Notes: Following excerpt was taken from the book, "Italy" by Frank Fox (London: A& C Black, 1918).
Recent official figures show that now of the
total area of Italy, 70,793,000 acres, only 10 per
cent are uncultivated. The productive area is 71
per cent of the total, and the unproductive 19 per
cent, but this includes the land occupied by
lagoons and marshes which, in a great measure,
is open to agricultural improvement by
drainage.
The cultivated area is divided into five agrarian
zones. The first zone is that of the "agrumi"
(oranges, lemons, and similar fruits). It takes in
a great part of Sicily, extends along the southern
and western coasts of Sardinia, along the Ligurian
Riviera from Bordighera to Spezia and on the
Adriatic, near San Benedetto del Tranto and
Gargano, and in some regions of Calabria, and
terminates around the gulfs of Salerno, Sorrento,
and Naples. The region of "olives" comprises
the Sicilian valleys and part of the mountain
slopes ; the valleys near the coasts of Sardinia ;
and on the mainland it extends from Liguria
and from the southern extremities of Romagna
down to Apulia and to Calabria. There are also
districts of the olive region near the lakes of
upper Italy and in Venetia. The " wine " area
begins on the sunny slopes of the Alpine spurs
and in the Alpine valleys open toward the south,
and it extends over the plains of Lombardy
and Emilia. It covers the mountain slopes in
Sardinia and in Sicily, the Calabrian Alps and the
whole length of the Apennines, and the hills of
Tuscany and Montferrato in Piedmont. The
region of " chestnuts " extends from the valleys
to the highest plateaus of the Alps, along the
northern slopes of the Apennines in Liguria,
Modena, Tuscany, Romagna, Umbria, and the
Marches, and along the southern Apennines to
the Calabrian and Sicilian ranges, as well as to the
mountains of Sardinia. The "wooded" region
covers the Alps and the Apennines above the
chestnut level.
Those are the "tree" zones and illustrate
the variety of the climate. There is a wide
range of cereal cultivation ? wheat, maize, rice,
rye, barley, oats, and millet being cultivated
in different parts of the peninsula. Potatoes,
beets, and turnips, and various legumes, which
form a great proportion of the food of the people,
occupy many acres. Then 30 per cent of the land
is devoted to pasture, and great areas to tobacco,
hemp, flax, cotton, olives, citron fruits, nuts,
mulberry trees (for silkworms), and of course
vines. The Italian people produce about
1,000,000,000 gallons of wine a year, mostly
Chianti for home consumption, but a good deal
for the export trade. Cheese-making, horse-
breeding, the pasturage of sheep, goats, and
swine are other great agricultural industries.
Of late the Italian Federation of Agrarian
Unions has greatly contributed to agricultural
progress. Government travelling teachers of
agriculture, and schools of viticulture, are also
doing good work. Machinery is coming into use
for better cultivation, ?l,000,000's worth being
imported on an average every year. The income
from land is generally steady, and will increase
owing to the encouragement given by the State,
especially in connection with irrigation, drainage
of low-lying land, river regulation, and various
Credit Fonder laws.
In most places the mode of agriculture is still
very primitive, and for that reason very picturesque.
The wooden plough and the plough team
of oxen may still be seen in many districts, though
American and other agricultural machinery
gradually invade the land, more useful and more
profitable, but less pleasing to the eye. Occasionally
a district keeps its old-time atmosphere
even as regards its town. Siena, for example,
planted firmly on its rock, comes straight out
of the Middle Ages. Almost every house is
convertible to a fortress at will. The ancient
walls still lift their ramparts, within which the
houses climb upwards, grouping closely round
the cathedral. Old customs there never die and
change never comes. White oxen walk the
streets dragging after them wicker carts shaped
like Roman chariots. The people till their farms
and carry on their little businesses just as they
might have done under the Roman Republic.
Other attractive small towns with something
of the old atmosphere still are Caserta, Arezzo,
Lucca, Montepulciana, and Ancona.
The teaching of modern agriculture goes
on apace in most districts, however, and the
" scientific farmer " is taking the place of the
peasant who followed the methods of his fore-
fathers. The change is mostly for the good.
In one indirect respect it is of advantage in
putting an end to one of the scandals which
visitors to Northern Italy have often deplored
as a stain on the national character ? ^the cruel
destruction of bird -life. A custom, suggested
by poverty probably in the first instance, had
grown up among the Italian peasants at the foot
of the Alps to trap in nets and destroy for the
larder all kinds of small birds as they passed on
their seasonal migrations. The destruction of
bird-life was grave. It had no apology in the
amount of food that the bodies of the little
songsters afforded. Now the agricultural teachers
are pointing out that this wholesale destruction
of birds is chiefly responsible for the ravages of
insect pests in Italy. The peasant kills and eats
the bird, who therefore is not able to kill and eat
the insects ; and the insects, unchecked, destroy
the crops. All the argument of self-interest as
well as of sentiment is in favour of stopping the
cruel war on bird life ; and that is beginning to
be recognized.
Education, however, both agricultural and
general, has a hard task to combat the superstitions
which have a great influence still on the
national life of Italy. Silkworms, for instance,
do not call for this or that scientific precaution.
But it is strictly necessary that any one entering
a house where silkworms are should invoke a
blessing : "II Signore ve lo benedica." And
the eggs of the silkworms must be taken to
church on Palm Sunday to hear the " Passion "
read. The women carry the eggs in their pockets,
and they are not blessed openly. But if not
taken to church on that day they produce either
bad caterpillars or silk of inferior quality. Also
new wine must be tasted on St. Martin's Eve
or else next year's grapes will not yield good
wine.
The silk industry is in its yield one of the
most important of modern Italy. It represents
one-third of the total exports of the country,
having increased from a value of ?12,381,840
recently to a value of ?23,000,000 in 1912. Not
all of this, however, represents home-grown silk.
Raw silk to the value of about ?4,000,000 a year
is imported from China, Japan, and France to be
made up by the Italian people. The cotton
goods largely exported from Italy are made up
chiefly of imported raw material, though a little
cotton is grown by the Italian people.
In fact, a resolute effort is being made to
graft upon the agricultural people of Italy a
highly-organized industrial life, raw materials
being imported for the factories, and markets
sought abroad for the finished products. At
present the growth of this industrial life is
hampered by the lack of a local supply of coal
(coal to the value of ?10,000,000 a year has to
be imported). But the development of "white
coal" power, i.e. of electrical power, generated
by waterfalls, is rapidly making Italy independent
of coal, and will assist enormously her industrial
development.
So the Italian people of to-morrow, or the day
after, may have developed into a people of
factory workers rather than agriculturists, their
beautiful mountain torrents and lakes given up
to utility and sacrificed as natural joys for the
sake of power. It is a development which many
will look to with sorrow. But it seems to be the
way of the world. Progress demands that we
should give up being happy in order to be busy,
give up beauty for utility, and barter a rye crust
and cheese under the rainbow of a waterfall for
canned beef and white bread in the shed of a
factory. And who would dare to say a word
against Progress?
|
