The daily morning journal and courier., 1901-02-21
THE MEN WHO CARRY KNIVES.
Italians Have a Worse Reputation
 Than They Deserve.

Than They Deserve.
 T wonder why it is" said a cotton sampler who brides himself on his close observation, according to the New Or leans Times-Democrat, that the Itali- ans have acquired such a sinister repu- tation as knife-fghters. The facts don't bear it out. I have been knock ing around the wharves for a good many years and have seen plenty of fighting among sailors, roustabouts and desperate men of all kinds, colors and nationality, and never but once did I see an Italian use knife. Even then the weapon was thrust into his hands by a companion, after he had started blithely into the melee with a stick As far as my observation goes, the people most addicted to cold steel in the settlement of their little differences are Norwegian sailors. The most for midable knife -wielder I ever met in my life belonged to that class. He was a big, yellow-haired, rather melan- choly-looking chap, who came here on a Liverpool tramp and invested some small savings in lodging house not B. acquainted with him soon after he set up in business and took quite fancy to the fellow. Like many sea-faring men of his nationality, he was pas sonately fond of music, and, strange to say, he had heard nearly all the great singers and was familiar with most of the famous operas, although he was otherwise uneducated and could barely read and write.
 T sized him up as gentle, simple minded giant and labored under that delusion until 1t was roughly dispelled by tragic episode of which I chanced to be an eyewitness. Three drunken seamen dropped into his place one evening with the avowed intention of raising a row. and one of them set the ball rolling by kicking over the stove. Instantly my Norwegian friend leaped over a little counter, at the same time drawing an eight-inch dirk from some where back of his neck, and went to work on the trio. The fracas occupied possibly half minute, at the end of which time the sailors had disappeared and everything in the room was more or less spattered with gore. I never learned how badly they were hurt, but there were certainly some pretty pro- miscuous carving while the row lasted.
 Later on the lodglng-house keeper showed me how he carried his knife. He kept it in sheath sewed to the in ner side of his vest, just under the col lar. It seemed an outlandish place for A. weapOn. but he cOuld draw if liIya lightning and, as he remarked, it was apt to be overlooked in a search. He also gave me an exhibition of dirk throwing-at which some sailors be- come astonishingly proficient. He would hold the blade open on his right palm, the point to the left, and launch it through the air with a sudden, inde- scribable swoop, At dozen feet away he could strike a circle six inches in diameter with unfailing accuracy, but with all it's daxterity there was some- thing so barbarously uncouth about the performance that it made my blood run cold to watch him. He got into several other knife fights afterward, and his fondness for that diversion eventually led to his departure between two suns. If he were still here I think would select some other illustration for my remarks"