PERTH’S COUNT

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 394, 30 June 1928, Page 10

PERTH’S COUNT

SELLS CIGARS ON WHARVES FINE POLICE COURT MANNERS “The Marquis Bonanate, Prince Dacaia, Duke of Piacensa, etc., etc. He sells cigars on the Perth waterfront, and the police know him. Periodically Western Australians are reminded of the fact that another tiny mouth will be required to be fed by the State charitable departments. The reminder is contained in the birth column of Perth newspapers and appears at regular yearly intervals, announcing that the wife of “the Marquis Bonanate” has given birth to another child. The notice appeared for the sixth time last week as follows: —Bonanate, on May 9, 1928, at the King Edward Hospital, Subiaco, to Anne, wife of his royal highness, the Marquis Bonanate, Prince Dacaia, Duke of Piacensa, Doge of Venice, Count of Moya, illustrious family, 1377 A.D., sixth child (Pauline Anne Isabelle Diana Dolores). When the notice first appeared some six years ago, Perth sat up and wondered how a real live scion of Italian nobility could have reached these shores unheralded and unsung. The police dispelled their wonderment by stating that the fustrious father was no less a personage than a grubby individual known as "The Count,” who sold cigars in the street, and made a public nuisance of himself by getting drunk. For years the count has passed himself off as a man of royal blood, but officials in the Italian Consulate smile expansively when the subject is mentioned. The official book of Italian nobility contains no reference to the Bonanate family. “The Count” himself is a picturesque figure, who often has been hauled rudely to gaol by the police on no less than 5 occasions during the past few years. He has appeared before the magistrates in the Perth Police Court on charges arising out of excessive drinking. He invariably greets the magistrate effusively with such address as “Good morning, my noble lord,” and his bow would turn a Spanish grandee blue with envy. Last year the Count was discovered by child welfare officials living with his wife, an Australian woman, and five children, in a house which was described in court as a pig-sty. The children were charged with being neglected, and were handed over to the State Children’s Department.