Military life in Italy : sketches - Societa italiana di storia militare

CARMELA. 157
most rocky and solitary mountains, gesticulating, talking, and
laughing loudly to herself. Many
times when the carabineers
were passing those localities, they saw her from a distance quite
intent in building towers with stones, or seated motionless on
the summit of a promontory with her face turned toward the
sea, or stretched sleeping on the ground. If she espied them,
she followed them with her eyes until they disappeared, without
replying by voice, smile, or motion to
any sign they might
have made. At first, sometimes when they were far away, she
pretended to fire at them with her two hands but her face
;
was quite serious all the time. So it was with the soldiers, with
whom no one had ever seen her talk or smile. She passed before
them or among them without replying to the jokes they
flung after her, turning her head, or looking a,ny one in the face.
Nor was there any man who would have attempted to touch
her finger or pull her dress, because it was said that she gave
cuffs that left the imprint of her fingers on their faces.
However it may have been, she made her appearance as soon
as she heard the sound of a drum. The soldiers left the town
to
go and drill on the sea-shore, and she followed them. While
the sergeants commanded, and the officer, at a distance, looked
on, she would withdraw and mimic with the greatest gravity
the attitudes of the soldiers, and imitate
movements of the muskets, repeating
voice. Then, suddenly, she would throw away
with a little stick the
the command in a low
the stick and
go and lounge around the officer, looking and smiling lovingly
at him, and calling him by the sweetest and tenderest names,
in a low voice, however, covering her mouth with her hand so
that the soldiers should not hear her.
When she was in the town she almost always stood on the