Read "The House by the Medlar-Tree" by Giovanni Verga online for free on Textopian. Full text with search, annotations, highlights, and AI-powered reading aids.
In the whole place nothing was talked of but the affair of the lupins, and as La Longa returned with Lia from the beach the gossips came to their doors to see her pass.
"Oh, a regular golden business"! shouted Goose-foot, as he hitched along with his crooked leg behind Padron 'Ntoni, who went and sat down on the church-steps with Padron Fortunato Cipolla and Locca Menico's brother, who were taking the air there in the cool of the evening. "Uncle Crucifix screamed as if you had been pulling out his quill-feathers; but you needn't mind that -- he has plenty of quills, the old boy. Oh, we had a time of it! -- you can say as much for your part, too, can't you, Padron 'Ntoni? But for Padron 'Ntoni, you know, I'd throw myself off the cliffs any day. So I would, before God! And Uncle Crucifix listens to me because he knows what a big ladle means -- a big ladle, you know, that stirs a big pot, where there's more than two hundred scudi a year a-boiling! Why, old Dumb-bell wouldn't know how to blow his nose if I wasn't by to show him!"