a destruction of woodland and complete disappearance of game. It is
hailed as the beginning of a new era of prosperity; and so it well may
be, from a commercial point of view. But the traveller and lover of
nature will be glad to leave some of these wild districts in the hands
of their rich owners, who have no great interests in cultivating every
inch of ground, levelling rocky spaces, draining the land and hewing
down every tree that fails to bear fruit. Split into peasant
proprietorships, this forest would soon become a scientifically
irrigated campagna for the cultivation of tomatoes or what not, like the
"Colonia Elena," near the Pontine Marshes. The national exchequer would
profit, without a doubt. But I question whether we should all take the
economical point of view--whether it would be wise for humanity to do
so. There is a prosperity other than material. Some solitary artist or
poet, drawing inspiration from scenes like this, might have contributed
more to the happiness of mankind than a legion of narrow-minded, grimy
and litigious tomato-planters.

To all appearances, Italy is infected just now with a laudable mania for
the "exploitation of natural resources"--at the expense, of course, of
wealthy landowners, who are described as withholding from the people
their due. The programme sounds reasonable enough; but one must not
forget that what one reads on this subject in the daily papers is
largely the campaign of a class of irresponsible pressmen and
politicians, who exploit the ignorance of weak people to fill their own
pockets. How one learns to loathe, in Italy and in England, that lovely
word _socialism,_ when one knows a little of the inner workings of the
cause and a few--just a few!--details of the private lives of these
unsavoury saviours of their country!

The lot of the southern serfs was bad enough before America was