WAR HERO'S WRETCHED LIFE.

Shannon News, 26 September 1924, Page 4

WAR HERO'S WRETCHED LIFE.

IiOVJS TRAGEDY OF YOUNG ARTIST. Rain or sunsliinv, from early morn until dusk, with a heap of coloured chalks by his side, in an odd-faded. suit of clothes, old army cobbled shoes and. a broad black mourning band on his left arm, he sits on the pavement before the world 6 famous Uflizi gallery, Fldrence, Italy, and creates on the cement blocks before liim the masterpieces that hang in all their glory in the building, above. Antonio Abruzzino, born 'in sunny Naples, once with a love song on his lips and a brush that streamed beauty and delight on canvas, now shattered | by war and faithlessness, his mind a i deep pool of brooding confusion, but J with hands restlessly moving as if by > mechanical propulsion to draw and copy the works of his student days, sits before the river portal of this old palace gallery close to Ponte Veechie of Medici fame unseeing, un- ' hearing, an inhert mass except for the ever moving fingers. , If the story of this man were not so tragic, one would, smiling think of the old ballad. "The Face on the Barroom Floor." There is reality much in common between the story of the ballad and Antonio. A-shattered love as in the song sent him to the depths. But'never has he either mentioned or pictured the face of the woman he loved. Passer-by, tourist, the curious, look him over, watch liim work and sometimes throw a lira on the pavement be'fore him. He pays no attention. ■ Only recently an American, moved perhaps by the spirit of mischief, let a dollar drop on his work. The lingers of the man drew back startled and ti'embling. The figure grew tense, and the crowd that always surrounds him drew back in fear. With a snarl, yet -without moving his sitting posture, he snatched the bill and hurled it from him. For a few moments he shook as if with the ague, and then collapsed and began to cry. That day he disappeared and was gone for a week. His chalks left behind him,, his unfinished drawi'ngs were tenderly taken care of by the old flower woman at the bridgehead. Each morning she would put the package where he had left it. When he reappeared he was as iinspeaking, unhearing. He carefully washed the traces of the unfinished drawing off f the pavement and began it anew. |

Both Are Struck Down. For a five-lire piece the motherly old flower woman told a bit of his

story. She told it with a prologue. Her "bambino" Guillo had been a comrade of Antonio in the war. Guillo had fallen. He and Antonio had been great friends, Antonio was an artist, but it made no difference to him if Guillo was a mule driver. They had been great friends. In the great drive in 1918 when Italy smashed the Austrian front, both were struck down. Guillo never rose. Antonio lay a long time in many hospitals, and then disappeared. Last November he returned and has been drawing ever since. He knows no one. She has tried to talk to him, but there is only silence, it is so terrible* He was gifted. There was always a song on his lips, Guillo had said. Now —and with a shrug and the making of a cross with her hand, she, too, became silent.

From official sources the rest of the story was obtained.i Antonio had as a youth, come to Florence with his mother, a widow, and studied art. He was talented, an eager worker. In his second' year in Florence his mother died. Apparently there were no other relatives. For a while he studied in Venice and then Rome. Then he went to America, settling in. New York. This was in 1910. For a while he worked for an American a.rtist in Greenwich Village who turned out Hand-painted copies of -OWL World masterpieces. Later he opened his owl studio and became a well-known figure in the Bohemian quarter. Life was light and love was a smiling, caprice to this talented Neaolitan. Until "he met Blossom Mahoney. Blossom worked in a downtown store. She was red headed, \ Irish and a bundle of laughing, blue eyes and lips. Antonio decided that life was neither light nor love a caprice. He loved with the wild ardour of his Neapolitan nature. Blossom was willing to be courted by Tony, but youth was too joyous to settle down and be married. So it went, with a fuss and a quarrel now and then but with all joyous friendship. 0 ' Then came August, of 1914, and the war. The assault on Belgium awakened Antonio from his idyl. He became an ardent advocate for Italy's entrance in the conflict. In 1915 the Italian Ambassador to America issued at the request of his Government a call to all American-Italians to re-

turn to their fatherland. Italy was engaged with her centuries-old oppressor, Austria. Among First To Respond.

Antonio was among the first to respond. He made but later withdrew a request for a brief delay while he finished a portrait of Blossom he was making. He intended the picture for exhibition in the spring Art Academy saloon. Blossom the night before he sailed kissed him and hold him, she would wait' for him until he returned. He gave her a beautiful locket containing the miniature of them both. Antonio was wounded in 1916. In

1917 he was badly gassed, and in 1918 terribly shattered in a mine explosion in an assault on an Austrian position. It 'was not until 1920 that he could leave the hospital. He was a changed man. After leaving the hospital he disappeared. The next that was heard of him was in July of 1921, when he was taken to a hospital after being found unconseious in the streets of New York. His case was reported to the Italian Consul* who took steps to provide for his return to Italy. He was sent back in 1922, and again, dropped put of sight until last year, when he took up his place before the gallery, where years before he had come as a gay youth to learn and topaint. What became of Blossom Mahoney is unknown. There were found in his pockets when he was picked up several old letters from her, badly worn, and one, poorly written and incoherent, by him, which was evidently intended. to be mailed to her. Did she disappear, did she die, had she ceased to care ? -

in New York h'e perhaps would not be permitted to draw as he does on the pavement before Palazzo Uffizl. But then, sunny, idle Florence is not New York. Here he sits, while" his fingers etch tender-smiling madonnas and lovely-faced bambinos. Here this once joyous, talented youth works blankly and mechanically, everything still and - motionless but restless fingers and memories—perhaps.