The evening tribune. (Pawtucket, R.I.) 189?-190?, 1897-07-21
RICH NOMADS THESE.
FiFTY-SIx, ALL OF ONE FAMILY, AND
HAVE s22o, 900 IN GOLD.

Settle In This Country--The Tplba II
} Ruled on P~triarchai Principles.
Miguel Nicolai and his family, con-
listing Of 90 persons, arrived at New
York recently from Europe on the Ham
burg-American limo steamer Patria.
They had ten dogs with them. cat
and six bags Of gold. together with va
rious cnrios gathered from all sections
Of the globe. The gold is in American
%, sio and $40 goldpieces. the cash
capital Of the family amounting. accord
Ing to its head, to e220. 900.
The Nicolai family has travelled more
than 100000 miles. The head Of the
family is 20 years old. He is Brazilian
gaucho, or ranchman. Fifty years ago,
as he stated to reporter, he began to
raise coffee. children and cotton In
Brazil. All of his children are alive, az
is his wife.
'This is not the first time that we
have been in the vicinity Of New York, /"
he said. about four years ago when
business became bad down in Brazil we
sold out our ranches and plantations,
and it was agreed that / should act as
chief of our band. We decided to come
to the United States and raised all the
cash we could ON our property and ex-
changed it for United States money.
1.-THE family at that time was not as
big, Of course, as 1t is now, but we
came to New York and then went to
Louisiana, where we settled on a cotton
plantation. AS the members Of the
family all stuck together and never
quarreled we got along nicely. II there
were any disputes between any men,
bers of the band, 1t was left to me to
settle them. Everything was left in
my hands. II a marriage was to be con-
tracted, was consulted. Then would
make al investigation. If thought it
proper to allow the marriage to go on,
] would start the new branch of the
family under prosperous circumstances.
II it was thought best not to have
marriage contracted with any member
Of the family, would simply explain
the matter and argue it in proper
manner until I.convinoed the member
that 1t would be better for his welfare
not to marry.
! Probably there is not king or an
emperor anywhere In the world who
rules his people as ! do. The reason
that am able to rule them so well is
because I give them almost everything
they want. The handling Of money be-
longing to the family is a very re-
sponsible duty. Ny brothers and my
father act as sort Of consulting board,
and everything I propose comes before
them at meeting held for the purpose
II three ont Of the four decide against
my proposition, abide by the result
and then request them to suggest some
thing else. In this way we always
manage to agree. OF course mistakes
are made by my brothers, by my father,
by myself, but as rule we keep ON the
right track.
"All of us speak good English, at
least good enough to make ourselves
understood. Naturally we speak Por-
tuguese and Spanish, and we have ac-
quired German, French and Italian.
The female members Of the family do
not speak any English. They keep to
themselves and do not mingle with out
siders
"We are all happy because we have
health and money. That is all any one
lives for. We are greatly attached to
each other. None Of the children is
quarrelsome, because they never see
their father and mother quarrel. The
children are taught to love every mem
ber of the family.
II will tell you the way we come to
be here now, il you think it interests
any one. When we sold out our posses
sions in Brazil and came to the United
States first, we made lot of money at
cotton planting in Louisiana It was
down therv that we learned to speak
French. Then we took trip out to
Missouri, deciding to settle there, but
we found it was not prosperous coun-
try, sUAwe came right up to New York,
and on the 18th of November last we
sailed for Europe. We had nearly $685.
600 at that time, but our trip to Europe
cost us over $4,000. 1t was our inten-
tion to 60 to Russia and go into the
ranch business there. We went to Rus
sia by way Of Hamburg, and when we
got to ST. Petersburg we soon learned
we had made great mistake in leaving
America. We found that the cheapest
meat there cost 20 cents pound. Other
provisions were just as high in proper
tion. We decided il would be better for
rs to return to America and raise cattle
here. Then we thought we might get a
good price for our meat IL we sent it to
Russia. It would pay us better to sell
meat to the Russians than to buy IL
from them. However. we got away from
Russia AZ quickly as we could.
"Then we went to France. We found
no chance for us to make money there,
SO we went to Switzerland. It was
worse there. Then we went to Italy,
where we found people starving. So we
went to Prussia. We found Germany to
be very nice country, but not as nice
az the United States"
When Chief Emilio pronounced the