This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1849 Excerpt: ...priest, brother of the footman Giacomo, and in his younger days began by household oflices, but was subsequently brought up to kill two dogs with one bone--to be the parish priest and chaplain, and at the same time steward of the Count's estate. "The mingling of voices as a sedan chair is set down tells of another ...
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This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1849 Excerpt: ...priest, brother of the footman Giacomo, and in his younger days began by household oflices, but was subsequently brought up to kill two dogs with one bone--to be the parish priest and chaplain, and at the same time steward of the Count's estate. "The mingling of voices as a sedan chair is set down tells of another visitor, and Monsignore the Archbishop of Ragusa is announced. This lofty personage is much less formidable on a nearer view; nothing can exceed the courtesy of his address, or the pliability of his manners. He must be a foreigner, according to the laws of the Republic, and his salary is only a hundred zecchins a year; but for all that, he lives in good archiepiscopal style; for he has to beg from time to time donations from the senate, and the political powers that be are thus guaranteed against spiritual ambition. What a kind salutation the Archbishop gives the Jesuit, because the senate rules the Archbishop, the Count rules the senate by his influence, the Countess rules the Count, and the Jesuit rules the l In a sketch like this, only a free translation would be understood. Countess. As for the poor fribble, he counts for nothing." Occasional balls and the opera for a couple of months are the entertainments of winter. A few literary friends used to assemble nightly at the house of Count Z., who is a fanatico for English literature; and at the town-house of my fair fellowcountrywoman, Countess Gozze, I had an opportunity of seeing a Ragusan ball. Our orchestra was the dingy gypsies of the Hungarian regiment; but better dancing music I never would desire; the accentuation of the waltz phrases was so marked that the dullest ear must have caught the emphasis and danced in time. The charm of the waltz is surely in part owing to it...
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