Then there is Maria's niece, the nineteen-year-old Filomena, a
tall, handsome girl. Every evening they have fine times, laugh, sing,
and play cards. On Sunday evening they go out to the fair (_alla
fiera_) and look at the things without buying. Others have to pay a
lire to go in, but they go in free, as they know some of the people. On
festival occasions Maria wears a silk dress.
There is a crucifix over my bed, an oleograph of the Madonna and child
and a heart, embroidered with gold on white, horribly pierced by the
seven swords of pain, which were supposed to be nails; on the centre of
the heart, you read, partly in Latin, partly in Greek letters:
JESU XPI PASSIO.
All the same, Maria is very sceptical. Yesterday, on the evening of my
birthday, we had the following conversation:
_Myself_: "Here you celebrate your saints' day; not your birthday;
but, you know, up in the North we have not any saints"--and, thinking it
necessary to add a deep-drawn religious sigh, I continued: "We think it
enough to believe in God." "Oh! yes," she said slowly, and then, a
little while after: "That, too, is His own business." "How?" "Well," she
said, "You know that I am dreadfully ignorant; I know nothing at all,
but I think a great deal. There are these people now who are always
talking about the Lord.
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