"[...] It appeared that Lattarullo had a secondary profession producing occasional windfalls of revenue. He admitted with a touch of pride to acting as a Zio di Roma – an 'uncle from Rome' – at funerals. Neapolitan funerals are obsessed with face. A man who may have been a near-pauper all his life is certain to be put away in a magnificent coffin, but apart from that no other little touch likely to honour the dead and increase the bereaved family's prestige is overlooked.
"The uncle from Rome is a popular character in this little farce. Why should people insist on Rome? Why not Bari or Taranto? But no, Rome it has to be. The uncle lets it be known that he has just arrived on the Rome express, or he shows up at the slum tenement or lowly basso in an Alfa-Romeo with a Roman numberplate and an SPQR badge, out of which he steps in his well-cut morning suit, on the jacket lapel of which he sports the ribbon of a Commendatore of the Crown of Italy, to temper with his restrained and dignified condolences the theatrical display of Neapolitan grief.
"Lattarullo said he had frequently played this part. His qualifications were his patrician appearance, and a studied Roman accent and manner. [...] Where the Neapolitans tend to familiarity and ingratiation, Lattarullo shows a proper Roman aloofness and taciturnity. When Lattarullo meets a man he says buon giorno and leaves it at that, and he goes off with a curt goodbye. This, say the Neapolitans, who are fulsome and cloying in their greetings, is how a real Roman gentleman speaks."