Bismarck weekly tribune. [volume] (Bismarck, Dakota [N.D.]) 1884-1943, 1890-03-21

working people. It is made from the meal Of
chick peas, which is mixed with water until a
paste is formed. Then eggs are beaten into
it, and the whole is poured into a huge round,
shallow platter, we'll covered with olive oil
and baked in an oven or over a hot fire. It
is cooked along the streets and in the market
square over charcoal stoves. This, with a
half dozen other similar dishes, a few varie-
ties of fish, cheese, fruit, nuts Especially
chestnuts), bread and the wine of the region,
constitute the food of an ordinary working
mans family. They never eat meat. 1t is
too dear. And, it nay be added, the Nicois
in easy circumstances expend very little on
the table.
We ate the socca as we picked our way
through the narrow streets down to the
market. Here was a busy and curious scene
A large square occupied by perhaps two hun
dred women, who cried their wares or coaxed
us in all the patois of southern France and
northern Italy to buy their flowers, or fruits.
or vegetables, or snails, or c%hestnuts, or game,
or cakes, or sardines, or what not. The small
boy was on land to secure his share of onion
tops and cast off fruit, to guy the vender Of
socca and get the scraps in case there was O
remnant, to tease the fortune teller's rooster,
that wise bird that knows how to select from
the many tinted bits of paper on his mistress
stand the one that just fits each case-price,
two cents. Lively turkeys tied together by
the legs, easy going motherly hens, sprightly
rabbits, and tuneful birds Clipped in to COM
plete the hubbub of the closing hour of the
market.
The flowers Of Nice are something marvel
Gus. It is only a few years since their cult
walton and sale formed what might be called
an industry here. Now, however, thanks to
the efforts of the Nieois author, Alphonse
Kari, a flower trade has been built up which
supports many hundreds of people, and, it is
said, brings $500, 900 annually into the town.
In the market they are sold very cheaply, as,
in fact, is almost everything else there.
From the market I followed my guide home
with the basket. We lodged through crooked
old alleys, between tall stone houses and past
multitudes of poor little shops. Cobblers,
coopers, chair members, wool bleachcrs, looked
up from their small pieces of work and nod
ded to the child as she fitted by. Now and
then we thrust our heads into a dark hole
where a few bottles dilnly outlined on a
rough board shelf and a list Of prices nailed
up near the entrance announced that wines
were sold there. Here was a candy store. A
dollar would have cleaned it out and paid the
rent for a month. There a few bits of cheap
pottery, or a dozen pine cones, or three or
four handfuls of snails, or a small basket of
sardines, constituted the entire stock of a
merchant and possibly the entire support Of
a family.
At length we turned into a lane so narrow
that the roofs of the stone buildings met
across it, and began to climb the hill. The
ascent was broken at short intervals by low
steps. The brick pavement was perfectly
clean, but the air was chill and damp. Not a
CLEAN of sunlight found it's way there. A rat
darted across the path before us. There was
a grewsome aspect to the rooms into which
we peered. They looked like rows of tombs.
They were so black that faces within could
not be distinguished; only a couple of glisten-
ing eyes here and there told that the occu-
pants were alive. The weirdness of the place
was beginning to weigh upon me. The market
girl was turning into asprite, when suddenly
she pushed open a low door and invited me
to enter. "This is my home" she said. And
she introduced MT to her mother very pref
tily. 1stared into the aperture. Sure enough,
here was a family, a father, mother and
three children. I stepped inside and the door
swung together. Through the cracks in it a
ray or two Of light struggled. But for that
the apartment would lave been dark as
night.
found that the father, when he had work,
earned forty or forty-ive cents a day. The
mother could make about half that. Two
cents, as l have said, was a good days earn.
ings for the child, for, she explained, she had
to compete with licensed carriers at the mar
ket, almost all of whom we're italian women
who could carry heavier weights, and who
could make eight or ten cents during market
hours. Their apartments, or home, com.
prised two rooms, the one on the ground and
a bedroom above. The rent amounted to a
little over a dollar a month. They calcu-
lated that they expended twenty-five or
thirty cents a day for food. That was in
the good season, when there was work.
When the father was idle they were obliged
to live more economically. paid the child
for her services and went down into the sun
light and over the river.
Down into the sunlight and over the river,
where hand organs, sweet toned ones, too,
were going in all the streets, where groups
of s~trolling iddlers and harpists were play
ing before the great hotels, and plainti7e
voiced girls were singing under the palms in
front of the English and Russian villas. The
Nicois were there, drinking in the delicious
strains. Their faces spoke their enjoyment.
In the public garden, where the city and
military bands give concerts six times every
week, more than half the vast audience were
natives. If the Nicois, notwithstanding their
pinched lives, are light hearted and even
gay; if they are not without physical vigor,
it is because of their southern sky. It is be-
cause they find relaxation in music. It is
because they stray off on Sundays to the hill
sides around and dance away dull care among
the olives and the roses.
MALvINA A. HOWE.
To Improve the Finger Nails.
Many people think that pushing the skin