ITALIAN CHILD-SLAVES.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XXIII, Issue IX, 26 August 1899, Page 33

ITALIAN CHILD-SLAVES.

i:im;iiT to work in french FACTORIES. The “happy days of childhood,” a phrase that comes glibly enough to the lips’ of those whose lines have been cast in pleasant places, sounds like bitter mockery to many a man and woman as they look back upon the years that are gone; but to none, assuredly, can the recollection be more bitter than to those Italians whose youthfid years have been passed in the slavery of the French glass works. The parental instinct in the peasants of certain parts of sunny Italy has been dulled by hardship, and the people readily sell one or more of their numerous offspring as “workmen” for the glass works.

The method adopted is for a man —- called the padrone, or employer—to go round the villages in search of boys of ten to thirteen years of age. to whose parents he offers a sum varying from £4 to £6 for the boy's services for three years. This sum is quite a little fortune for the peasants, and the transaction also results in their having one mouth less to till: they consequently do not scruple to sign the contract, and the padrone goes off with a convoy of hapless youngsters, many of whom certainly will not live to complete their term of slavery. The children—they are no I more

than that live under the worst possible conditions. They work in a super-heated atmosphere tilled with noxious gases, and are liable to dreadful accidents. They are hated by the workmen because they are Italians. and because they work cheaply, and thus keep down the wages of the men. From inquiries instituted a short time ago. it appears that tin* cost to the padrones of maintaining these boys averages threepence a day. They go about in rags, for the padrone does not waste his money on clothes, although he pockets all their earnings. ranging from seven shillings a

“ ONE LI ITLE MAID FROM SCHOOL.” Photo, by Ellerbeck. week, and even the gratuities the\ occasionally receive. At night they rest on sodden straw mattresses without other covering than their ragge*d clothing, whether it be winter or summer. It is difficult to get precise figures concerning tin* mortality among these unfortunate children, but carefullycompihd estimates show that it must be at least fifty per cent. Quite* another thirty per cent, remain in their adopted country after their term of slavery, so that twenty only out of every hundred ever see their parents again. Yet. although the peasants know that so few return home, there is no trouble in obtaining a supply of boys to take tin* places of those who have died off. So great has been the dema ml for these* youthful workers that the padrones have* not been able* te> meet it. and have* been sending girls to make* up the* deficiency; but the* attention of be>l h Governments has been e*alle*el to the* whole* practice, and it is to In* hoped that it will now be* steippeel.