The Fargo forum and daily republican. [volume] (Fargo, N.D.) 1894-1957, 1918-02-19

flight of the early settlers to the
ludi. the long ridges of sand that rim
the sea, they learned the peril Of the
mainland; and that at the outset OF
| the ninth century, when they held
the Franks at bay, Pipin's fleet de
! fed by the impenetrable network OF
small canals and ooZy mudbanks"
! they learned in turn the peril Of the
sea. So here, midway Of the lagoons
on the islands Of the archipelago,
they forthwith sink their communal
feuds, drove their piles, and founded
city Of which the world has no
equal. But what Of the peril Of the
sky? There is a legend that one OF
the churches of Venice is built in the
place above which, as foretold by a
heavenly visitant to Bishop Magnus
of Altinum, he should see a red
cloud rest; and another, where a
white cloud should stand. But there
have been no legends or heavenly
visitants to forecast the black cloud
should come with its altogether new
peril of the air for church and citi-
zens alike.
Venice suffered from bombardment
in the fifteen months siege by the
Austrians which snuffed out her rev.
olution in 184S, but that was before
the age of air craft. The church OF
the Scalzi, damaged then and re-
stored in 1860, was bombed in 1915,
and the large fresco by Tiepolo shat
tered. The ceiling Of Santa Maria
Formosa was destroyed the same
year, and in 1917 a bomb brought
down that of the church of IS.
Giovanni Paolo. In the adjoining
fifteenth century Scuola di s. Marco,
which has been used as an ospedale
civile since the time Of the
Napoleonic wars, four people were
killed, nineteen others wounded, and
half Of the magnificent carved wood
en- ceiling, with the Lion of st. Mark
done in its different panels. was de-
stroyed. A bomb hit the angel on
the dome Of San Pietro di Castillo,
the island church which was for $50
years the seat of the patriarchate.
Attempts at Terrorism.
According to the American consul
at Venice, the city had suffered from
thirty air raids since the beginning
Of the war, twenty-four people were
killed in one night, and four bombs
had fallen anywhere from nine feet
to a hundred yards of st. Marks,
eight to ten more bombs within an
hundred yards. The
church Of the Scalzi is next the rail-
way station, that Of st. Pietro near
the arsenal, and Venice has been a
naval base, which made these fair
targets. Only concerted or
sporadic attempts at terrorism could,
In the judgment Of local observers,
account for others Of the raids, and
only self-restraint from such a policy
can account for the complete free
dom Of the city from harm this fall,
much less keep it so, once the en-
emy's great guns are brought up on
The lower PiaVe.
Why Venice Was Bombed.
or the outlook in, mid November,
there were as many notions as men |
you met--that the churches had been |
attacked in order to prompt the Pope
10 press for peace, and hence bomb |
ng would be repeated: that 1t had |
been stopped by his intercession and |
hence would not be repeated: that |
he Austrians in a spirit Of venge-
lnce would raze the city; that their |
plan was to take it and then threaten |
% leave no stone upon another IL |
italy did not make peace; that, rath- \
sr than see a fall into Austrian /
lands, certain fervid poet had pro-
posed that Venice be evacuated by |
he Italians and burned by them, and /
20 on. The more reasonable hypo- |
.hesis seemed to be that, from the /
of the land campaign,
here was no military Importance to
he city as such. Its impregnability /
~ land or sea was Of other centur-
es, before hydroplanes and long /