Caper 'Starts' A Menagerie.
As an animal-painter, Mr. Caper was continually hunting up materials for sketches. He made excursions into the Campagna, to see the long-horned gray oxen and the hideous buffaloes; watching the latter along the yellow Tiber, when, in the spring-time, they coquetted in the mud and water. He sketched goats and sheep, tended by the picturesquely-dressed shepherds and guarded by the fierce dogs that continually encircled them. In four words, he studied animal-ated nature.
On his first arrival in Rome, he had purchased one of those sprightly little vetturo dogs, all wool and tail, that the traveler remarks mounted on top of the traveling carriages that enter and leave Rome. With a firm foothold, they stand on the very top of all the baggage that may be piled on the roof of the coach; and there, standing guard and barking fiercely, seem to thoroughly enjoy the confusion attendant on starting the horses or unloading the baggage. They are seen around the carriage-stands where public hacks are hired, and as soon as one moves off, up jumps the vetturo dog alongside the driver, and never leaves the vehicle until it stops; then, if he sees another hack returning to the city, he will jump into that, and be carried back triumphant. This sounds like fiction; but its truth will be confirmed by any one who has ever noticed the peculiarities of this breed of dogs, which love to ride.
Caper kept this dog in his studio, and had already made several very life-like studies of him. One morning, leaving his lodgings earlier than usual, he met on the stairway of his house a countryman driving a goat up-stairs to be milked; the Romans thus having good evidence that when they buy goat's milk, they don't purchase water from the fountains. As Caper was going out of the door that led into the street, he saw among the flock of goats assembled there, a patriarchal old Billy, whose beard struck him with delight. He was looking at him in silent veneration, when the goats'-milk man came down-stairs, driving the ewe before him. He asked the man if he would sell the patriarch; but found that he would not. He promised, however, to lend him to Caper until the next day, for a good round sum, to be paid when the goat was delivered at the studio, which the man said would be in the course of an hour.
Our artist then went down to the Greco, where he breakfasted; and there met Rocjean, who proposed to him to go that morning to the Piazza Navona, as it was market-day, and they would have a fine chance to take notes of the country-people, their costumes, etc. They first went around to Caper's studio, where they had only to wait a short time before the milk-man came, driving the old Billy-goat up-stairs before him. Caper made him fast with a cord to a heavy table, the top of which was a vast receptacle of sketch-books, oil-colors, books, and all kinds of odds and ends.
Rocjean and he then strolled down to the Piazza Navona, where, while walking around, Caper suddenly stumbled over the smallest and most comical specimen of a donkey he had ever seen. The man who owned him, and who had brought in a load of vegetables on the donkey's back, offered to sell him very cheap. The temptation was great, and our animal artist bought him at once for five scudi, alias dollars; but with the understanding that the countryman would deliver him at his studio at once. In twenty minutes' time, the donkey was climbing up a long flight of stairs to Caper's studio, as seriously as if he were crossing the pons asinorum. Once in his studio, Caper soon made arrangements to have the donkey kept in a stable near by, when he was not sketching him. This matter finished, Rocjean helped Caper pen him up in a corner of the studio, where he could begin sketching him as soon as he had finished portraying the billy-goat. The patriarch had made several attempts to rush at the vetturo-dog; but the string held him fast to the table. Rocjean mentioned to Caper that he ought to feed his menagerie, and the porter being called and sent out for some food for the goat and donkey, soon returned with a full supply.
Both artists now set to work in earnest; Caper with paints and brushes, and Rocjean with crayons and sketch-book, determined to take the patriarch's portrait while he was in a peaceful frame of body and spirit.
With an intermission for luncheon, they worked until nearly four o'clock in the afternoon, when Rocjean proposed taking a walk out to the Villa Borghese, and as they returned, on their way to dinner, they could stop in at the studio, and see that the donkey and goat were driven out to the stable, where they could be kept until wanted again. Accordingly, both artists walked out to the villa, and had only taken a short turn toward the Casino, when they met a New-York friend of theirs, alone in a carriage, taking a ride. He ordered the driver to stop, and begged them both to get in with him, and after passing through the villa and around the Pincio, to come and take dinner with him sociably in his rooms in the Via Frattina. They accepted; and at ten o'clock that night, while going home in a very happy frame of mind, it suddenly occurred to Caper that his menagerie ought to have been attended to. Rocjean consoled him with the reflection that, having the key in his pocket, they could not possibly get out; so the former thought no more about it.
Early in the morning, having met as usual at the Greco, and breakfasted together, Caper and Rocjean walked round to the former's studio. Before they entered the door of the building, they noticed a small assembly of old women surrounding the porter, and as Caper entered the passage-way, they poured a broadside into him.