328 



FRANCE. 



were excited with drink, some Frenchmen mal- 

 treated an Italian whom they caught washing 

 clothes in their drinking-water. The Italians 

 retaliated, and a fight ensued, in which the Ital- 

 ians were driven out of town, and about 200 

 were besieged in a farmhouse until they were re- 

 leased by troops. There were 7 Italians and 1 

 Frenchman killed, and the wounded numbered 

 about 40. The Prime Minister expressed regret 

 to the Italian Government and suspended the 

 Mayor of Aigues-Mortes, who had issued a proc- 

 lamation urging the men to prove how well they 

 had succeeded and how completely their de- 

 mands were satisfied by ceasing from demonstra- 

 tions and going quietly to work again. The in- 

 cident was made the occasion in Italy of anti- 

 French demonstrations by labor agitators hos- 

 tile to the Government. In Rome they stoned 

 the French embassy building, and the Govern- 

 ment suspended the prefect and the chief of po- 

 lice for not preserving order when the disturb- 

 ances were renewed two days later. In Naples, 

 Milan, Turin, Como, and Bologna public demon- 

 strations were made against the French. In 

 Messina the escutcheon in front of the French 

 consulate was torn down and burned. In Genoa, 

 whither the wounded from Aigues-Mortes were 

 taken, a mob destroyed the cars of a French 

 street railroad company. The Italian Govern- 

 ment took severe measures to repress 'the anti- 

 French manifestations, and the newspapers of 

 the country generally approved this action. Sev- 

 eral persons were arrested at Aigues-Mortes who 

 took part in the riot, and in Italy a great num- 

 ber of rioters were arrested. The good will 

 shown by both governments removed all obsta- 

 cles to a satisfactory termination of the incident. 

 Coal Strike. The miners of the Pas de Ca- 

 lais and the Nord, deciding to make common 

 cause with their fellow-workmen in England, 

 went on strike in September, and persuaded a 

 part of the Belgian miners to join in an interna- 

 tional contest with the mine owners, such as had 

 been discussed and recommended at the interna- 

 tional miners' congresses. Deputy Basly and 

 Jules Guesde assumed the lead in the movement. 

 The demands were an increase of 10 per cent, 

 in wages, making 7'15 francs a day the usual 

 pay ; the fixing of 5'50 francs as minimum 

 wages ; that no workman over forty years of 

 age shall be discharged ; and none shall be 

 dismissed who has incurred the penalties of the 

 law so long as the company is not a sufferer. In 

 a local strike in the early part of the year some 

 Belgian miners who took the strikers' places 

 were hunted away by the French workmen. Now 

 the Belgians, whose wages are lower than in 

 France, after voting in a referendum in favor of 

 a simultaneous strike, tried to act in harmony 

 with the French miners, but only a third of the 

 miners of the Borinage and Charleroi districts 

 took part in the referendum and the subsequent 

 strike, but later the strike became more general. 

 In France the strike was sudden, general, and 

 determined, except at Anzin, where a strike had 

 recently been overcome and the unions driven 

 out, and in the Loire. The men generally re- 

 mained tranquil. If they had not, there was an 

 abundant force of gendarmes and soldiers drafted 

 by the Government into the mining districts to 

 quell lawlessness. In Belgium the strikers gained 



an increase of wages. In France they gained 

 nothing, but suddenly decided to submit after 

 remaining out for seven weeks, declaring that 

 they must bow their necks to the despotism of 

 capital, expecting no improvement in the work- 

 er's lot and cherishing no hope of justice save 

 by social revolution. 



Anarchism. In May, 1893, the Paris police 

 arrested a group of 5 anarchists, named Leveille, 

 Marchand, Vinchon, Bondon, and Spannagel, in 

 whose possession were found bombs of the most 

 dangerous kind, a large quantity of materials for 

 explosive mixtures, and burglars' tools, with doc- 

 uments proving their connection with an associ- 

 ation that defends theft as a means of propa- 

 ganda by deeds. Others were arrested from 

 time to time in various cities. On Nov. 14, a 

 young anarchist named Leo Lanthier, a shoe- 

 maker out of work, stabbed a special envoy of 

 Servia, Georgevich, in a Paris restaurant, for no 

 other reason than that, wearing good clothes and 

 the decoration of the Legion of Honor, he 

 seemed to be one of the hated bourgeoisie. On 

 Nov. 15, some one managed to steal past the sen- 

 tries, enter the house of Gen. Mathelin, command- 

 er of the Fifteenth Army Corps, in Marseilles, 

 and deposit an infernal machine, which exploded 

 with a terrific noise, tearing a hole through the 

 walls, but killing no one. An unexploded 

 bomb was found, which from its unscientific 

 composition indicated that professional anarch- 

 ists were not the authors of the crime. Some 

 Italian workingmen were suspected and placed 

 under arrest. The police of France and other 

 countries were incited to vigilance at this time 

 in response to suggestions of the Spanish Gov- 

 ernment. The French police, acting on the sup- 

 position that anarchism was an exotic growth, 

 arrested Germans and other foreigners suspected 

 of holding anarchistic opinions, and watched the 

 Belgian frontier to intercept any foreign anarch- 

 ists that might be seeking to escape from the 

 Belgian police. In Marseilles three anarchist 

 adepts Bossy and his wife and Charregon were 

 arrested, and a tunnel was found dug beneath the 

 street, in which were tubes and fuses and several 

 kinds of highly explosive substances. 



An infernal machine of clumsy construction 

 was sent from Orleans addressed to Chancellor 

 von Capri vi, probably by some German anarchist 

 as a terroristic demonstration. On Dec. 9, Au- 

 guste Vaillant, who had obtained admission to 

 the visitors' gallery in the House of Deputies, 

 attempted to throw a bomb at M. Dupuy. A 

 woman seized his arm, spoiling his aim, and the 

 bomb, which was filled with nails and bits of 

 iron, struck the cornice of the public gallery and 

 exploded, wounding himself and many others in 

 the galleries and 4 Deputies. After the explo- 

 sion M. Dupuy immediately called the House to 

 order, and business went on without interruption. 

 On the following day the ministry brought in 

 bills to modify the press law by making incite- 

 ment to crime a felony, to forbid the association 

 of enemies of society, and to increase the penal- 

 ties for unlawful possession or manufacture of 

 explosives. 



Algeria. This dependency is administered, 

 as far as possible, as an extension of France. 

 The head of the administration is a Governor- 

 General. Jules Cambon has held the office since 



