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CHAPTER TWELVE
Having been exempted from the final lyceum examinations, as previously mentioned, I am back in Castelmezzano during the latter part of June, 1902.
The decorative parchment is framed and conspicuously displayed in my house. It gives an official stamp of higher culture. But, at seventeen, it is awkward to be looked upon with so much deference and be expected to play the part of a savant.
My inner regret is that the years of happy browsing in the olympian pastures of literature, art, science and general education, as a scope in itself, have come to a terminal point. In a few months, I am to begin the technical training of a Law School. Will the legal career interest me? I don’t know, but it must be pursued according to plans, blueprinted long ago. It is my parents’ supreme aspiration and they well deserve to see it fulfilled. Moreover, I must make myself useful to my family. It is a means to an end. There is no turning back.
The prospect of going to Rome, of treading on its sacred grounds, overshadows all other thoughts. To study law at its spring should be stimulating and perhaps more real than it now appears to me. The cobwebs of doubt are swept away and I give myself to the full pleasure of that simple, refreshing country life, so masterfully portrayed in Virgil’s Bucolicae and unaltered in our remote rural communities.
Our summer skies are always cloudlessly blue, the sun gloriously brilliant, the air filled with a penetrating tang, the peasant girls sing joyfully, while toiling in the fields. Our folks are so warm at heart. There is a patriarchal touch in being close to them.
In the summer twilights, sitting on stone benches in front of our house, we watched the slow parade of home trekking peasants, with grubbing hoes on their shoulders, leading donkeys or herding small flocks of…
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…bleeting sheep and goats. There were men, women and children. They all greeted us with a cheerful “good evening,” the men respectfully removing their hats. According to the season, the women and girls carried gingerly on their heads, or slung on their arms, baskets of cherries, pears, apples, plums, grapes and figs, covered with coarse white linen. They would stop and beckon us to sample the luscious fruit which, at times, we could not refuse to accept. Market distribution being barred by distances and lack of transportation, much of the fruit crop was fed to domestic animals.
The main events of the summer were three Saints’ feat-days, occurring in July, August and September. The preparations were always exciting. For days in advance, ambulant merchants and peddlers of pottery and housewares, of cotton prints and cheap jewelry, of confections and sherbets, of cutlery and primitive toys, would trickle into the town and set their booths and counters in the few vacant shops available for the occasion or under tents around the square. Beggars, fortune tellers and other impostors were also flocking in, like flies to honey.
The church entrance and corners of the square were festooned with multi-colored small flags and candle-lit Japanese lanterns, which also arched at wide intervals the narrow, uneven main street. On the platform in front of the church, a gayly decorated wooden stand was erected to accommodate a band of thirty or forty musicians, who would arrive a couple of days before the feast and be billeted in various houses.
After a short rest, the musicians would begin limbering their fingers and lungs on their respective instruments. You soon hear shrill cornets and mellifluous flutes, deep trombones and garrulous clarinets, twittering fifes and rolling drums, all in a pell mell of discordance, as sunny days are preceded by the morning bedlam of chirping and shrieking birds.
In the afternoon the first sonorous waves of popular songs would echo through the mountains, at the claps and shouts of youngsters.
From sunrise to sunset the next day, offerings for the feast in money and commodities were collected from house to house, with the band giving short snappy pieces at every stop.
Around 8:30 P.M. services were held in the church, with few selected instruments playing religious music. After the services, a procession moving from the church carried a lighted tower (aguglia) along the main street, followed by the band and a long line of torch bearers. It…
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…was a fantastic spectacle of glow and sound, weaving through the dark background of the town. It ended with a small display of fireworks in the square, which filled the air with the acrid smell of powder.
On the morning of the feast, the band makes its first tour of the town, at the crack of dawn, and the pace is set. All are up and moving about; the streets are filling with men and children; the housewives are busy preparing their meats and sweets; pinnacles of smoke rise from every chimney; peasants who had late country chores are rushing in; out of town friends and relatives arrive in small groups, with parcels and bundles. Chatters and laughters are heard everywhere. From seven A.M. the square is humming and business is booming. At eleven, the faithful are summoned to order and prayer by a clamorous, joyous carillon, which goes on until the church is filled to capacity, its doors wide open to give a view of the altar to the long trail of outsiders. High Mass is celebrated to the tune of subdued music. All kneel and rise in succeeding waves, some cry, others beat their breasts effusively. At the last “pax vobis;” a great shuffling and the procession starts. First the three priests in their richest regalia, the archpriest sheltered under a silk canopy, spread on four gilded staffs, then the statue of the saint in whose honor the feast is celebrated, then the statues of two other saints, each supported by four proud citizens, who take turns in that sought privilege.
The band follows in colorful uniforms and the entire populace gets into line, without class distinction, except women first and men after.
A characteristic feature of the parade are several small pyramids and towers of candles, interwoven with ribbons and flowers. They are carried on the erect heads of healthy, bronze skinned girls, who broad smiles reveal their fine teeth and whose brown eyes sparkle from pride of being admired.
In a group by itself, you see strong, supple young men balancing tall, shimmying poles in their cupped hands or on their chins, an acrobatic feat that conquers the girls’ hearts. This group has its own music of bagpipes and pastoral flutes.
The cortege moves slowly, stops at designated places where prayers are offered on bent knees. It makes the entire round of the town and at the southerly end, two blocks from the church, it comes to a stand on…
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…the side of a hill, below which long strings of firecrackers bark and explode, capped by a final thunder of heavy mortars.
One more stop in the square, more prayers, and the church is re-entered, with the band playing the last notes.
The dinner tables are set, food and wine are copiously consumed and the streets are deserted. But, before long, the tide mounts again. The peddlers and mountebanks are busy, the petty swindlers with chance games make a haul of many a rusty coin.
In the late afternoon the band takes its place on the grandstand in front of the church and plays a long repertoire of operas and operettas until about seven P.M. With few exceptions, everyone is quiet and absorbed. Music is in the soul of our people. I have seen peasants’ backs, curved by a lifetime of toil, straighten up as at a magic call. At eight P.M. thanksgiving services. Humble gratitude is everpresent, even in the midst of fun.
At about ten P.M., just outside of the town, a stupendous exhibition of fireworks takes place, while the band plays in between, and the whole countryside is lit up.
After this last performance, some go back to their farms and others dance all night in various houses, the musicians being distributed according to request and pay.
I have taken pleasure in giving this sketchy account of those festal days, which are part of and give a lift to our overburdened people. They always gave me a thrill, not only in youth but at mature age.
Next: Chapter 13
