The daily Gate City. [volume] (Keokuk, Iowa) 1855-1916, 1913-05-04
ELECTRIC LIGHTS
IN THE VATICAN
Private Plant Has Just Been Installed
and There is Much satisfac-
ton Over
POSSESSION OF LAND
Three Hundred Square Yards Wher
the Mint Was Located is
Now Part Of the
Grounes.
BY Henry Wood. Rome corresponds!
of the United Press.l

by Henry Wood. Rome correspondent
of the United Press.l
ROME. May 3.-The vatican is in
dulging in much rejoicing just at pres
ent as result of the recent opening,
and the official blessing by Cardinal
Merry del Val. of its own electrical
plant. Tha rejoicing did not come
about SO much by reason of the fact
that this new addition to the vatican
will increase either the lighting or
elevator facilities, but because it en-
ables the vatican to dispense with
one of the enforced courtesies which
it has been accepting from the Italian
state for some little time past.
When Rome was taken from the
popes by the new Italian government
and the pope closed himself up in the
vatican, all relations were supposed
those of prisoner and jailer. the pope
| insisting he was the former and the
Italian government being left to as
sumo the latter For certain time.
the vatican found it possible to get
along without any help from Italy.
/ spurning even the few millions of lire
which the government appropriated
each year for the maintenance of the
papal court, but which has never been
accepted.
Later, however, the vatican found
itself rather isolated, In many re-
spects. and especially isolated from
being able to take advantage of many
of the latest conveniences and COM
forts of modern progress. A stiff eff
4 fort, however, was made by the pre-
4 lates and dignitaries to worry along
on the same basis on which the vati-
I can had been conducted century
4 ago. and this was kept up until the
incoming of Cardinal Merry del Val.
The latter had been educated in
4 England and had become too accus-
toned to doing business with the help
of telephones. the telegraph, typewrit-
ers. electric lights and elevators to
undertake on the old basis the secre-
| taryship of a state that rules over
: more people than any temporal pow
r er. Despite, therefore. the protests
/ of the old regime, he at once opened
!. negotiations with the supposedly hos
: tile power of the Italian government
) without and the latter most Willingly
: accorded to the vatican connections
, with Rome's electric light plant tele
5 phone and telegraph system. ane
E even issued life passes for all of the
i cardinals on the state railways.
While the extension of these cour
tesies on the part of the Italian gov
/ eminent and the acceptance OF then
by the vatican did not in any wa.
disturb the peaceful relations tina
that have always existed between
the prisoner and the jailer, neverthe
less was always considered thor
in the side of the former by many Q
the adherents of the vatican, and the
awaited long and patiently the con
ing OF the opportunity to reasser
even in the matter of electric light:
the independence of the vatican owe
! the quirinal.
This opportunity CAME last yea
when the Italian government comple
ed its new mint. Previously 1t ha
made forcible use of the old pap;
mint which really lay within the ori'
| inal vatican walls and on one side
which. for 80 years, two guards
| the famous italian "hersalieri" alwa!
patrolled while two members of tt
equally famous Swiss guard corps I
the vatican kept jealous eye fro
the other.
The moment the Italian governmei
relinquished its forcible claim on tn
institution. Pope Plus arranged Il
its purchase through the bank of TIA
and it once again passed back n
only into the possession of the va
can but its site was again re-incorpe
ated within the vatican walls Sim
then. with the same alacrity and Wi
the same spirit of modern progre
with which he installed elevators
Saint Peters and the vatican. Cardi
al Merry del Val has been busy