Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1891-01-11

across his left hip by broad band OF hide,
with occasionally the priceless treasure OF
polished brass or bronze buckle. Is the
inseparable capsella or shepherds pouch.
A rusty carbine. which is never discharged,
or stout staff as high as his breast-but
never the shepherds crook of the olden
tales and modern tableaux vivants-com-
pletelthe picture.
Awakened the HaiIstorms.
On the mountain sides the life Of this
shepherd family is a change]ess one the
whole summer long, unless the terrible hall
storms of Southern Italy fall upon the
mountains, or the still more destructive
windstorms, that frequently fling both shep-
herds and focks from the crags to death,
come whistling over peak or bowling
through gravina. Then the human marmot
awakens from his lethargy and accomplishes
prodiglous feats of strength and wondrous
acts of valor. in rescuing endangered mem-
bers of the flock or of his own terrified
brood.
His food Is polenta and chestnut-four
bread. He is the one italian who drinks
water instead of wine. His feId-lore, though
unconscious to himself, is marvellous. When
spurred by extreme hunger, all mountain
moorland birds are doomed where he sets his
snare. 1t is wild, strange, melancholy
land he looks down upon, il he have the en-
ergy for looking. His wife and children
around him are as voiceless as himself and
his tlocks. The very melody Of the sheep
bells becomes a meaningless din. One car
ries away from his environment and COM
panionship with him only pathetic sense
OF his hopelessness and degradation. You
can only remember him as another animal
in hairy hide, insensate to the trumpetings
OF eternal nature around him.
Shepherds of the North.
But there are other shepherds in Italy of
whom a SUMMER picture can be drawn.
These are the shepherds and shepherdesses
of the peasants lesser focks in Piedmont, in
Lombardy, in radiant Tuscany, and even in
pestiferous, death-breeding Maremme, on
the Tyrrhene sea. There are many among
these who, like the Apulian shepherds,
have descended from shepherd ancestors,
and who all their lives soddenly follow the
one vocation. But in the main they are the
little folks and the youths and wives of all
the peasantry.
In Northern Italy the peasantry are a
happier folk than those of the South. The
beauty Of the cities, quaintness and peace
iulness Of the villages and hamlets, the
radiance Of the valleys and the noble pic
turesqueness of the forests and mountains.
ness, sunniness and even virility to the
people. Their shepherds do not possess the
grave. sad, vacuous faces of the South.
Companionship accounts largely for this. In
the North the shepherd is always one of the
villagers He or she shares their everyday
life. The feasts, espousals. marriages, fu-
nerals, all are theirs for enjoyment and con-
temptation. Nearly every family has its
own little flock. Often several of these are
merged into larger flock and taken to the
highest mountain lands for the entire sum-
mer. In such cases a shepherd and his
family accompany them. and they live much
as do their kind in Apulia. In October the
same flock will be driven to the moors and
marshes of Maremme, where the shepherd
and his family subsist almost entirely on
shared wild fowl, which come here in
myriads to escape the winters of the British
Isles, the Baltic regions and the German
forests.
Day With the Flocks.
But tens Of thousands of little focks led
by tens of thousands of little shepherds and
shepherdesses leave the village gregia or
sheepiold and home every morning for the
higher glades Sometimes dog, often a
pig trained to herd the flock, goes with
them. II maiden has charge of the flock,
she will have her spindle or knitting, and
will work and sing and tend her flock, the
whole day long. If lad or STRIPPING lead
flock, he will let the pig or the dog tend
the sheep, with an occasional moment of ex-
ecutive observation, and the rest of the day
he gathers mushrooms, hunts the young Of
birds, ali of which are eagerly eaten save
those of the swallow and hawk, snares forest
fowl. or pipes on his flute in idle fantasy.
Both must bring a backload. of 1erns,
grass, oak, elm or vine leaves, with the
focks at night Some of this is for tenn
porary use; but the winter store is chiefly
thus gathered. I have counted more than
100 of these little focks descending from the
mountains with the shepherds at eventide.
The valleys are voiceful with thousands OF
tinkling bells, with the notes from hundreds
of shepherds flutes, with the trilli of scores
Of shepherds songs. Then, as the shadows
fall softly uron the hamlets, comes the
housing of the sheep in the greggia. ana the
pastoral yields to the prosaic while SRA
vella" and "Nencia" gain new strength for
the morrow from their bowl of steaming
polenta, or porridge of crushed white beans.
EDGAR L. WAKEMAN.