Statistical Notes on the Sette Comuni

Appendix.

Statistics

On the Sette Comuni. 2/2

(Conclusion.)

At present, the inhabitants of Asiago enjoy a certain prosperity, though few are rich in land or livestock, and even these few live, despite their wealth, like savages. The use of table linen, for instance, is unknown to them. Some more educated individuals wished to introduce a distinction between master and servant, but had to abandon their design because they found no one who would not have demanded to eat at the same time and at the same table as his master. – In all of the Sette Comuni a bull has never been slaughtered; they feed only on the meat of young calves and goats. Their trade consists in the sale of slaughter cattle and a small number of cows. They make little butter and use the milk almost solely for the preparation of cheese. – Providence gave these mountaineers a vigorous spirit and many natural talents. In their vengeance they are shrewd and cunning. The shape of their faces strongly recalls the features of northern peoples; they have strong cheeks, small eyes, and flat noses; their stature is above average, and their frame firm and powerful. The women are anything but beautiful and delicately built; they wait at table and rarely sit down to eat before the men are entirely satisfied. – At the beginning of September, those inhabitants who do not practice a trade leave the mountains with their livestock in search of fodder; they stay away until May, when they return to their homeland. During this time, the Sette Comuni resemble a land inhabited by Amazons, for the men and able-bodied youths are then absent tending their herds. The entire territory bears much resemblance to the Swiss mountains. Instead of carts, mules are used for transport, because two-wheeled wagons cannot pass through the narrow gorges; in autumn they are almost entirely impassable because mountain torrents flood the gravel-filled valleys, and just as little in spring owing to melted snow and ice. — The houses built of mud, or more properly speaking, stables in which men, women, and children dwell together, are thatched with rushes, to which large boards are fastened projecting two feet over the street to protect passers-by from rain. The hearth is situated in the middle of the living room, and as the houses have no chimneys, the smoke clings to the walls and ceilings of the wretched chambers, which become as black as coal mines. — During the long winter months, it frequently happens that whole packs of hungry foxes come to Asiago; the howling of the dogs, which scent them from a great distance, almost always protects the inhabitants from the accidents such visits might cause. The inhabitants then lock themselves in their houses and shoot at these beasts through their windows, which are covered with oiled paper, for there are only few houses that have glass windows. — In one of the villages, named Enego, straw hats are manufactured, of which some samples were able to be exhibited in Milan at the exhibition of Italian industrial products.