The
instrument played only two or three airs, and one of them became a
great favourite with the populace; very soon, numerous voices joined
with that of the singer, and all this and the following day the
melody sounded, near or far. It had the true characteristics of
southern song; rising tremolos, and cadences that swept upon a wail
of passion; high falsetto notes, and deep tum-tum of infinite
melancholy. Scorned by the musician, yet how expressive of a
people's temper, how suggestive of its history! At the moment when
this strain broke upon my ear, I was thinking ill of Cotrone and its
inhabitants; in the first pause of the music I reproached myself
bitterly for narrowness and ingratitude. All the faults of the
Italian people are whelmed in forgiveness as soon as their music
sounds under the Italian sky. One remembers all they have suffered,
all they have achieved in spite of wrong. Brute races have flung
themselves, one after another, upon this sweet and glorious land;
conquest and slavery, from age to age, have been the people's lot.
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