The classic ancient original of this boar may be seen in the Uffizzi Gallery. As the small image of a pig carried by ladies ensures that they will soon be, as the Germans say, “in blessed circumstances,” or enceinte (which was all one with luck in old times), so the image of the boar is supposed to be favourable to those ladies who desire olive branches. From all which it appears that in ancient times swine were more highly honoured than at present, or, as Shelley sings:
“We pigs
Were blest as nightingales on myrtle sprigs,
Or grasshoppers that live on noon-day dew.”
THE FAIRY OF THE CAMPANILE, OR THE TOWER OF GIOTTO
“Bella di fronte e infino alle Calcagna,
Con un corredo nobile e civile,
In te risiede una cupola magna
E superbo di Giotto il Campanile.”—Giuseppe Moroni.“Round as the O of Giotto, d’ye see?
Which means as well done as a thing can be.”—Proverb.
Many have wondered how it came to pass that Virgil lived in tradition not as a poet but as sorcerer. But the reason for it is clear when we find that in Florence every man who ever had a genius for anything owed it to magic, or specially to the favour of some protecting fairy or folletto, spirit or god. Is a girl musical? Giacinto or Hyacinth, the favourite of Apollo, has given her music lessons in her dreams. For the orthodox there are Catholic saints with a specialty, from venerable Simeon, who looks after luck in lotteries, to the ever-blessed Antony, who attends to everything, and Saint Anna, née Lucina, who inspires nurses. And where the saints fail, the folletti, according to the witches, take their place and do the work far better. Therefore, as I shall in another place set forth, Dante and Michel Angelo have passed into the marvellous mythology of goblins. With them is included Giotto, as appears by the following legend of “The Goblin of the Bell-Tower of Giotto.”
Il Folletto del Campanile di Giotto.
“Giotto was a shepherd, and every day when he went forth to pasture his herd there was one little lamb who always kept
near him, and appeared to be longing to talk to him like a Christian.
“Now this lamb always laid down on a certain stone which was fast in the ground (masso); and Giotto, who loved the lamb, to please it, lay down also on the same stone.
“After a short time the lamb died, and when dying said: