Elmore County Republican. [volume] (Mountain Home, Idaho) 1910-1915, 1912-05-04
From The Magazine Press.
Excerpts of Opinion from the Leading Writers of Today
Rev. John A. Peake.

Inc current MctluTeS contains
very interesting article from the pen
of Arthur Train on Imported Crime,
the Story of the Camorra in Ameri-
ca.
There are million and half Ital-
ians in the United States, of whom
LeaIy six hundred thousand reside
in New York City-more than in
Rome itself Naples alone of all
tie cities of Italy has so large an
Italian population; while Boston has
one hundred thousand, Philadelphia
one hundred thousand, San Francisco
seventy thousand, New Orleans sew
enty thousand, Chicago sixty thous-
and, Denver twenty-five thousand,
Pittsburgh twenty five thousand,
Baltimore twenty thousand, and there
are extensive colonies, often number
ing as many as ten thousand, in sew
eral other cities.
So vast foreign-born population
Is bound to contain elements of both
strength and weakness The North
italians are MOTTO SIMPATICI to
the American character, and many
of their national traits are singularly
like our own, for they are honest,
thrifty, Industrious, law-abiding, and
good natured
The Italians from the extreme
south of the peninsula have fewer of
tfese qualities, and are apt to be
ignorant, lazy, destitute, and super
stitious. A considerable percentage,
esIeGally CT those from the cities,
are criminal. Even for a long time
after landing in America, the Gala.
briaI and Sicilians often exhibit n
lack of enlightenment more charac-
teIistic of the middle ages than of
the twentieth century. y
| Sicilian method of chastising ones
wife. Mr.. Train gives the following
description CT an actual occurrence:
When the writer was acting as an
bar charged with assault with intent
assistant prosecutor in New York
| County, young Italian, barely TWEEN
| ty years Of age, Was brought to the
to kill The complainant was with
cred Sicilan wCman who claimed to
lie lis Wife. Both spoke an almost
unintelligible dialect. The case on its
| face was simple enough. An officer
| testified that on Sunday morning in
| Mulberry Bend Park, at distance
of about fifty feet from where he was
standing, he saw the defendant, who
had been walking peaceably with the
complaining witness, suddenly draw
a long and deadly-looking knife and
proceed to slash her about the head
al % arms. 1t had taken the officer
but moment to seize the defendant
from behind and disarm him, but in
the meantime had inflicted some e.
leNen, Wounds upon her body. No
explanation had been offered for this
terrible assault, and the complainant
had appeared involuntarily before the
grand jury, and even now had to be
kept in the house of retention as a
hostile witness. The woman, who APP
leaIed to be about fifty years old,
was sworn, and on being questioned
stated that she had been married
to the defendant in Sicily three years
before. She declind to admit that he
had attacked or harmed her in any
way, constantly mumbling: "He is
my husband. Do not punish him.
The defendant, however, seemed
eager to get on the stand and to tell
his own story; nor did the introduc-
tiCn of the knife in evidence or the
exhibition of the woman's wounds
'emIbarrass him in the slightest de-
gree. His manner was that of a man
who had only to explain to be en-
tirely exonerated from all blame.
He nodded at the jury and the
judge, and scowled at the complain
ant, who was speedily conducted to a
place where no harm could possibly
come to her. When at last he was
sworn, he could hardly restrain him.
self into conference.
20 Judges! Permit Me to Kill Her
or Decree that She be Hung"
Yes, that woman forced me to
marry her, he testified in substance.
But in the eyes OF God | am not
her husband, for she bewitched me,
else would ! have married an old
creme who could not have borne me
children?
When her spells weakened left
her and came to America. Here |
met the woman l love-Rosina-and
as l had been bewitched into the
other marriage, We lived together as
man and wife for two years. Then
one day friend told me that the old
woman had followed me over the sea
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