The Forest Republican. [volume] (Tionesta, Pa.) 1869-1952, 1882-02-15

NJunlFl Allo IN ltaAIs
A lady living in country village in
ITALY writes, in the Co7ahiy Mdqasinc,
of her neighbors and their habits. She
says
II is amazing how smart the very
poorest lady who has any pretentions
to being such will turn out on occa-
sions, however dilapidated her home
attire. Two young ladies belonging to
an old but utterly ruined family, whose
parents we're too poor to keep servant,
would dress themselves for their even,
ing walk in the most fashionable hats
and costumes, with their fans, smelling
bottles, lace handkerchiefs and gloves,
all complete. In order to obtain these
dresses the young ladies had to con-
descend so far rs to work for the peas
ants, who paid them for the
manufacture of the smart stays
and chemises they wear on feast
days. The attempts vt being high
" fashionable, combined with an en-
tire ignorance of the ways of the
fashionable world, produce sometimee
the strangest incongruities. The lacs
veil is now almost confined to the class
called " artisti"-that is, shopkeepers
and skilled workpeople; but few of
the old.fashioned ladies still keep to it.
Curious specimens of decsyed nobility
are to be found in these remote villages
people bearing grand names and re-
tanning considerable pride in their an
cient lineage, whom generations of idle
ness and unthriftiness have reduced to
extreme poverty. They are not
educated for any profession, and
when starvation stRres them in
the face they have no resource
but to earn their bread by manual labor.
One noble count of my acquaintance is
carpenter another bricklayer I
have seen the granddaughter of a
countess working in the fields. With
their fortunes, their manners deteri-
crate, until nothing but remnant of
pride remains to distinguish them from
the peasants between whose class and
theirs so great gulf was once fixed.
remember nothing more melancholy
than the sssemblage of these poverty
stricken mobiles 1 once met at the
house Of the rich man of village.
We were at supper; and as one
ragged and dirty old man after
another came shambling in, each
in turn was, to my great sur
prise, introduced as the descendant of
an ancient and noble family, but fallen
-''caduto"-added my host, with a
gesture of compassion. The old man
would then bow his head in melan-
choly acquiescence, and casting rueful
glance at his shabby cloak with the
faded green lining, would stink into o
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 decoration
of our ceiling. was prepared to feel
quite romantic interest in this un-
fortunate nobleman, and to be en-
chanted with his artistic genius; but
he was so uncommonly dirty,
and his manners were so little removed
from those of q peasant, that
my illusions were dispelled at once
Neither did his style of decoration ex-
actly come up to my ideal, although it
was ambitious enough. A basket of
flowers soon adorned each corner of our
ceiling, and in the center, from amid
clouds and wreaths of roses, rather
shapeless Cupid began to be delineated.
In the middle of the work the artist,
whose temper was short and whose
feelings were sensitive, took offense las
we supposed) at some unintentional
slight on our part. Without the slight
est explanation he departed one day,
leaving the Cupid minus one leg and
one arm, and returned no more. Poor
Cupid