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There are seven more "where nows," including lovers, and "proffered husbands," and "romances," and ending with the startling question and answer, the counterpoint of the former close, "Ove son l' aspre selve e i lupi adesso, E gli orsi, e i draghi, e i tigri? Son qui presso." Where now are all the woods and forests drear, Wolves, tigers, bears, and dragons? Alas, here!
Tommaseo, in the preface to his 'Canti Popolari, mentions in particular a Beatrice di Pian degli Ontani, whose poetry was famous through the mountains of Pistoja; and Tigri records by name a little girl called Cherubina, who made rispetti by the dozen as she watched her sheep upon the hills. Salutatemi, bella, lo scrivano; Non lo conosco e non so chi si sia.
The purity of all the Italian love-songs collected by Tigri is very remarkable. Although the passion expressed in them is Oriental in its vehemence, not a word falls which could offend a virgin's ear. The one desire of lovers is lifelong union in marriage.
All this is not the poetry of the Renaissance peasant; it is the poem made out of his reality; the songs which Valléra sang in the fields about his Nencia we must seek in the volume of Tigri; those rispetti and stornelli of to-day are the rispetti and stornelli of four centuries ago; they are much more beautiful and poetic than any of Lorenzo's work; but Lorenzo has given us not merely a peasant's love-song; he has given us a peasant's thoughts, actions, hopes, fears; he has given us the peasant himself, his house, his fields, and his sweetheart, as they exist even now.
The divisions of those two sorts of songs, to which Tigri gives names like The Beauty of Women, The Beauty of Men, Falling in Love, Serenades, Happy Love, Unhappy Love, Parting, Absence, Letters, Return to Home, Anger and Jealousy, Promises, Entreaties and Reproaches, Indifference, Treachery and Abandonment, prove with what fulness the various phases of the tender passion are treated.
"Fuit et Ninus, imposita Tigri, ad solis occasum spectans, quondam clarissima." PLIN. H. N. vi. 13.
She is always cheerful and good-humored." To indicate the color of the eyes, Cagnolo uses the word "bianco," which in the language of the people still means blue. In the folk songs of Tuscany collected by Tigri, there is frequent mention of occhi bianchi, that is, "blue eyes."
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