Collectanea. 2 1 7
If rain comes from Aosta, be warned; if from Chatillon, go on with your work, for it will not last.
A pale sun in the morning means a high wind.
Dances.—At the festa of le zouvent, the young men promise da zouvent, i.e. not to dance during vespers. Two girls with a white veil over their heads take bread to the altar rails to be blessed, and distribute it in the sacristy to their waiting companions, a large piece being offered to the priest. At the public dances, for which the girls make decorations with leaves and sheets, there is a particular dance called el bal dêl basen; at a certain high note the couples suddenly stop dancing and kiss each other. Often the dances are held out of doors, but in the evening they are generally in a stable, for which the young men make a temporary wooden floor. On the Sunday after the festa all the young men have dinner at the house of the girl who has had charge of the preparations, the girls providing and cooking the food (usually mutton) and the young men giving the wine. Dancing and supper follow, and on the following day all the company returns to eat up what may have been left over.
Tinkers' feasts.—At Mondovi the tinkers during Carnival on Giovedi Grasso blacken their own faces and those of any whom they may meet. In the evening polenta is made from maize by both men and women in the piazza, and given away to any one who asks for it.
Souls as flames.—On certain nights, four small flames or lights are to be seen on the campanile of the church of St. Giulio, in the Isle of St. Giulio in the Lake of Orta. These are the souls of four saints, SS. Giulio, Elia, Chiliberto, and Alberto, who meet there to discuss and arrange the affairs of the island.
Blasphemy punished.—At a dinner some one carving a chicken said that he had done it so well that not even St. Peter could put it together again. Suddenly the chicken came miraculously together, jumped about the table so vigorously that it splashed every one with broth, and then flew away. All the guests present died that year. (From Tibaldone Ms.)*
^Cf. vol. XX., pp. 297-8 (Roumania). The Tibaldone Ms. is in the Archivio di Stato at Milan, and is a kind of encyclopaedia written in 1701.
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