--you will hear in spring-time a sharp ringing voice under your
window, '_Acqua chetosa! Acqua, chetosa!_' an abridgment of _acque
accetosa_, or water from the fountain of Accetosa, considered a good
aperient, and which is drank before breakfast. Also a voice crying out,
'_Acqua-vi-ta!_' or spirits, drank by the workmen and others at an
expense of a baioccho or two the table-spoonful, for that is all the
small glasses hold. In the early morning, too, you hear the chattering
jackdaws on the roofs; and then, more distinctly than later in the day,
the clocks striking their odd way. The Roman clocks ring from one to six
strokes four