Evening Republican, Volume 15, Number 76, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 30 March 1911 — MODEST TOMB OF GARIBALDI [ARTICLE]

MODEST TOMB OF GARIBALDI

Expressed Desire of Italian Patriot Disregarded After Death by Friends and Relations.

There is In Caprera a peculiar scent of resin andJncense baked in the sun, and it is precisely this sun, pot as In .Africa, which brings out the aroma of the lentisk of the low-growing pines, and of the myrtles, says the Glasgow Herald. The pungent perfume of these island shrubs explains the desire expressed by Garibaldi in all his wills (not - excepting the last in 1877) to have his body burned on a funeral pile of the wood of the island “before letting riny one know of his decease,” In the open air, his face turned to the sun like Pompeius, and then to have £he ashes placed In the wall behind the tomb of his little grandchildren, Anita and Rosita, and beneath the shade of a leafy acacia. But when he died, his will was disregarded by friends and relations, and against this profanation Giosne Carducci, the greatest of modern (Italian poets, has protested —a protest approved by the most eminent men of science and of the democracy. Thus the body of the hero was embalmed and placed in a tomb covered by an enormous block of Caprera granite and inscribed on it only the name, Garibaldi. A tomb worthy indeed of the hero and which reminds the visitor of the modest grave of Gladstone’s father in the little cemetery at Leith, near Edinburgh. Garibaldi's resting place Is in an olive wood between the general’s house and the seashore. Five oother tombs surround his now, those of Menottl and Maulo, his eldest and his youngest sons; of his daughter Teresita, wife of General Canzio, and of Rosita and Anita. A sailor of the. Italian navy mounts guard at the tomb. In his home at Caprera Garibaldi rose very early in the morning and with his hat well pulled down over his eyes proceeded by a tiny footpath to a prominence and thence admired the wide view of sea and horizon. After his morning walk he returned home in a cheerful frame of mind, had a kind word for everybody and went with the peasants to look after the cultivation of his fields. During the last years of his life, being crippled hand and foot by arthritis, he seldom left his room, but he sat with ,the windows open and the sparrows hopped in and took food from his hand. On his deathbed he had the windows opened to let two little tame tomtits into his room. He generally dined at noon, then played a game of draughts; after that he dictated his correspondence or' some lines from memory, retired to bed at 9 and there read his favorite authors.