for. There seems to have been no particular
dispute about this, but on the morning of the murder, Simonetti was
summoned before the overseer of the factory, on the ground of his refusal
to pay the sum claimed by Avanzi of fifteen baiocchi, or seven pence
halfpenny. Simonetti did not deny that Avanzi had some claim upon him,
but disputed the amount. At last, the overseer proposed, as an amicable
compromise, that Simonetti should pay down seven baiocchi as a settlement
in full, sooner than have a formal investigation. Both parties adopted
the suggestion readily, and returned to their work apparently satisfied.
An hour and a half after, while Avanzi was sitting at his frame, with his
face to the wall, Simonetti entered the room with an axe he had picked up
in the carpenter's store, and walking deliberately up to Avanzi, struck
him with the axe across the neck, as he was stooping down. Almost
immediate death ensued, and on the arrival of the guard, Simonetti was
arrested at once, and placed in irons. Probably, as a matter of policy,
so daring a crime required summary punishment; at any rate, Papal justice
seems to have been executed with unexampled promptitude. With what the
report justly calls "laudable celerity," the case was got ready for trial
in a week, and on the 30th of July, the civil and criminal court of
Civita Vecchia met to try the prisoner. There could be no conceivable
question about the case. The murder had been committed during broad
daylight, in a crowded room, and indeed, the prisoner confessed his
guilt, and only pleaded gross provocation as an excuse. There was no
proof, however, that Avanzi had used irritating language; and even if he
had, too long a time had elapsed between the supposed offence and the
revenge taken, for the excuse of provocation to hold good. Indeed, as
the sentence of the court argues, in somewhat pompous language, "Woe to
civil intercourse and human society, if, contrary to every principle of
reason and justice, an attempt to enforce one's just and legal rights by
honest means, were once admitted as an extenuating circumstance in the
darkest crimes, or as a sufficient cause for exciting pardonable
provocation in the hearts of criminals." The tribunal too considers,
that the crime of the prisoner was aggravated by the fact, that his mind
remained unimpressed "by the horrors of his residence, or the dreadful
aspect and sad fellowship of his thousand unfortunate companions in