The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1909-08-25
SAYS MESSINA WILL
NEVER BE REBUILT.
Destruction Too Complete to
Ee Overcome by incompetent
Autho rites.

Mrs. Claire C. Sisco who, in con-
function with Miss Katherine B..
Davis, had charge Of American relle1
work in Syracuse, Sicily, after the
earthquake, visited Messina on quit
ting Sicily early in the present month.
In a letter describing the visit h eX-
presses the opinion that the city can
never be rebuilt.
I'm all the pathos of it," she
writes, zone has a feeling Of salts
faction over a job thoroughly done.
The ruin is absolutely complete. NO
Goth, Vandal or Saracen ever
equalled this; it's a chef d'oeuvre OF
%desolation.
81 knew that with several hun
dred Messiah acquaintance who had
been under my care as refugees l
would surely meet some to show me
about, and that proved to be the case.
For four hours I was led over
piles Of debris three stories high,
under standing arches and IN the
shadow of unsupported walls. The
buildings for the most part had thick
walls Of broken rock and stone mixed
with plaster, all covered with a ven
eer of plaster painted like stone. This
looked strong, but 1t was really ready
at tttle p~rovocation to crumble into
rubbish heaps.
"This rubbish Is not worth cart
ing off. It is like bread crumbs. Ex-
cavations merely shift the heaps, re-
moving none Of them. Hence after
three months the ruin is as misshapen
and as chaotic as at the beginning,
and so it will remain.
II encountered strange sights in
my tour. Scarcely any furniture re-
NAMED whole, but many big oil and
wine TASKS survived unbroken. I
saw lamps resting on shelves four
stories in the air. In a doorless
closet a woman's hat hung on a nail.
In the mass which vas once the best
hotel many bodies still lie. No M
will accept the task Of excavating
there for some of the walls stand and
menace death to any one touching
the ruin.
my deepest sympathy goes out to
the italian authorities. They have a
hard problem, both on account OF
physical conditions here and also be-
cause of the Sicilian character, and
the official brain is not Of the species
that we call practical. Had I a PAL
ace full of treasures in Messfna 1
would say addio and start life fresh
in new scenes.
1.-THE people who escaped death In
Messina were the hut jewellers, so to
speak. 1t is estimated that less than
one-fourth of the refugees wore of
the small merchant class, the others
being laborers and slum people. All
who could live in the better kind Of
dwellings persisted.
IAN American who has been en-
gagged in relief work here for three
months said to me: I feel as If I had
given my time to the very unscien-
tifc work of aiding in the survival of
the unfttest and with the best posi-
BILE motives I have thus been hinder
ing human. progress
1.-The bulk of the people now here
are better housed, better fed and may
get higher wages than before the
earthquake. Yet many of them had
rather prowl about the ruins in the
hope Of finding treasure than to earn
good pay in helping to build quarters
which outside ~benevolence has placed
here. The surviving masses lack self
respect and there is among them
much dishonesty and envy and vicious
ignorance. At first I was all SYM
pathy for them, but with increasing
contact I think that ever my powers
of compassion have disappeared."-
New York World.