CÈCINGÙLO.
'THERE was one who would have done much better for you than Pasquino; that was Cècingùlo, [1] at least that's the nickname people gave him. There was no end to the number of stories he could tell.
'In days gone by, [2] he used to sit in Piazza Navona of an evening when people had left work and had time to listen, and he would pour them out by the hour. Now and then he stopped, and went round with his hat, and there were few who did not spare him a bajocco.'
'Did you ever hear him yourself?'
'No; it was before my time, but my father has heard him many's the time, and many of the stories I have told you are the tales of Cècingùlo. How often I have said to him, "Tell me one of Cècingùlo's tales, papa!"' [3]
FOOTNOTES
[1] I have not been able to make out the origin of this name. It is possibly, a mere combination of Cecco, short for Francesco, and a family name, or the name of the village of which he was native which I do not recognise.
[2] 'Nei tempi di prima.'
[3] It is very likely Cècingùlo was some generations older even than the narrator's 'papa.' I have thought it worth while to put this much about him on record, as he was doubtless one of those who have given the local colouring to these very tales. The old women whose heads are their storehouse, as they repeat them over the spinning-wheel, say them with no further alteration than want of memory or want of apprehension necessarily occasions. It is the professional wag who, sitting in the midst of the vegetable market amid a peasant audience, will ascribe to a cicoriaro the acts of a paladin, and insert 'a casino in the Campagna' in the place of an oriental palace. I have met various people who had heard as much as the above about Cècingùlo, but no more.
