THE MISERY OF ROME.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXII, Issue 10031, 4 July 1910, Page 4

THE MISERY OF ROME.

Here is a tragic picture of the misery of Rome by the great archaeologist, Commendatore Boni. "The pigsties dug out of the rocks in the Via i Flamiira, the inside nichcß and the outer buttresses of the Aurelian Wall, the remains of the Temple of Claudius and of the Circus Maxiraus, the foundations of the Temple of Venus and Rome, and the vaults behind the- Basilica of Maxentius have been invaded by a gipsy race of troglodyte instincts. In the tufa cellars, beneath the stone vaults, between., the piasters of such walls as the pickaxe has spared, shut in with ' pieces of old tins and fragments of boards, live whole families of shameless and l.alf-nakcd creatures with their dirty offspring, trained to steal firewood, break street lamps, or tunj earl-wheels for a halfpenny. , While all rcnntl Rome, on the banks J of the Tiber and Anio, on the i

heights of the Via Cassia or Via Prenestina, there are, still unoccupied, uncultivated lands and deserted pastures,* while the banks and institutions of credit capitalise their interest; while, in spite of the rise in rent, the revenue of the commune decreases, wasted in million? upoT works which are harmful —all this time these, houseless wretches, in the horrible promiscuity cf their asphyxiating cabins, in the dank darkness of their cellars, are multiplying even more precocious recruits for the country's prisons."