BRIGAND'S LOVE.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLIV, Issue 13497, 25 May 1907, Page 2 (Supplement)

BRIGAND'S LOVE.

i- The term - "brigand," as used in Italy, is IS nowadays much misapplied. • Formerly it 5 }*\ signified the leader or member of a' maraudx_ | ing brotherhood who, having robbed and ,_! kidnapped their victim, carried him to an inaccessible mountain .cave, whence ran1 sbni was demanded.; That kind of brigand * r may be considered as extinct. • The person who has succeeded to his * name, says -the Rome correspondent of the r _ Tribune, is a much more ordinary kind of j r outlaw, who lives by overawing an ignorant j peasantry, and by blackmail levied on the v j more prosperous. r i He lives on the outskirts of a town, j!sometimes in a wood, where he lies in amj bush andr makes bitter war on the military 1,; patrol which his presence makes a neces[c fiity. ■ . : '-',i- ■'.', ..-.';•■ - ■-■ ' ).| Much a brigand lately distinguished himiejself in the neighbourhood or Salerno by d | killing a non-commissioned officer, but he ;e j has now paid the penalty with his life. jj In a moment of fancied security,he sent ie ja - friend to levy blackmail on a person of (j!some substance! The woman,, a* she was] I returning with the sum demanded, was [waylaid and arrested by the police, who j thus' learned where the man was in .■bid-

mg. ~ ...•':::>,-:-/-V:'.,- v ,.»,U:'' : ( .That night they literally " raked" th* wood where the brigand * lay concealed Escape was impossible; and he receivec the fatal shot from a young comrade of the brave soldier whom he, but a short whil< before, had sent to his doom. How far the state of society in Soutr Italy and. Sicily is responsible for the mak ing of such "brigands' it is not easy tc determine. A strange document, however, comes opportunely ,to help anyone whe may desire to solve the problem, in th< shape of the autobiography of the gala mone, who, at this moment, is actually living the life of a brigand. .; • Written by his own hand, and sent tc the editor of a Sicilian newspaper, thestorj describes his trial, some years ago, for an offence of which, he declares, he was innocent. This is followed by an account of his life during his term of ten years' imprisonment.''."''- / ■: '■-.->. : It is a plain, graphic narrative, tersely told, in ungrammatical, badly-spelled Italian. Some of his statements are convincingly true, and no one in Italy is likely to contradict them. ■- What makes the story pathetic is the evident fact that it was written by a person not far beyond redemption. ' -'<' : '■ .\\- .■ ' -','-, • : , The vengeful outpourings of the man are mingled throughout with the' softer traits of one who devoutly loves his mother and his country, and the reader learns instinctively that here, indeed, is one who has been the victim of a bad system.