CATANZARO.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume VIII, Issue 27, 4 July 1891, Page 128

CATANZARO.

Few cities have such a magnificent promenade as the Via Bellavista of Catanzaro. The road skirts the edge of the precipice by which the city is built, and the broad river bed at its baseseems dwindled to a ribbon’s width. Hither,at sundown, the citizens and their wives and daughters come to take the air, enjoy the view, see and be seen. The ladies of Catanzaro have long had a reputation for their beauty. When the French soldiers were quartered here in the Napoleonic wars the officers were delighted to find that it was a custom

(breach of which implied extreme discourtesy) tor acquaintances of both sexes to kiss each other as a formal method of salutation. They thought no more of it than if they had merely put hand to hand. In his memoirs of the war in Calabria, one of these officers describes the winning way in which the fair girls of Catanzaro, upon an introduction, were wont to make tender of their lips. Alas, however ! the spirit of progress which has breathed over Calabria in so many directions during the last century has wrought a change in this respect also. The manners of the yonng ladies of Catanzaro to-day do not differ much from those of the Neapolitans, and it is no longer the custom to kiss a stranger in sight. Otherwise it is probable the excursion agents of the ribald north of Europe would be quick to advertise toms to this fascinating spot. For my part, I was fain to believe the ladies of the city are not as beautiful as their fame. It might have been different if they bad shown the old interest in a stranger. But they showed none, as a matter of fact. They moved up and down the promenade in their stiff, unbecoming finery and tall Paris hats, chattering so fast that the swallows, gyrating athwart the face of Catanzaro’s cliffs, seemed to hold their babble for a challenge, and screamed loud in their turn. Nevertheless, for their long, exuberant black hair, and their expressive dark eyes, the ladies of Catanzaro still deserve to be praised.