The Windham County reformer. (Battleboro, Vt.) 1876-1897, 1895-07-01

EX-CONGRESSMAS CHARLES TRACEY.
touched me on the arm, and with sig
nificant wink and gesture toward the
satchel whispered: 1t takes an Irish
man to make himself as safe as possible
under all circumstances If we are
caught, it will be Hemans they Will
hang and not met But we were not
caught. We passed safely through the
Italian lines, and on explaining to the
outposts of the papal troops who we
were and what our mission was we
were allowed to enter the city Here we
separated from Hemans, who was cor
respondent for some London papers, and
who wished TO remain outside the city
in order to observe the expected engage
ment. The three of us went at once to
the headquarters of the colonel of the
zouaves and enlisted for two years. The
next morning the city was bombarded
and two days later was surrendered to
the Italian army.
1.-THE zouaves We're sent to Civita
Vecchia and kept in prison for several
DAYS. The terms of surrender included
the right of the foreigners in the army
to return to their homes. There were
$500 of the zouaves in Rome Our
company was composed of about one
half gentlemen and one half servants
who did our work and attended to our
wants for pay. Whenever we heard of a
fine gentleman recruit we always sent
him an invitation to join our company.
and in this way many of the first fami-
lies of Europe and America were repre-
scented in our ranks.
Zone day, while we We're in the pris-
on at Civita Vecchia, Captain Darcy,
my commander, came up with some Of
the officers of the prison and said,
Come and go out with us.
1--WE did so, and after strolling about
for awhile the party turned back to-
ward the prison. They thought l was
following them, but | gave them the
slip and made a dash for a small boat
not far away and succeeded in reaching
a French frigate lying in the harbor. 1t
turned out that had taken this risk
unnecessarily, for the next day permits
sion came for Darcy, O'Cleary and
myself to leave Italy, and we took pas
sage for Genoa in an Italian warship
while we wore lying in the harbor
of Genoa and waiting for arrangements
to be made TO send us ashore there oc-
Cured very interesting incident.
Though we weIc first class passengers,
there We're nu-nher Of the poor zouaves
down i'll the hold. 1t was drcadfully
hot there, and they had no water and
were suffering so much that Darcy
made bold tn lC. cans of water down to
them through the hatchways The Ital-
ian marines did not like this and gave
us some fierce looks. Growing ont ui
this affair ar argument occurred at din
Ter between tho captain of the guards,
pretty decent sort Of iellov. and ID Ar
cy. The latter said the captain was not
a good Catholic because he had been
fighting against the pope. The captain
maintained that he was good Catholic.
but that it was his duty to uphold his
government and obey military orders
The argument was good natured enough.
but the stewards who had overheard if
reported the conversation to the guards,
and next day, while the captain of the
guards was ON shore, leaving a sergeant
IN charge, the guards got hold Of some
liquor and became tipsy and ugly. /
overheard item uttering threats against
D'Arcx