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UP AT A VILLA---DOWN IN THE CITYAS DISTINGUISHED BY AN ITALIAN PERSON OF QUALITY
Had I but plenty of money, money enough and to spare,
The house for me, no doubt, were a house in the city-square;
Ah, such a life, such a life, as one leads at the window there!
Something to see, by Bacchus, something to hear, at least!
There, the whole day long, one`s life is a perfect feast;
While up at a villa one lives, I maintain it, no more than a beast.
Well now, look at our villa! stuck like the horn of a bull
Just on a mountain-edge as bare as the creature`s skull,
Save a mere shag of a bush with hardly a leaf to pull!
---I scratch my own, sometimes, to see if the hair`s turned wool.
But the city, oh the city---the square with the houses! Why?
They are stone-faced, white as a curd, there`s something to take the eye!
Houses in four straight lines, not a single front awry;
You watch who crosses and gossips, who saunters, who hurries by;
Green blinds, as a matter of course, to draw when the sun gets high;
And the shops with fanciful signs which are painted properly.
What of a villa? Though winter be over in March by rights,
`Tis May perhaps ere the snow shall have withered well off the heights:
You`ve the brown ploughed land before, where the oxen steam and wheeze,
And the hills over-smoked behind by the faint grey olive-trees.
Is it better in May, I ask you? You`ve summer all at once;
In a day he leaps complete with a few strong April suns.
`Mid the sharp short emerald wheat, scarce risen three fingers well,
The wild tulip, at end of its tube, blows out its great red bell
Like a thin clear bubble of blood, for the children to pick and sell.
Is it ever hot in the square? There`s a fountain to spout and splash!
In the shade it sings and springs; in the shine such foam-bows flash
On the horses with curling fish-tails, that prance and paddle and pash
Round the lady atop in her conch---fifty gazers do not abash,
Though all that she wears is some weeds round her waist in a sort of sash.
All the year at the villa, nothing to see though you linger,
Except yon cypress that points like a death`s lean lifted forefinger.
Some think fireflies pretty, when they mix i` the corn and mingle,
Or thrid the stinking hemp till the stalks of it seem a-tingle.
Late August or early September, the stunning cicala is shrill,
And the bees keep their tiresome whine round the resinous firs on the hill.
Enough of the seasons,---I spare you the months of the fever and chill.
Ere you open your eyes in the city, the blessed church-bells begin:
No sooner the bells leave off than the diligence rattles in:
You get the pick of the news, and it costs you never a pin.
By-and-by there`s the travelling doctor gives pills, lets blood, draws teeth;
Or the Pulcinello-trumpet breaks up the market beneath.
At the post-office such a scene-picture---the new play, piping hot!
And a notice how, only this morning, three liberal thieves were shot.
Above it, behold the Archbishop`s most fatherly of rebukes,
And beneath, with his crown and his lion, some little new law of the Duke`s!
Or a sonnet with flowery marge, to the Reverend Don So-and-so
Who is Dante, Boccaccio, Petrarca, Saint Jerome and Cicero,
``And moreover,`` (the sonnet goes rhyming,) ``the skirts of Saint Paul has reached,
``Having preached us those six Lent-lectures more unctuous than ever he preached.``
Noon strikes,---here sweeps the procession! our Lady borne smiling and smart
With a pink gauze gown all spangles, and seven swords stuck in her heart!
_Bang-whang-whang_ goes the drum, _tootle-to-tootle_ the fife;
No keeping one`s haunches still: it`s the greatest pleasure in life.
But bless you, it`s dear---it`s dear! fowls, wine, at double the rate.
They have clapped a new tax upon salt, and what oil pays passing the gate
It`s a horror to think of. And so, the villa for me, not the city!
Beggars can scarcely be choosers: but still---ah, the pity, the pity!
Look, two and two go the priests, then the monks with cowls and sandals,
And the penitents dressed in white shirts, a-holding the yellow candles;
One` he carries a flag up straight, and another a cross with handles,
And the Duke`s guard brings up the rear, for the better prevention of scandals:
_Bang-whang-whang_ goes the drum, _tootle-te-tootle_ the fife.
Oh, a day in the city-square, there is no such pleasure in life!
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