chance that a witness noted the number of the car in which M atteotti was abducted there wo·uld have been no clue and he would si1nply have disappeared-like so many others. . We know to-day that a numbe.r of persons witnessed what happened in a street of the capital and yet did not venture to intervene, having become accustotned to similar displays by the ruling power. Can we say more in condemnation of the type of order actually in force in Italy? Need we say more to prove that Matteotti is but one of hundreds, perhaps thousands, who died like him-unknown fighters for freedo1n and victinis of violence? Let him say it himself. In this book, which he· was forced to publish anonymously, he has recorded the deeds of Fascism during the first year of its reign. He was about to add the chronicle of the second year. He was not allowed to finish. He had to prove by his death that what he has registered with almost striking sobriety in these pages, which we. read to-day with profound ernotion, is, in fact, true to the very letter. Suddenly that letter has turned red. Never was it more cruelly true to say . that a man has written· with his heart's blood. · And never has another word become more true than those prophetic words of the dying hero-they killed him but they were unable to kill the ideal for which he stood. They tried to stop a fighting force, and they have stirred a whole nation. They wanted to silence a single man, and they have raised a world-wide move- . tnent of horror and protest. They killed one, and there are hundreds eager to take his place in the ranks. They stabbed M atteotti to death, and he is still alive; they buried his body, and his spirit is amongst us, leading and fighting more than eve1'. · OSKAR POLLAK .. September, 1924. xi. Biblioteca Gino Bianco 7
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