"Who was that spoke?"

"Oh, my dear, it was Brother Cucuzza, the begging friar."

"Where is he? Where is he?"

"There he is, along there, laughing into his beard. How bold he is!"

"Ah, God in heaven! If we were to dream of him---"

While the two cousins were pouring out endless comments upon the
Capuchins and their beards, the capes of the canons and the surplices of
the seminarists, the 'feroci' came running across from the other side to
re-establish order with the help of their gun-stocks.

"By the blood of my patron saint," cried a stentorian voice, "if I catch
you between my finger and thumb, I will straighten your back for the rest
of your days."

"Who are you falling out with, Gennaro?"

"With this accursed hunchback, who has been worrying my back for the last
hour, as though he could see through it."

"It is a shame," returned the hunchback in a tone of lamentation; "I have
been here since last night, I slept out of doors to keep my place, and
here is this abominable giant comes to stick himself in front of me like
an obelisk."

The hunchback was lying like a Jew, but the crowd rose unanimously