THE ROMAN NOSE

Comment concerning the incarceration of John Abbott '25, in an Italian gaol has been rife among members of the Current Events Club at Harvard during the last two days. Of course, the subject does possess enough local background to give it savor and flavor. Yet, after all, its importance is, to say the most, conversational.

For the convention which suggests prison as the proper place for him who would denasalize an officer of the law is not purely Italian. Nose punching, even in democratic America, is seldom without a legal postlude. Truly the affair does arouse one's ire when one realizes how unsportsmanlike the officer must have been. But to misquote a certain British actor, "Aren't they all?"

Naturally the Italian people have reason for fearing any and all attacks upon the Roman nose. If to be a Fascist one must be a true Roman, that Bergeracian appendage is essential. Premier and policeman, both must guard the nasal bridge, valiant as Horatius, and twice as undemocratic. For democracy, if it does not predicate complete denasalization, at least suggests a diminution of nasal swank. The affair, indeed, is after all, quite conversational.