The Somerset press. [volume] (Somerset, Ohio) 1873-1977, 1882-01-12
Fallen Grandeur.

1t is amazing how smart the poorest
lady in Italy, who has any pretensions to
being such, will turn out on occasions
however dilapidated her home attire.
Two young ladies belonging to aN old,
but utterly ruined family, whose parents
were too poor to keep servant, would
dress themselves for their evening walk,
in the most fashionable of hats and cos
tunes, with their fans, smelling bottles,
lace handkerchief, and gloves, all COM
plete. In order to obtain these dresses
the young ladies had to condescend so
far as to work for the peasants, who paid
them for the manufacture of the smart
stays and chemisettes they wear on feast
days. The attempts to being highly
fashionable, combined with an entire ig-
norance of the ways of the fashionable
world, produce sometimes the strangest
incongruities. The lace veil is now
almost confined to the class called "ar-
fists that is, shopkeepers and skilled
workpeople; but few of the old-fash-
ioned ladies still keep to it. Curious
specimens of decayed nobility, are to be
found in these remote villages people
bearing grand names, and retaining con-
siderable pride in their ancient lineage,
whom generations of idleness and un-
thriftiness have reduced to extreme pow
erty. They are not educated for any pro-
fession, and when starvation stares them
in the face, they have no resource but to
earn their bread by mutual labor. One
noble count of my acquaintance is q
carpenter another bricklayer. Ihave
seen the grand-daughters of countess
working in the fields. With their for
! tunes their manners deteriorate, until
nothing but remnant of pride remains
to distinguish them from the peasants
between whose class and theirs, SO great
a gulf was once fixed. I remember
nothing more melancholy, than the as
semblage of these poverty stricken no
bles once met, at the house of the rich
man of village. We were at supper ;
and rs one ragged and dirty old man after
another came shambling in, each in turn
was, to my great surprise, introduced as
the descendant of an ancient and noble
family, but fallen" caduto," added my
host, with gesture of compassion. The
old man would then bow his head in mel
ancholy acquiescence, and, casting rue
full glance at his shabby cloak with the
faded green lining, would sink into a
chair, at the far end of the table. One
of these fallen mobiles, who had taken to
house-painting, we thought it only
charitable to employ for the decora-
ton of our ceiling. I was pre-
pared to feel quite romantic in
terest in this unfortunate nobleman,
and to be enchanted with his artistic
genius, but he was SO uncommonly dirty,
and his manners were so little removed
from those of PEASANT, that my illusions
were dispelled at once. Neither did his
style of decoration exactly come up to n5
ideal, although it was ambitious enough
4 A basket of flowers soon adorned eacl
corner of our ceiling, and in the center
/ from amid clouds and wreaths of roses
rather shapeless Cupid began to be de
lineated. In the middle Of the work
the artist, whose temper was short, ant
whose feelings were sensitive, tool
effense-as we suppose-at some unin
tentioned slight ON our part. Withou
the slightest explanation, he departed
one day, leaving the Cupid minus one
leg and one arm, and returned no more
Poor Cupid Being in such sadly mu
tilated condition, we thought best to d.
away with him altogether, and my hus
band, mounting ladder, swept coat O
whitewash over Cupid, clouds, basket
of flowers and all. This operation wa
repeated several times, but the Cupi'
would keep reappearing in a ghastl,,
manner.-FrOna CO77ahiU Magazine.