“Sposa” disappears within the kitchen and one of the girls comes out to entertain the visitors while the dinner is cooking. She stands with one hand on the back of a chair, the other fingering her blue and yellow apron, pink with shyness, but devoured with curiosity. Every detail of one’s dress, every bit of jewellery is being taken in—to be described to all the other girls of the place when they meet at Church on Sunday—but she answers one’s questions with a confident smile. How old? Oh, “in seventeen”—that is, sixteen last birthday. Her name? Candiduccia, at the Signora’s service! Betrothed! A pinker flush and an indescribable little movement of the shoulders, and then down goes her head, while “Mammà,” whose sharp ears have heard all, replies in her deep sonorous tones, from among the pots and pans: “A good youth, but he is getting a bad bargain! This lazy one has not spun half her linen yet. I had mine all spun and woven by the time I was fourteen! Here, thou! come and fetch the plates! The illustrious ones are hungry!” Candiduccia dives into the kitchen, and a moment later your dinner is before you—a big dimpled omelet, trout from the stream fried in olive oil, and crisp salad in a big majolica bowl. Sposa cuts the fresh rough bread—first making the sign of the Cross over the loaf—and serves you cream cheese, made from goat’s milk, instead of butter. Butter and cow’s milk do not enter into the Sabina bill of fare; our mountain people do not care about these things, but it is a feast for the gods, all the same. When the time comes to go, you give Sposa what you think right, and she takes it rather unwillingly, but very gratefully, and as you ride away she and her girls stand at the door and wave their hands and say, “La Madonna v’accompagni”; and the boys, young rascals, will race your horses to the foot of the hill or the turn in the road, knowing well that you will give them a few coppers for their very own as soon as you are out of sight of “Mammà,” who, you may be sure, will never hear of the transaction.