the south are usually dark-mooded, sad-faced men. Nothing surpasses for
unstudied misanthropy of expression the visages of different Neapolitan
harpers who have visited us; but they have some right to their dejected
countenances as being of a yet half-civilized stock, and as real artists
and men of genius. Nearly all wandering violinists, as well as harpers,
are of their race, and they are of every age, from that of mere children
to men in their prime. They are very rarely old, as many of the organ-
grinders are; they are not so handsome as the Italians of the north,
though they have invariably fine eyes. They arrive in twos and threes; the
violinist briefly tunes his fiddle, and the harper unslings his
instrument, and, with faces of profound gloom, they go through their
repertory,--pieces from the great composers, airs from the opera, not
unmingled with such efforts of Anglo-Saxon genius as Champagne Charley and
Captain Jenks of the Horse Marines, which, like the language of
Shakespeare and Milton, hold us and our English cousins in tender bonds of
mutual affection. Beyond the fact that they come "dal Basilicat'," or "dal
Principat'," one gets very little out of these Neapolitans, though I dare
say they are not so surly at heart as they look. Money does not brighten
them to the eye, but yet it touches them, and they are good in playing or
leaving off to him that pays. Long time two of them stood between the
gateway firs on a pleasant summer's afternoon and twanged and scraped
their harmonious strings, till all the idle boys of the neighborhood
gathered about them, listening with a grave and still delight. It was a
most serious company: the Neapolitans, with their cloudy brows, rapt in
their music; and the Yankee children, with their impassive faces, warily
guarding against the faintest expression of enjoyment; and when at last
the minstrels played a brisk measure, and the music began to work in the
blood of the boys, and one of them shuffling his reluctant feet upon the
gravel, broke into a sudden and resistless dance, the spectacle became too
sad for contemplation. The boy danced only from the hips down; no