Page:Rambles in Germany and Italy in 1840, 1842, and 1843 - Volume 2.djvu/252

 the destruction of the savings of the poor, state lotteries all over Italy. It was considered that this demoralising gambling ought not to be kept up in the capital of the head of the church: but it was argued that a love of putting in the lottery could not be rooted out, and while Naples, Tuscany, and Venice had lotteries, the Romans would send their money to those states, if they could not be indulged at home. A Roman lottery therefore exists, and the proceeds go to keep up a house of industry. Here a number of young people are taught various trades. Young men are apprenticed, and girls receive dowries, while the old people have a home that smoothes their passage to the grave. Besides these conventual aids and government institutions, there are many confraternities of citizens whose bond of duty is charity to the sick and poor. People of all classes of society belong to them, and meet on an equal footing. The city is divided into several quarters, and the various confraternities have each one assigned to them, which they visit and relieve.

Several of the persons I know remained in Rome during the visitation of the cholera in 1837, and they still vividly remember the horror of the time.

It was a conviction, a superstition, nourished by the church, that this fatal epidemic would spare