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THE SOCIALISM OF TO-DAY. 
Socialism is invading the country parts ; an exceptional thing 
in Europe, save perhaps in Spain. The peasantry are reduced 
to extreme poverty through excessive rent and taxes. Wages 
are entirely insufficient. The agricultural labourers live crowded 
together in straggling villages, and obtain only an intermittent 
employment Thus a rural proletariat is formed, more 
miserable even than that of the industrial centres. Shut out 
from ownership by the latifundia, they become the enemies 
of a social order which is crushing them. Elsewhere, and 
notably in France, in agricultural gatherings, in assemblies and 
in the army, the country folk are the mainstay of the existing 
régime. In Italy a serious danger will arise when revolutionary 
ideas shall have been carried into the army by the sons of the 
peasantry. 
Some recent trials show clearly the two aspects of Socialism 
in Italy, namely, the rural Socialism produced by poverty, and 
the cosmopolitan Socialism of Nihilism. The first occurrence 
was as follows: At the beginning of April, 1877, some thirty 
persons, who came nobody knows whence, used to meet every 
evening in a house which they had hired at San Lupo, a village 
in the province of Benevento. On the night of the 6th of April 
the carabineers who were watching the house are fired at, and 
two of them fall, severely wounded. After this exploit the band 
advance towards the neighbouring village of Letino, with a red 
and black fiag at their head. They take possession of the 
town-hall. The councillors demand their discharge ; it is given 
to them in these terms : “ We, the undersigned, hereby declare 
that we have seized the municipality of Letino by armed force 
in the name of the social revolution." Then follow the 
signatures. They carry out to the market-place, to the foot of 
the cross that stands there, the cadastral surveys and civil 
registers, and set them on fire. The peasants quickly crowd 
around, while one of the insurgents makes a great speech. He 
explains that the movement is a general one, and that the 
people are free. The king is fallen and the social republic 
proclaimed. Applause follows. The women demand the 
immediate partition of the lands. The leaders reply, “You 
have arms, you are free. Make the partition for yourselves.”