Lectures on the Market

Have you ever been in a country town on the day of a fair? Amidst the clamour of the children, the elbowing of the peasants, men and women, who want to get close to the stalls where cloth, clothing, footwear, etc., are being sold, to see, to compare, to touch, and the cries of the vendors, who want to persuade you that their goods are the best, the only ones that you will tire of wearing before they wear out, the ones that are a real gift considering the little money you will have to spend to buy them? That fair is a market, that is to say a place where on a fixed day, known in the surrounding towns, hundreds of sellers’ trucks, carts and pushcarts come together, laden with goods, with the most diverse things, from clothes to shoes, from kitchen casseroles to ploughshares, from sheets to pillowslips, from odds and ends for children to gifts for fiancées. Everything is offered at the fair, and there are always many who offer the same thing. And from every direction, from the circle of villages and farmhouses around the large town, where there are squares and inns that can put up and feed so many people, thousands, multitudes of buyers converge to acquire the things they lack. The crowd of buyers and sellers is especially large at the Easter and All Saints’ Day fairs. The buyers come in swarms, knowing that where there is a large gathering it is always easier to find what one needs, and to find it at the best price.