when he pauses before Mezzetin and Harlequin, who, dressed as labourers,
are making love to Lisetta, a young shepherdess. He mocks them, and
from injurious expressions they come to blows. But the shepherdess and
her friends, who arrive at the noise, separate the brawlers, and compel
them to make friends. Lisetta, desiring to cement the harmony between
Mezzetin and Harlequin, exacts from them a promise that, for love of her,
they will eat Cavicchio’s soup in the position that she shall indicate.
Lisetta then places them back to back and ties their arms. She then
places the bowl on the ground, bidding them eat, and departs, enjoining
Cavicchio to give them drink after they have finished the soup. Mezzetin
and Harlequin then attempt to pick up the soup, but each of them, every
time that he stoops, lifts his companion upon his shoulders, which is
a source of jests for Cavicchio, who looks on with bursts of laughter.
Harlequin ends by picking up the bowl and runs off eating, carrying
Mezzetin on his back.
In the third act it is night; Cavicchio is in his hut with his children
who are weaving baskets whilst he sings to the accompaniment of a
hornpipe, so as to maintain the family gaiety. Hearing a noise without,
he takes up a lamp and goes outside, to find himself face to face with
a military patrol. He cries out and calls his wife to his aid, but the
captain having reassured him, Cavicchio takes up his hornpipe and sets
them all dancing, his wife, his children, the soldiers and even the
captain.
vi
FICCHETO is a simpleton who wearies his master, the innkeeper, and his
customers by gross proverbial comparisons and ponderous quotations. To
listen to him you would suppose that he had been in the Doctor’s service,
and that he had profited by his lessons. Extremely timid, he goes greatly
in fear of thieves, and so as to deceive them he never sleeps in the
same part of the house on two consecutive occasions; every evening he
is engaged in removing his bed. His master, intrigued by these nightly
removals, inquires the reason.
“It is on account of thieves,” replied Ficcheto. “They will be finely
trapped——”
“I hope so indeed,” replies his master, a man of sense.
“I say that they will be finely trapped. A rolling carcass gathers no
flies, as my father was wont to say.... And then again I like to sleep as
far from you as possible, for, as the proverb has it: Who lies down with
dogs gets up with fleas, and then——”
“That will do!” says his master, pushing him rudely aside. “Sleep where
you will.” And thereupon Ficcheto begins once more to transport his
mattress.
Among the less known Italian buffoons may be cited Gian Manente and
Martino d’Amelia.
In _La Calandra_ of the Cardinal of Bibbiena, the servant Fessenio
compares Calandro, the ridiculous and deceived husband, to these two
buffoons. “The thing that above all others makes me laugh at the expense
of Calandro,” he says, “is that he believes himself to be so beautiful
and lovable that all the women that see him are immediately enamoured of
him, as if the world did not possess such another model of perfection. In
short, as a popular proverb runs, if he ate hay he would be a bull; in
his own way he is almost as good as Martino d’Amelia or Giovanni Manente.”
“He is more simple than Calandrino,” is a proverb based upon the two
models of Boccaccio in which the simplicity of the painter Calandrino
impinges upon imbecility. _Far Calandrino qualcheduno_ means to make a
fool of someone. Bibbiena gives this popular name to the old man of his
comedy _La Calandra_.
Cortavoce, also called _Courtavoz_, was one of the first Italian mimes
to go to France in 1540. His costume with its grey hood and his long
cardboard nose earned him the surname of _the pilgrim_.
Rabelais, describing in his _Sciomachie_ (1569) the fêtes held in Rome on
the occasion of the birth of a dauphin of France, speaks of “Bergamese
mimes and other _matachins_, who came to perform their jests and
somersaults” before the court of Rome. Among others he cites Il Moretto,
the archbuffoon of Italy.
Il Moretto is also cited several times by Ludovico Domenichi in his
collection of _Facétie_, 1565, as a famous utterer of witticisms and a
master of his art.
XVI
TARTAGLIA
IL TARTAGLIA (the stutterer) is a mask of Neapolitan origin. Sometimes he
is a gossiping servant who, unable to complete the articulation of his
words so as to convey his ideas, flies into perpetual rages with himself
and with others. Nevertheless he is fat. Enormous spectacles conceal
three-quarters of his countenance, to suggest that he is short-sighted,
and that he has no desire to be surprised by danger; for however ready he
may boast himself to brave anything, from an elephant downwards, he will
usually conceal himself behind a hayrick if he hears a cock crow.
The type is one that was but little seen out of Italy. He filled utility
rôles and had never more than one scene in a scenario. He would play
moreover the parts of notary, of constable, of advocate, of judge, and
sometimes of apothecary; but he was invariably a ridiculous and ridiculed
personage.
Favart writes in 1761:
“The farce _I Tre Gobbi_ (”The Three Hunchbacks“), translated
into French by Lelio Riccoboni, is being repeated at the
Théâtre; this farce develops badly; but if it succeeds, that
at least will be a good development. I fear in this _facétie_,
the character of Tartaglia. One of the three hunchbacks is a
stammerer who always halts upon indecent syllables. That is to
venture a great deal in a nation whose ears are as chaste as
their morals are corrupt.”[5]
Tartaglia’s characteristic costume has always presented a great deal of
analogy with that of the _Zanni_. Created, it is said, by Beltrani da
Verona in 1630, an epoch in which lackeys such as Scapino and Mezzetino
began to discard the mask, Tartaglia assumed as his characteristic device
no more than the enormous blue spectacles, without which he cannot play.
His face is beardless, his head bald and covered by a round grey hat; he
wears an enormous linen collar; his cloak, coat and pantaloon are green,
striped transversely with yellow; his stockings are white and his shoes
are of black or brown leather. Such at first was Tartaglia.
But like all the others he underwent modifications suggested by changing
fashions. In 1750, Fiorilli, a very talented Neapolitan actor, a member
of Sacchi’s troupe, played this type in short breeches and cap; by giving
the garments of Tartaglia the form proper to Scapin he eliminated the
yellow stripes, and embroidered his green livery with silver frogs.
In the nineteenth century in Naples this personage, whose character is to
be nothing in particular so that it may be anything he chooses according
to the actor undertaking it, wore the white wig, the three-cornered
hat and the green coat in the Louis XV. fashion; he was the modern
Tartaglia, stammering the emphatic dialect of Naples. He delivers himself
of the most outspoken and buffoon sayings, with a nonchalance and calm
that are imperturbable. It is also a very common thing for the actor who
plays Tartaglia to go and spend a night, or perhaps four or five days, in
prison. It is a state of things accepted by the actors and the public,
and no one troubles about it.
At every undesirable word he stops as if to seek the proper one, and when
he has found it he falls upon it heavily, as it were. It is difficult
to give a specimen of the excessively free subjects which lead to his
arrest. There was one which assumed the importance of a political
fact. In the piece in which it was delivered Tartaglia was returning
from Spain, and attempted to inform the audience that the queen had
just opened the Cortes, being attended by the leaders of all political
opinions. The manner in which he garbled the word _Cortes_ and several
others remained stamped upon the memory of those present, and the jest
created some sensation, seeing that the Queen of Spain was then the
beautiful Christina, sister to the King of Naples. Tartaglia was sent to
prison for a week, and deprived of his favourite spectacles for a month.
The latter was the most cruel punishment possible to inflict upon the
actor and the public; for without his enormous spectacles Tartaglia is
paralysed.
Tartaglia is not always a fat fellow. Sometimes he is so dry, so long
and so lean, and adorned with so prominent a nose, that he resembles
a walking-stick. He then enjoys a singular prerogative; he is a
_jettatore_, he has the evil eye, or rather he has two evil eyes, for he
can see nothing behind his great spectacles.
“Tartaglia,” says M. Paul de Musset, “is a Neapolitan, enjoying
as great a favour as Pancrace. He represents the southerner
worn out by the climate, suffering from chronic ophthalmia, and
in a condition bordering upon cretinism. His hollow cheeks, his
long nose surmounted by enormous blue spectacles, his sickly
air and his vice of pronunciation make up the particular signs
of a _jettatore_ whom it is dangerous to encounter.”
In the comedy _Il Re Cervo_ of Carlo Gozzi, Tartaglia, his stammering
and stupidity notwithstanding, is the prime minister of the kingdom of
Serendippe. He desires to marry his daughter to the king, his master.
The king, however, loves another, the beautiful Angela. He marries her
and becomes jealous. To satisfy his desire to test the sentiments of his
wife, the magician Durandarto gives him a formula by means of which his
soul can introduce itself into any dead body that he desires to resurrect.
The imprudent monarch confides this important secret to Tartaglia, who is
not only furious at the marriage of the king, but further has permitted
himself to fall in love with the queen. We behold the injudicious king
and his perfidious minister in a forest. A hunted stag falls dead at
their feet. Tartaglia persuades his master to put his magic formula to
the test upon this animal. The formula is terribly efficacious, for,
simultaneously with the passage of the soul of the king into the body
of the stag, the body of the king falls dead. So far the evil is of
little account, for the king, who has become a stag, may return his soul
into his discarded inanimate body. But Tartaglia has been made aware
of the formula. He makes use of it immediately to cause his unworthy
soul to pass into the body of the king, and, whilst the latter bounds
away though the forest, Tartaglia returns to the palace and orders the
massacre of all stags, young and old, in the kingdom of Serendippe.
The scene in which Angela beholds the return of her husband, now
stammering and unbearable in his behaviour, is extremely amusing. She
drives him from her chamber, and finds herself at the door face to face
with a poor beggar whom, by force of instinct, she immediately begins to
love. This mendicant, of course, is none other than her real husband.
The king had found in the forest a poor devil dead of cold, and he had
taken possession of his body, thinking it but little suitable to reappear
before his better half in the shape of a stag.
Explanations follow, and Angela, to be rid of the odious Tartaglia,
promises him her caresses if he will consent to resurrect the little dog
which she has just lost. Tartaglia submits to this caprice, but scarcely
has he left his body than the legitimate king resumes it by means of the
formula, whilst Tartaglia yelps and whines in the body of the dog. That
is the last effort of his eloquence, for the king immediately strangles
him, and thus ends the comedy.
In Bologna the office of Tartaglia is to provoke laughter at the expense
of the law. It is sometimes the commissary himself, sometimes merely the
police agent who is held up to ridicule. But the Corporal of the _sbirri_
is his triumph. If he goes to arrest a guilty man his stammering renders
him so ridiculous that everybody falls to mocking him. His choler rises
to heights of fury when he perceives that the more he speaks the more the
laughter increases. We hear then inarticulate cries and unearthly roars
issuing from his throat. At last he departs, consigning everybody to the
devil, and from a distance we still hear his bizarre ejaculations which
it would be idle to attempt to reproduce.
ii
Can we dispense with THE NOTARY? Impossible. Does not love play its
part—the principal part—in every piece? And if love is to be succeeded by
Hymen must not Hymen be preceded by a notary?
It is necessary, therefore, to the end that the scenario of a gay piece
shall satisfy the public, that when the dénouement is reached Ottavio
shall wed Isabella, and his servant shall wed the soubrette. The
notary comes to prepare the contract and to marry these young people.
The old men never marry, and all their needs are to be satisfied by
the apothecary. Should the notary by chance arrive in answer to their
summons, it is for the purpose of drawing up their wills.
A wig with eight curls, a black gown, a bourgeoning nose pinched by
enormous spectacles, an empty belly, a great foot, a cane in one hand
to sustain this ponderous individual, and a portfolio in the other
to balance him, shaking his head, smiling at everyone, he enters—the
desired, the indispensable, the triumphant notary! He salutes the
company, blows his nose and mops his brow, for he is a man of importance.
After the customary pinch of snuff proffered him by Cassandro, he takes
a chair, extracts his papers from his portfolio, seeks for a long time
his pen which is behind his ear, and on the score of which he disturbs
the entire household. It is Columbine who eventually finds it, thrust
into his wig. The company sits; a circle is made, whilst the Notary cuts
his pen, plucked, he says, from the right wing of Eros, and destined to
cement the happiness of the future spouses. Finally, after testing the
point upon his nail, and then trimming and retrimming it a little, after
having taken off and replaced his spectacles a dozen times, as if to test
the patience of his clients, he makes up his mind to receive the names,
patronymics and qualities of the one part and the other part.
The actual business is speedily despatched, particularly if he has
been primed beforehand. Sometimes, it is true, discussions arise, and
everything is on the point of being broken off. Throughout these he
remains impassive. Sometimes he comes to draw up the contract of the
guardian, and it is signed by the lover. This may enrage others, but
it matters not at all to him. All that concerns him is to have two
signatures. With these he will depart quite satisfied, particularly if he
has been well paid. Having pocketed his fee he will discuss the weather,
he will yawn more than is polite, and he will sometimes permit himself
to accept refreshment, and even to caress the chin of the soubrette,
throwing her a roguish glance over the top of his spectacles. He never
refuses to join the nuptial banquet, and he is capable of remaining at
table for three days and three nights without weariness; he will never
fail at each dessert to sing in a falsetto voice some old and playful
couplet upon the charms and graces of the bride. Thereafter, pleased with
his alleged witticisms, he will resume his eating.
There is, however, no company so good but that in the end it must be
quitted. A nuptial banquet cannot last six years. The Notary will return
home, supported by some of his clients, for his desire to return to his
wife has been left in some of the bottles he has emptied.
Not always, however, does it happen that he is so hospitably treated.
In those houses into which he comes to contravene by his ministry the
desires of the true lovers, if he dares to rise from his chair to make
a bow he will invariably sit down again upon nothing, to the great
satisfaction and hilarity of the servants. Sometimes also his fee is laid
across his back for him, after which he will not be seen again until the
storm is over. At bottom he is always a good fellow, fearing his wife and
the king, without any real evil in him, and residing at the corner of a
street in all the cities of the world.
In the _Intronati_ company, the Notary was sometimes called Ser Neri,
sometimes Ser Ghello, Ser Agapito or Ser Ciappelletto.
iii
In many Italian pieces the _Podestà_ or the _Bargello_ plays his part in
the dénouement. Neither is ever loaded with a long or a difficult rôle.
Their dress is severe, their manners insignificant, they represent the
law in all its rigidity.
THE COMMISSARY, being of an inferior order, is treated more cavalierly in
the Italian scenarii, as in the farces of Polichinelle.
THE COMMISSARY (_to his clerk_). Come, let us make haste, open
your desk, shut the door, drive away the dogs, take a chair,
blow your nose, leave a wide margin and write a large hand.
THE CLERK (_producing a large pen and a very small ink-horn_).
Sir, let us get on if you please.
THE COMMISSARY. I shall soon be done. Accused, what is your
name, surname, quality, birthplace, street, parish and lodging?
Have you a father, a mother, brothers or relations? What are
you doing in this town? Have you been here long? Whom do you
visit? Where do you go? Whence are you come? Set it down,
scribe. (_He strikes the shoulder of his clerk._)
THE CLERK (_dropping his ink-horn_). Oh, my shoulder is broken!
Behold a crippled clerk!
THE COMMISSARY. That is _punctum interrogationis_, you ignorant
devil! And you, accused, are you going to answer? Set it down
that he has said nothing.
THE ACCUSED. How could I, sir, when——
THE COMMISSARY. Enough! Do you think I have time to listen to
all your idiocies? Don’t you know that I have to see three
rascals hanged to-day without counting you? Send word that the
gang is not yet to set out. I have something here by which to
increase it.
THE CLERK. Sir, the gang will not start until you join it.
(_Collection of Gherardi._)
iv
“_Avocats, procureurs and gens de chicane_,” as the song has it, received
fairly sharp treatment in the Italian buffooneries and the French farces
alike. In these the man of the robe is represented as more grasping
and thieving than his clients. They were always mocked, ridiculed and
presented with malice by the actors, to the delight of the audiences that
witnessed their scenic misfortunes.
“The Chicanoux earned their living by being beaten,” says
Rabelais. “The manner of it is as follows: When a monk,
a priest, a usurer or a lawyer is ill-disposed towards a
gentleman of his country, he sends him one of his Chicanoux.
Chicanou will cite him to appear, will outrage him and utter
impudent injuries against him according to his resources and
instructions, until the gentleman, if he be not paralysed of
wit and more stupid than a frog, is compelled to answer him
with blows and sword-thrusts, or, better still, to fling him
through a window or from the ramparts of his castle. That done,
Chicanou becomes rich for four months, as if beatings were his
proper harvests. For he will receive sound compensation from
the monk, the usurer or the lawyer, and from the gentleman a
reparation sometimes so excessive that the latter will lose
all his property in it, with danger of perishing miserably in
prison, as if he had struck the king.”
Many a spectator, after applauding the shower of blows with which
Polichinelle rewarded this Grippeminaud or that Grapignan, would return
home, considering with rage that a real Grippeminaud would come to
summon him on the morrow. In Italy the naïve public would still to-day
applaud the prowess of the “Seigneur de Basché daulbant sur Chicanoux,”
especially in certain remote districts, where law and justice are no
better loved or respected than they were of old; and in such places it is
not always without danger for the manager or for the actor himself when
a gentlemen in black comes to parade his venality and absurdities upon
the boards. On the Italian stage in Paris these caricatures of men of the
robe were usually played by Harlequin or Mezzetin, and Louis XIV., far
from having any notion of reprimanding their satirical allusions, laughed
at them and applauded them heartily.
In the following scene Grapignan is played by Harlequin.
THE THIEF. Is Master Grapignan at home?
GRAPIGNAN. Yes, sir. I am he.
THE THIEF. Sir, I am your servant.
GRAPIGNAN. Sir, I am yours.
THE THIEF. Knowing you to be the most honest advocate amongst
advocates, I come to beg you to enlighten me by your advice on
a little matter which has just happened to me.
GRAPIGNAN. What is the question?
THE THIEF. Sir, I was walking along the highway, when I was
very roughly struck by a merchant, mounted on an old screw.
When I asked him what he meant by it, he sided with his horse,
got down and told me that the animal was not an old screw and
that it was I myself who was that. Thereupon we quarrelled, and
we came to blows, and as he did not happen to be the stronger
I knocked him down. He got up and ran away. I ought to add
that as we rolled along the ground some twenty-five or thirty
pistoles fell from his pocket.
GRAPIGNAN. Ho! ho!
THE THIEF. I picked these up, and seeing that he had already
run away I got on to his horse, and I rode on as if nothing
had happened. Presently I learn, sir, that this rascal has
been lodging a complaint against me, charging me with being a
highway robber. I beg you to tell me whether there is about my
action the least appearance of such a thing! Inform me, I beg
of you, whither this affair is likely to lead me?
GRAPIGNAN. Faith! If the affair is conducted with heat it may
very well lead you to the hangman. We must get you out of it.
Did anybody see you?
THE THIEF. No, sir.
GRAPIGNAN. So much the better. To begin with we must lock up
the horse. For if the merchant came to discover it, seeing
that he has no other witness, he would not fail to have it
interrogated upon the facts, and then you would be lost.
THE THIEF. There is nothing to be feared on that score. The old
screw is incapable of unlocking its teeth.
GRAPIGNAN. Do not trust to that. Every day we behold dumb
witnesses bringing about the downfall of the accused.
THE THIEF. The devil!
GRAPIGNAN. We must lose no time. We must begin by procuring
witnesses at any price.
THE THIEF. But there was no one on the highway at that moment.
GRAPIGNAN. Never mind, never mind. We will discover someone who
was there.... I have in mind a couple of Normans who sometimes
work for me; but they will not undertake the matter save at a
good price, for they have just issued from an affair in which
without me ... you understand. (_He puts his hand on his neck
in a gesture suggestive of hanging._) Also it is a fact that
witnesses are very dear this year.
THE THIEF. How does that happen?
GRAPIGNAN. It is because no quarter is given them, they hang as
many of them as they can discover.
THE THIEF. If it is only a matter of money, sir, here is my
purse with twenty-four pistoles.
GRAPIGNAN. Heh! Heh! That may suffice for one witness,
but there are two of them. Haven’t you anything else, any
jewellery, any old diamond? On occasions like this, it is
necessary to know how to bleed oneself.
THE THIEF. Here is a diamond worth another twenty pistoles, and
here a watch, which may be worth twelve.
GRAPIGNAN. Well, well, out of love of you I might advance five
or six pistoles myself. After that we’ll make our accounts.
THE THIEF. Do so, sir. I place myself in your hands, and I
trust myself to your discretion.
GRAPIGNAN. Very well, then. It will be an extraordinary thing
if, with my two witnesses, I do not have your accuser sent to
the galleys. (_The thief departs._) Twenty-four pistoles on the
one hand, a watch and a diamond on the other: is it not better
that I should profit by these things than the provost? For this
poor devil will undoubtedly be sent to the wheel without delay!
Such is M. Grapignan, who succeeds in robbing even highway robbers.
v
IL SBIRRO (the Constable) was ever a type greatly in vogue in the Italian
comedy. He is the same personage as the _Sergent du Guet_ of the booth of
Polichinelle, under the names of _Corporal Rogantino_, _Corporal Simone_,
_Capo de gli Sbirri_, etc. Like the _Podestà_ (chief magistrate), this
terrific personage appears but little in the course of the plot’s
development.
[Illustration]