MALLERY. | NEAPOLITAN SIGNS. 301 
Pompeian paintings, as well asin the classic authors. The significance of 
the action in the hand of thecontemporary statue of Sardanapalus at An- 
chiale is clearly worthlessness, as shown by the inscription in Assyrian, 
“Sardanapalus, the son of Anacyndaraxes, built in one day Anchiale 
and Tarsus. Eat, drink, play; the rest is not worth that!” 
The bridegroom has left his mother to do the honors to the bride, and 
himself attends to the rest of the company, inviting one of them to 
drink some wine by a sign, enlarged in Fig. 88, which is not merely point- 
ing to the mouth with the thumb, but the hand with 
the incurved fingers represents the body of the com- 
mon glass flask which the Neapolitans use, the ex- 
tended thumb being its neck; the invitation is there- 
fore specially to drink wine. The guest, however, 
responds by a very obvious gesture that he don’t wish _7 
anything to drink, but he would like to eat some 
macaroni, the fingers being disposed as if handling 
that comestible in the fashion of vulgar Italians. If 
the idea were only to eat generally, it would have Fic. 88. 
been expressed by the fingers and thumb united in a point and moved 
several times near and toward the mouth, not raised above it, as is nec- 
essary for suspending the strings of mavtaroni. 
In ig. 89 the female in the left of the group is much disgusted at 
seeing oue of her former acquaintances, who has met with good fortune, 
promenade in a fine costume with her husband. Overcome with jeal- 
ousy, she spreads out her dress derisively on both sides, in imitation of the 
hoop-skirts once worn by women of rank, asif to say “So you are playing 
the great lady!” The insulted woman, in resentment, makes with both 
hands, for double effect, the sign of horns, before described, which in this 
case is done obviously in menace and imprecation. The husband is a 
pacific fellow who is not willing to get into a woman’s quarrel, and is very 
easily held back by a woman and small boy who happen to join the group. 
He contents himself with pretending to be in a great passion and biting 
his finger, which gesture may be collated with the emotional clinching 
of the teeth and biting the lips in anger, common to all mankind. 
In Fig. 90 a contadina, or woman from the country, who has come to 
the city to sell eggs (shown to be such by her head-dress and the form 
of the basket which she has deposited on the ground), accosts a vender 
of roast chestnuts and asks for a measure of them. The chestnut 
huckster says they are very fine and asks a price beyond that of the mar- 
ket; but a boy sees that the rustic woman is not sharp in worldly mat- 
ters and desires to warn her against the cheat. He therefore, at the mo- 
ment when he can catch her eye, pretending to lean upon his basket, and 
moving thus a little behind the huckster, so as not to be seen, points him 
out with his index finger, and lays his left forefinger under his eye, pull- 
ing down the skin slightly, so as to deform the regularity of the lower 
