The Birmingham age-herald. [volume] (Birmingham, Ala.) 1902-1950, 1910-08-07
SAD STORY OF
TWO CONVICTS

Milan, August Especial 1.-TWO Ital-
ian conyicts, both followers of the in
| trepid Garibaldi. have just been released
from the galleys. where they spent So
years of their lives for the assassina-
| ton of Raffaele Souzogne
| Farini and MorelIi, the names of tina
prisoners, were strong young men when
| they were sent to prison In 1875 Now
| they are old and bent.
| Giuseppe Luciani. the prime instfgator
OF their romantic crime. succeeded in
persuading the young fellows that the
great liberator of modern Italy would
be well content at being thus rid of SO
tough and implacable an adversary as
Souzogne They did the deed of blood
at Lucianis bidding simply from a false
sense of heroism, and were amazed when
they subsequently learned that Garibaldi
was anything but gratifed.
Both were condemned to the ergasto1o.
or galleys. In Italy this means a literal
life sentence, which is rarely abridged
by royal pardon. 1t is an almost I'M
known phase of Italian life.
Talking of his first impressions of the
ergastolo. Farini says: II arrived at
Genoa April IT, 1876 for the ceremony
Of initiation to my new life. I was put
in a bath and afterwards shaved all
over the head and face. A big chain
They CARRIED me in gray breaches,
green cap and scarlet jacket-the habit
worn by the condemned for life. had
undergone my baptismal bath resigned
to everything. but the sight of that red
coat caused me to CULVER with shame
from head to foot What an infamy for
one who had worn glorious red-shirted
uniform of Garibaldi, even though I had
been guilty of imagining what the grand
hero would delight in Souzognes death.
For 112. days I was kept confined in
a darksome cell. weighted down with
those irons We condemned slept eight
or ten together in rooms each six yards
by five Most were voorhees,, and so
earned nothing; but such OF us were
skilled in weaving Jared better than the
rest, because we could earn a trihe to
buy an extra morsel of food or a sip
of wine, though never more than half
litre of wine daily.
"Our rations were 600 grammes or
black bread in the morning. lard-cooked
soup at midday and in the evening
nothing.
Morelli a man of more philosophio
turn of mind dwells on the law OF
adaptation to circumstances
He is grave and rhetorical LAS lions
reared in the boundless desert manage
to live in a narrow cage, So" he said,
does a fierce, free, strong minded NAH
of full capacity for physical and in
tellectual enjoyment come to adapt his
existence of the painful unnatural life
of the galleys even in spite of him.
self
I'm confirmation of what I say, let
me tell you that suicide, so increas-
ingly common among free beings. is al
most entirely uninterrupted and un-
known among conyicts doomed for
life. ~
Life as an italian galley slave II
merely an animal, or, rather vege-
table existence, one of simple meme
cries To the few who pass from this
hell to the sworld again after 20, 80
or 40 years, the prison Is a parenthesis
in their career. They start life where
they left off when they stepped within
the prison gates. ,i}
when I bade good-by to the world
there were no telephones. no electric
lights nor electric tramways. Motor
cars, cinematographs. airships and aer-
oplanes were unthought of.
But all these awake less in me the
sense of marvel than the changes I
note in human life. | had been able to
form some sort of conception of the
worlds new toys from new prisoners
or from casual letters or newspapers
that CHANGED to find their way into our
world. But of the change In
kinsfolk and friends--I had lived on
was not at all prepared.
The pictures of them in my mind were
the pict ures there when / left them IN
my youth for my death in life"