The morning star and Catholic messenger. [volume] (New Orleans [La.]) 1868-1881, 1872-02-04
Rome and its Beggars.

The following sprightly editorial para.
graph appeared in the columns of the
Picayune several days before it's change OF
control, and we do pretend that the present
administration of that paperis in any way
responsible far its paternity. It would
hardly. be advisable, however, to let such
singular assertions as it embodies pass
without protest:
RoME-The seven-hilled city. is just about
the size of New Orleans, numbering 100000
| inhabitants, the majority of whom subsist on
charity, or by squalid, wretched, idle beggary
and vice. The census of the city has just been
| finished ; its detailed report would probably
show as much of vice and Indebtedness as
| could be found in fifty such cities as this. The
ancient population was estimated by Gibbon
at about 200 900, but Hume rates it at 100000
or 100000. At the end of the thirteenth GEN.
tury the city had dwindled to third or fourth
rate town. By the end CT the pontificate of
Leo it numbered $4,000; in 1850, about co.
600 !; in 1909, abont 10000; in 1740, about 146-
600; in-4765, about 1852, 600. In 1921 it had de-
clined to about 146,eO but rose again to 149,-
600 in 1888.
1t will be interesting to compare the present
population of Rome with that which will be
shown after the lapse of another decade under
| the immediate government of the King and
Parliament of United Italy
We could hardly believe that this little
gem had been found in the alluvial forma-
ton of the Louisiana Delta, and imagined
| at first that it must have been washed out
of the granite hills of New Hampshire, but
further Investigation convinced US that it
was genuine editorial sterilization of the
Picayune sanctum.
In questions of fact simple assertions are
worth nothing; let us have the proof.
| What is gratuitiously asserted can be
equally as roundly denied. We deny, first,
that the "majority of the inhabitants of
Rome subsist on charity or by beggary,"
secondly, that the " detailed reports of it's
census will show as much vice and wretched-
ness as could be found in fifty such cities
as this" or even in this very city itself.
In advance of this Z" detailed report" we
may look at their proposition in specula-
tive way. AS to the first one, we must mar
vel at the extreme charity of that minority
of citizens who are willing in their muniti-
cence to support such an immense number
of beggars. There are some FIVE or six pro-
fessional beggars in New Orleans, and even
| this small number causes a great deal of
anuoyan to the Puritanc element of our
population. Now suppose that we were
flooded with an Eruption Of two hun
dred and fifty thousand beggars, that
is number about equal to our present
population which is not in beggary,
how would the "Picayune" element OF
society stand just think Of thegroan-
ing and outcries caused by the pres
ence of q governor and legislature and a
few other officers of this same grand fami-
ly of beggars and then think what would
become of US if we should have to receive
| q quarter of a million moro of carpet-bag-
gers. The Pieayune may not have intend
ed an eulogium on the well-to-do citizens
of Rome, but how could it have pronounced
more glowing one 7 No other spot on
earth can be found where Christian charity
blooms forth in such marvellous deeds as
the support of one half the population by
the other half.
ID. The "vice and wretchedness" charge.
Fifty times as much vice and wretchedness
as in this city. That is to say, we have
six Recorders courts, most of them we'll
patronized, therefore, in Rome there are
three hundred such tribunals in full blast
daily we have one parish prison, pretty
| Auii' Sney Anos' ho'o my, SoutahlhS alto-
gether a pretty large army of miscreants.
We have some two hundred children in the
Houses of Refuge, they must have 10000.
When we multiply in this way all the
prisons and asylums of wretchedness, we
find an immense number, in addition to the
free and easy population of beggars out of
doors and who amount to one half the peo-
pie, thus swelling their, ranks to such an
extent as to leave very few honest persons
of means. 1t is upon these few then that
the whole weight of this burden of charity
falls.