THE rhcciiir.s doing to death cf
Catherine de Paoli to satisfy a su
perstition is a circumstance that
is more than merely interesting.
It is something" more than, a sen
sational crime to read over your morn
ing coffee, shudder ul and fastidiously
.ii^miss from your mind.
In cur interdependent, complex, cosmo
-<j!i:an city life there is a responsibility
*f the enlightened and fortunate to the
inenlightened and unfortunate that is
*c!y , partly recognized and as often
evaded, and a shocking crime iike this
:•: veals it with the suddenness and vlvid
::• ss of a flashlight.
I winder, iis I write the word. 5f it Is
altogether just to call it a crime— appall
i"s as was the deed: for ignorance, after
\u25a0\u25a0>.!!. i* not wickedness.
A man s'.ays a woman- his own broth
er's wife— violently, horribly, with un
.-peakabSe fury, because he believes her
;><>s?«ss*d of devils and to have bewitched
his little children, to Taave put a spell
upon them, and upon h!s wife and himself
that will cause their death.
For self-preservation, and for what is
;>erhaps dearer than the preservation of
self— for the safety of his children — he
?-eats to death the woman possessed of
devils.
It is unbelievable, grotesque; it savors
cf the Middle Ag«s and the witch-burn
ing days of our own Cotton Mather.
Yet this is the twentieth century, and
an enlightened world — and the thing hap
><;-ned here, a week ago.
Emerson, in his far-seeing wisdom, cau
tioned us year* ago. before we had ocean
liners* carrying a town's population in
— \u25a0 •heir steerage, that we would yet have
:o reckon with the ignorance and unde
ve'opment of immigrants who were "but
one degree above the Quadruped."
One cannot rr.ake so harsh an estimate
of Luigl de Paoli. who beat to death his
sister-in-law because he sincerely be
lieves she was possessed of devils.
He is a man typical cf the Italian im
migrants that swarm to this country, and,
in a generation or two, profiting by our
Institutions, mtke good, useful, intelligent
citizens.
He Is a man who lived the hard, nar
row, groveling life circumscribed by
ignorance and poverty.
Luigi de Paoli, until he committed the
shocking deed that ha,s put him behind
prison bars, his poor, demented wife in
the asylum for the Insane, and his
ivo>rse than orphaned children in the
care of charity, was a flower gardener,
living in a little cottage at 420 Charter
Oak street, providing for his wife and
three children by toiling every hour of
the working day at gardening. 1
He was poor and industrious.
He was sober and frugal.
He was honest, well-meaning and
law-abiding.
Tour property or mine, your life or
mine, were perfectly safe so far as he
J was concerned.
& . He was domestic.
He was religious.
And he was profoundly ignorant and
deeply superstitious.
For people like that life cannot be
very brilliant or diversified.
It is made up of the struggle for
subsistence, the love and care of their
offspring, the hope of salvation '-,; for
their souls.
So it was with the De Paolls— husband
and wife.
Tho man labored with bent back and
gnarled hands in the soil among- the
prowing thing* as long- as there was
light.
The wife toiled In the little cottage
at the household duties and In the care
lof the children. \u25a0
They went to church and practiced
the observances faithfully so that their
souls might be saved.
They loved their children with a
ncrce. elemental, almost animal love.
They labored, ate, slept, prayed and
dandled their babies, and life was falL
And they believed In the* possession
of devils, in what Is commonly known
as the Evil Eye.
Alonts with thousands of other
Italians In the old country and the new
they believed that if sickness or re
verses came, if the family or the cattle
fell sick. If the crops went wrong, or
C*he house burned down, or trade or
.Ajhing- failed, it was because of the
Evil Eye; it was because some one pos
sessed of devils had put a spell upon
them.
For. a whole week before Luipi de
THE TERROR OF THE EVIL EYE
I'a.oli found it necessary to kill his sis
ter-in-law- to get rid of the devils that
possessed her and worked ill to him
and his, things had been going wrong
in the little cottage on Charter' Oak
street.
So Luis?! de laoli *ays in his state
ment to the police explaining .why he
had to kill his sister-in-law.
A peddler man had e-o:iie along, and,
the family not being q-.iite well, he
had bought some medicine from fcim —
Eotne little white tablets, a::d all the
family had taken them.
The tablets made them feel queer,
and into Lu i si de Puoli's head came
the notion that they were bewitched
tablets, and thuV if any one who lia«l
taken them should/ fall asleep he
would never wake up. .
So throughout the whole week all
the efforts of De Paoli and his wife
•were devoted to keeping themselves
and the children awake — even the lit
tle baby in arms — anil to expelling: the
devils from the household.
They went to church atid they prayed
at home; they burned candles to their
patron saint, i^nd they tried various
charms and exorcisms to drive' away
the devils. They slapped and pinched
and shook the children to keep their,
awake; even bathed tbelr faces in vin
egar and- held the little baby's head
under the faucet. Yet. strange to say,
the children sleepier and sleepier,
and their efforts to keep them awake
were futile. They would drop off to
sleep. .
They got afraid to stay in the housy
where the devils were— so says Luigi
de Paoli — and on the night of the mur
der (Friday. November £4) they went
to his brother's house and asked the
brother and his wife. to go to church
with them and pray with them. This
they did, and after coming from church
the brother's wife. Catherine de Paoli,
•went home with them, because they
were afraid to enter their little cot
tage without some one.
There they went on In desperation
with their efforts to keep the sleep
famtsbed little ones awake, and again
they prayed to, exorcise the devils.
They bad their little colored religious
pictures before them, and, so Virginia
. de Paoli. the wife of Luigl. says to 'the.
police in her, statement:
"We were praying to save ourselves.
We were praying our way, and she
(Catherine) was praying her way.**
It was between 2 and 3 o'clock in
the morning, and the sister-in-law,
sharing this strange vigil, protested
against keeping the poor little baby
awake any longer.
In their councils husband and wife
had whispered to each other their sus
picions that Catherine de Paoli was
possessed of the devils tormenting them.
She had , touched the children, espe
cially on this night— -and the children
•were plainly' sleepier, than ever. Now
she wanted, them to let' the little baby
go to sleep, when they knew that sleep
meant death for any one of : them.
The sister-in-law was standing, by*
the kitchen . stove with her back to
them. They exchanged glances. - The
HELEN DARE
man caught up a chair and fell upon
the sister-in-law. His fury grew with
the onslaught. One carair was broken
and then another, and the dreadful, sick
ening deed was done.
This was at 3 in the morning:.
A little before 8 a neighbor came
to the . little cottage on Charter Oak
street and Luigi de Paoli called to him:
"You cannot come in here. You can
look in through the window and see."
He looked, j
There was a* still, shapeless thing on
the floor. Luigi told him what it was.
There were the religious pictures, .
cheap little colored prints, scattered
about, the rosary on the table;: the
mother, ghastly,* distraught, still strug
gling to keep the little fretting baby
awake.
'"There was nothing else to do. It
was better to kill her than that, we all
should die.** . ; . \u25a0 "-'. **
This is all that Luigi de Paoli says,
with an earnestness beyond description.
' It is" as if he says he and _ his cherished
family were," Journeying; through ' a "wil
derness and wild beasts fell upon them
and he had to kill to save his own;* or
.as if a mad dog. once a pet, had put their
lives In Jeopardy ; and had to be • slain.
In his words and tone, there is Justifica
tlon and there , is \u25a0 sorrow. '
His conviction and his attitude are;uri-
alterable.
With his aftorney, ' Judge Splnetti. - I
visit ' Luigl de* Paoli In prison, expecting
to see a madman, '. for, to the twentieth
century mind, the act Is the act only "of a
-. madman.
\u25a0 Through one^of the grated doors a lit
tle man comes out, roughly dressed, with
the; mark of the :> toiler 'upon I him— the
mark, indeed; , of geherationsjr'of? toilers,
" f or ' he is ; sauat," , sinew>\?Hc6nstructed * for
use and : not for grace or beauty, with
the" strong thick torso land short legs of
i ric; S A'K\- j Vk A N CISCO SUJN DAi CaiX.
the peasant, a tough little packhorse of
a man. • ,
His face Is rough, , kindly and honest—
clumsiU- molded, to be sure, but not; re-*
pelllng \u25a0 confidence. ; The \u25a0 glance of his
bright brown eyes is singularly earnest
and steady for a man suspected of being
a maniac, j
He goes over in, Italian (JudgeSplnetti
acting as interpreter) the circumstances
leading up to and the details -of the j trag
edy in the little cottage' on ; Charter Oak
street— telling- everything as I have told It
already. • . -
"What could I do?" he asked at the
end; \ "There was only one thing to do
it was her life or ours; I had to save my
children."
The sincere belief, the absolute convic
tion, is pitiful. V -A ;-~v-
He looks from one" to "the "other so
sure that : he has asked \u25a0 the unariswer- '
able question; that there was.no other
solution but the one. he found.
: How \ does he feel , now: is he malcon
tento? asks- Judge Splnetti.
He puts his hand^ on his heart and'
smiles : ; a . smile •of : infinite sadness— a
sane man's smile of ._incurable * grief., of •
utter hopelessness. '."..
He says? he feels all empty inside—
hdllow, hollow;, and- he ;taps' : his: chest. ::
'"It"' is quite empty-^-turKulence, tem
pest, passion, anxiety and. hope; all are
ifone."" *
\u25a0Who that has suffered does not
know, the sensation? . r
Isjhe malcontento?? 5~5 ~
- Yes, yes; he; would be a, beast "if i he
'were' not .after— after . that.
: But— he had to do it_ He -. did : not \u25a0
wish"; to. -but he had to do lt^for the
children's sake. , It ,.,was his "duty to
save them. He must pay the penalty;
he supposes^ .It means— he ' makes a
speaking, awful gesture, a sweep of
the hand around the neck and an up
ward jerk dreadfully ; Illustrative-— it
means el cordo, . the rope, for him, and,
well, he Is ready.
Yet— what else could he do? Surely
he had to save his children.
So absolute Is his belief in the
••dial." "
The "dlai" is what 'the Italians call
this : superstition which we commonly
and; Incorrectly term the" Evil Eye. and
"dial" means merely "devils," being
the Italian plural for. devil.
\u25a0The murder of Luigi de Paoli's sis
ter-in-law, by Luigl de Paoli for. this
strange reason would be but a sensa
tional incident if. it were not for the
fact that his superstition Is-fshared by
thousands of his countrymen right here
in San Francisco. . .
'.: Among- YtHe humble Italians there is
perhaps -not a home, where the "dial"
are not * feared, 'where \u25a0 strange precau-,
tions against theni: are not-; taken..
It is a superstition that Boccaccio
made merry with in" his day and hung
many a side-splitting tale upon;, setting
the sophisticated to playing pranks
upon the credulbas. .
;' \u25a0 But 'never • before has tit • been \ carried"
to the fearful extremity that unhappy
Luigi dePaoll's terror drove him to.
; Once' upon- a * time, so _ local history
runs, ; a family in- terror \of . the "diai"
were engaged s in exorcising; them' by
frying a - heart, according to an . old
crone's advice, and keeping an eye on
the door for -the, one. possessed- of,' the
devils, thathad iworkedjthem ;ilir* The
one possessed • would ibe the first' one to
enter, according to^ the! working^ of .the'
charm;^"and- the" 1 first >one to enter,, in
consequence -was ' set \u25a0\u25a0 upon and beaten'
wi th ; the frying pan u ntil he was a can
didate, for six weeks' treatment in a
hospital. . ; .',
This Is but one incident, and for all
but the man who met the frying" pan
a laughable incident. "
More serious was the belief that ery
sipelas was an infliction of the Evil
One.
Among even the. enlightened Italians
it was, .and indeed is. the custom, as
soon as -erysipelas develops in a pa
tient, to cut off the doctor's visits,
"throw the medjclne out of the window
and call in some, old crone with a gift
to mutter incantations to drive the
devils out. |§|f§ " '
\u25a0 It is no secret that in the case of
no less a person than the late -Senator
-Palmier! this was done, and that his
death resulted from the treatment
s'lt is not so long ago that. , in - order to
stamp out this very abuse, four old
women," who were supposed to be gifted
with "the fower to drive out devtl3. were
prosecuted in order to force the admis
sion that they were frauds and had no
such power, and thus open the minds of
the duped, ignorant, credulous folk hold
ing to' : their superstition.
v f All- the. H*i tha t v flesh and fluctuating
fortunes are heir' to are attributed to the
machinations of the "dial." If one man's
- horse • runs 'away.; or another man's barn
" burns -down:] If ;the v pigs die or sickness
comes. to the cattle; 'if: the baby frets, or
the wife pines, or melancholy attacks the
husband, the "diai" have been at work,
and some unsuspected person in. the guise
of a" friend has brought their wicked influ
ence'into: the- "household.
"\u25a0-. So prevalent Is the belief that only^ a
little; while ago one, bright little woman,
otherwise .of .-modern' mind; I whose baby
fell- 111 of meningitis, insisted that «i girl
of hers had "looked at It strange
i;lyV;and then it fell 'ill. - ' '/\u25a0: .
is not surprising- when the "dial" hold
: terrors -that- strange : things are re
-sorted; to -to* drive "them away and cir
cumvent - them.
Sometimes it is not practicable to fall
upon and beat the devils oat of the pos
sessed one. as Luigi de Paoli did oat of
his j sister-in-law.
A common way is to ward off the evil
influence by pointing two fingers at the
possessed one — the forefinsw and tha lit
tle one. with the two middle fingers
turned under the palm.
As_a permanent charm against the dial
this' same sign Is made by stuffing a
glove, sewing the«flngers back, and hang
ing: it over the doorway to protect the
dwellers within.
Ashes and oil mixed into a paste and
rubbed upon the breast in the form of
the cross is another protection.
For the same reason the beautiful
strings of Neapolitan corals that our fash
ionable girl globe trotters have brought
home to become the fad of a moment aro
worn by the Italians of the south of Italy.
Many are the secret and private
schemes for circumventing the dial,
schemes so* childish that they would bo
laughable were It not for this shocking
circumstance that has shown how grava
a tfcins superstitution may become.
Dr. Badgalupi. the young autopsy sur
geon, made the statement at the cor
oner's inquest that three-fourths or four
fifths—l forget the proportion, figures
ever eluding •me gaccessfully— of the "
Italians here believe in th© "dial.** and
many of the educated and cultured mem
bers of the Italian colony Indorsed bis
statement.
\ But the Italian colony, wounded in
pride, is up in arms at the charte. It
does not deny it; it only regards the
statement as a disloyalty, bringing- the _
colony into disrepute.
Yet to cover a sore spot and deny its
existence does not cure it. " It festers
even white it Is hidden.
There are many charging, intelligent.'
educated, cultivated people in the Italian *
colony, and it lies with them not to hide
this blemish of ignorance upon their
countrymen, but to let the light in upon
it through their" own papers, their own
teaching and gentle uplifting.
If Is for them to feel the responsibility
of the enlightened and fortunat* to 'the
unenlightened and unfortunate.