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I always called Trieste Il Paradiso delle Sartorelle, because the sartorella was a prominent figure in Trieste, and Fortune's favourite. She was wont to fill the streets and promenades, especially on festa days, dressed a quatre epingles, powdered and rouged and coiffee as for a ball, and with or without a veil.
The ornaments on high days and holidays were gold necklaces and crosses, a profusion of rings and pendants. This of course was the contadina, or peasant girl. Opposed to her was the sartorella, or little tailoress, which may be said to be synonymous with the French grisette.
The women had broad frocks with coloured borders, and a short, heavy cloth jacket; and on their heads a white linen cloth hanging down behind, with costly lace upon it. The girl of the people, the "sessolotta," and the seamstress, the "sartorella," both go bareheaded, and are proud of their hair; they are fond of flowers and songs, and spend much of their time in the open air.
She was gorgeously clad without, but as a rule had not a rag, not even a chemise, underneath, unless she were 'in luck. 'In luck, I grieve to say, meant that every boy, youth, and man in Trieste, beginning at twelve and up to twenty-five and twenty-eight, had an affaire with a sartorella; and I may safely assert, without being malicious, that she was not wont to give her heart if we may call it so gratis.
For example, a family in Trieste always had a dress to make or petticoat, and the sartorella came for a florin a day and her food, and she worked for twelve hours, leaving off work at six, when she began her 'evening out. I am fain to add the sartorella was often a sort of whited sepulchre.
She was often pretty, and generally had a good figure; but she did not always look 'nice'; and her manners, to put it mildly, were very degagees. There were four thousand of these girls in Trieste, and they filled the lower-class balls and theatres. There was a sartorella in every house, off and on.
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