CURRENT TOPICS.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIII, Issue 303, 17 May 1911, Page 4

CURRENT TOPICS.

OLD AGE. There is a popular American fallacy that, old men, despite the approval of a good deal of contemporary literature, are more or less useless, and that after fifty years of age, as an absolute maximum, the employer who properly consults the interests of his business will replace all semi-centenarians by younger men. It is a cruel and bitter theory that is not borne out by history, as a writer in an American magazine is at pains to show. Science, art, polities, and every other branch of human activity where brains are allowed to count, furnish countless illustrations of the fertility of genius in old ago. Handel composed one of his principal oratorios at the age of seventytwo, and Samuel Johnson was the same age when he published his "Lives of the Poets." Bluchcr was sevonty-two when lie helped to defeat Xapoleon at Waterloo, and Galileo was a year older wucn he discovered the daily and monthly libration of the moon. Thiers became President of the French Republic when he was seventy-four, and Verdi was over eighty when he composed his celebrated "Ave Maria," "Stabat Mater," and "Te Deum." Victor Hugo and Lamurtine, in the field of literature, were similarly prolific after passing the Psalmist's allotted span of three score years and ten; whilst amongst statesmen Bismarck, Crispi and Gladstone were all leading intellects in affairs of State long after passing the arbitrary maximum of ' age which has been awarded to mental activity. Cato began to study Greek when he was eighty, and Goethe was over that age when he finished "Faust." Kanke wrote the last of his twelve volumes of "Universal History" when he was ninety-one. Voltaire and Tennyson wore both over eighty when they wrote their swan songs, and Spencer, Guizot, Xewton, and Talleyrand were well into the eighties when they were engaged on much of their best work. Titian was even more surprisingly active in old age, and painted his masterpiece, "The Battle of Lepanto," when he was ninety-eight. C'hevreul, who must be allowed to cap this list, which could be enormous!*- increased, published his last work when he was one hundred and three years old. In the face of such achievements it is presumptuous to put an arbitrary limit to the age of man's usefulness, and it is more probable that Dr. Cuyler was right when he assigned youth and early manhood to deeds of heroism and projects of reform, and endowed maturity of years with the faculty for concentrated .thought and ripe judgment. In any cas*- - the crime of growing old has amply justified itself in the pages of history.

BETRAYING THE CAMORRA. The trial of the Camorrists at Viterbo hinges upon the man Abbatemaggio, who has turned State evidence against his former comrades. During the early part .of the proceedings he sat silently in a steel cage provided by the government for his protection from the vengeance of the secret society, but after some weeks had been spent in angry wrangling oil points of law and the examination of comparatively unimportant witnesses, Ih> was told to make his statement. Abbatemaggio seems to have enjoyed thoroughly the sensation of being for a brief term the most prominent man in Italy, and he proceeded to describe the inner workings of the Camorra in detail, while liia furious companions in crime howled at liim through the steel bars of the dock. The Camorra, he said, did not devote all its attentions to attacks 011 persons or property, but was more concerned with commercial affairs and blackmailing operations. It drew revenue from tradespeople, capitalists, horse-fairs, produce marketß. gaming houses, and the "white slavery" business. Incidentally, it exercised a dominating influence in municipal and parliamentary politics. The Camorra organisation, explained the informer, consisted of fullfledged members and probationers, and it possessed very strict rules governing questions of authority and precedence. Abbatemaggio himself joined the society in 1002, when lie was coachman to Baron Amato in Naples, and he was employed first to assist in a burglary at his master's residence. In accordance with its usual custom, the Camorra arranged hefore the night of the robbery what articles were to be taken and the precise shares in the booty which the thieves were to enjoy. It seems that the oxcoachman has betrayed his order in part because he had a grievance in regard to money matters, but the really strong inducement, no doubt, was the offer of a big Rovernment reward, lie will have to hide himself securely if he is to live to enjoy his money after the trial has been concluded.