We think of Troy, usually, as the birthplace of church bells. But here was Pisa, a thousand years before Hendrick Hudson sailed up his namesake river, reknowned all over the inhabited world for its manufacture of big bells. Yes, nearly two thousand years before, for Pisa was a city long before the foundation of the original Troy, 1,600 years before Christ. Pisa was nearly two thousand years old when the Saviour was on earth, and if I may judge from appearances, I think some of the original buildings are still standing.
Rivalry in Monuments.
With all the iron bars and lengthened columns, the builders were cautious about putting the heavy bells on top of the Leaning Tower. The big six-tonner they put on the high side, trusting only the lightweights on the lower side. The fourth bell, which for some centuries was tolled whenever a criminal was led out for execution, is named the Pasquareccia. The others all have names, but I do not know them.
The custodian of the Cathedral came over while we were looking at the Tower, for fear we might wander away before he had secured the proper token of appreciation from us. He, too, spoke a few words of English, and he assured us as well as he could that the Leaning Tower was nothing whatevaire, compared with the great "monument" that he had charge of.
"Oh, ze m'sieu must see ze great tableaus." (The old imposter had somewhere learned the French word tableau, meaning picture, and evidently mistook it for English.) "Ze greatest tableaus in the world, m'sieu."
Accepting his assurance that ze greatest tableaus in the world could all be seen for 1 franc... we followed him across the grass to the Chathedral, which is quite as much of a mechanical wonder as the tower, for I do not believe there is a straight line in the whole thing from one end to the other. One needs at least a half hour of training under the Leaning Tower before he can go into the cathedral with any comfort. The walls bulge, the façade overhangs the steps, and the whole building looks as if it might collapse at any moment.
It is built of white and colored marbles, and must have been one of the architectural beauties of the world when it was in its prime. They had a great fire in it the other day (that is to say, in 1596,) which destroyed the dome and part of the roof, and damaged a lot of the furniture. Such at least is the guardian's story. I should not have believed that a few plumbers at work on a stone roof could set fire to it and burn it, if the same fire had not burned up the big bronze doors...
Galileo's Pendulum.
The first thing inside that the guardian showed us was the big lamp hanging from the ceiling of the nave--or rather, the first thing he tried to show us; for the shades of night were falling and there was not enough light inside to see anything distinctly. A few lamps were burning, to be sure, but in that great building we could hardly have found them without groping about with a lantern. The particular lamp that he most wanted us to see showed no lights whatever, and as it hangs at a dizzy height in midair, lighting it must be difficult work.
He began telling us about this great Man of Galilee, as I thought, and jumbled himself up in such a tangle of Italian, French and English that I gave him up in despair. But suddenly it dawned upon me that the word he was struggling with was Galileo, not Galilee. And that explained his story.
He who has ventured into the Fifth Reader, or into a book of Italian travels, or into a guide book of any period, is familiar with the touching story of how Galileo stood in this Cathedral of Pisa one day, and, instead of giving his attention to the service, as he ought, watched the great lamp swinging to and fro, and from that got the idea of the pendulum. And here was the same church, with the same lamp hanging in the same place, and not swinging in the least, though they call it the father of all pendulums.
There may be something more in that Galileo lamp than a mere chandelier of metal swung from a ceiling. Perhaps it is an inspirer of great ideas. It was while standing under it, at any rate, deploring the darkness that made it impossible to see more of the handsome Cathedral, and impossible to see anything at all of the Bapistry or the celebrated Campo Santo, and deploring the necessity of leaving Pisa without seeing a dozen more things that seemed worthy of investigation, that the great idea was suggested, "Is there any necessity about it? Is it really necessary for us to reach Rome early to-morrow morning, just as the gladiators are going out to their daily toil? Are there not hotels in Pisa, and is not a bad hotel better than a European sleeping car?"
Then there came that dreadful argument that costs most European travelers so much time and money:
"We shall never see this place again, probably."
That little phrase costs traveling Americans a great many millions every year. We shall never see this place again. Therefore, we must see it thoroughly this time. And here we are only a few minutes' ride from Leghorn; only an hour or two from Florence. Would it not be almost criminal to pass those places by?
Yes, Rome must have patience, and wait another day for us. The only necessity in the matter is the necessity of going back to the railway, for dinner has been ordered there in the station restaurant. Do not say that no good thing can come out of a railway eating house till you have spent an evening in the big station restaurant in Pisa.
WILLIAM DRYSDALE.
|
TIME Magazine, July 6, 1953, p. 78:
BUSINESS ABROAD: Fiat into Spain
Turin, Italy's fourth largest city, is the capital of Italian industry. It is also the biggest company town in the world, dominated by a single colossus world-famed for its name: Fiat (Fabbrica Italiana Automobili Torino). Almost two-thirds of Turin's 735,000 people owe their livelihood to Fiat; off the assembly lines of its 15 plants roll 90% of Italy's cars. But automaking is only the core of Fiat's industrial empire. A visitor to Turin rides to a Fiat-owned hotel in a Fiat taxi, drinks Fiat's Cinzano vermouth, shops at a Fiat drugstore, leaves for Milan over the Fiat-controlled autostrada (toll road).
Last week, Fiat grew a bit more. In Barcelona, a Fiat-controlled, Spanish-financed company named Seat began making Fiat cars in the hope of turning out 200 a month to sell at 150,000 pesetas ($3,750). The only sizable automaker in Spain, Fiat will have the Spanish car market virtually sewed up, since no other automaker can afford Spain's 40% excise taxes, from which Seat will eventually be exempt. Fiat also landed a $22.5 million U.S. Air Force contract to assemble F-86 Sabre jets under 10-year license from North American Aviation Inc., the first such order placed on the Continent.
"Will and Creation." Fiat, whose name Soldier-Poet Gabriele D'Annunzio once defined as the "word of will and creation," is a vertical trust which, through a holding company named I.F.I. (for Istituto Finanziario Italiano), controls a good cross section of Italy's economy. Among its holdings are insurance, buses, airlines, hotels, and cement, paint and steel plants. Abroad, in six countries from Sweden to India, Fiat plants turn out goods sold in 80 countries.
Fiat was created by the iron will of a flinty ex-cavalry officer named Giovanni Agnelli, who helped found the company in 1899. Agnelli made Fiat's red racing cars famous at international meets, sometimes driving them himself. Born with a passion work, Agnelli early saw the advantages of mass production and integration and began acquiring suppliers and outlets for his cars. So shrewdly did he choose that by 1927, when I.F.I. was formed to hold Fiat's investments (and solidify his control), he owned a diversified slice of the Italian economy. For such accomplishments and for Agnelli's financial help in the March on Rome, an admiring Mussolini made him a lifetime Senator. He also cooperated by placing staggering duties on imported cars.
With such help, Agnelli continued to expand Fiat in the '30s, entered World War II with the huge, new Fiat-Mirafiori auto plant. As one of Italy's biggest armament makers, Fiat was soon turning out everything from trucks to airplanes to machine guns.
Red & Black. Fiat plants were bombed repeatedly, with losses running to an estimated $40 million. When Agnelli died in 1945, it looked as if Fiat might never recover. But it was able to rebuild with the help of $46 million in U.S. loans. Then the Fiat union, a member of Communist-controlled C.G.I.L. (Confederazione Generale Italiana di Lavoro), formed "councils of management" to run the plants, virtually took over. The councils soon found the job to tough to handle, and gradually they were forced to let brilliant, little (5 ft. 1 in.) Professor Vittorio Valletta, who had succeeded Agnelli, take charge.
Valletta, a self-made man whose constant traveling and shrewd bargaining made him Fiat's best salesman, quickly got things humming again. By last week, Fiat was turning out 500 cars a day, twice its prewar peak, and its huge iron & steel works, including the biggest cold-rolling mill on the Continent, had doubled its capacity. Last year Fiat reported a $4,000,000 net on $320,000,000 sales.
Communists are still powerful, but membership in the C.G.I.L. has dropped from 82% to 65% since 1949. Though this still large membership in the Communist union worries U.S. military men, it does not worry Valletta. The big C.G.I.L. membership, he points out, does not mean that all are Communists, but merely that workers have chosen the largest, oldest and strongest union in Italy. Says Valletta: "If I were a worker, it's the one I would belong to myself."
Mice & Monopoly. As an automaker, Fiat specializes in small, low-horsepower models that can negotiate Europe's twisting roads and give good mileage on its expensive gasoline. Most Italians, however, find them too high-priced, complain that Fiat could afford to cut prices. They cite the fact that in Paris, where there is competition, the new Fiat "1100" sells for $235 less than in Italy. Even the Italians who can afford Fiat's two bestselling cars, the Topolino ("Little Mouse") at $1,146, and the "1100" at $1,608, must be prepared to put down a $320 deposit and wait eight months for delivery.
Grip of Iron. So important is Fiat to the Italian economy that the government would hardly make a major economic decision without considering its effects on Fiat. In addition to the 117,000 cars, trucks and buses it turned out last year, Fiat made two-thirds of Italy's tractors, three-quarters of its refrigerators, and much of its diesel and railroad equipment. It has helped reconstruct Italy in other ways. After the war, Fiat kept more men on its payrolls than were needed, and only recently has had work for them all. Explains Valletta: "If we had discharged all the people we didn't need, the result might have been a revolution."
Such immense power has bothered more than one monopoly-hating American charged with helping rebuild Italy's economy for NATO defense. But most of them have come to accept Fiat's position. As one of Italy's economists has pointed out, no Italian government, however strong, would ever be able to withstand the collapse of Fiat. Said he: "No matter how badly things were to go with Fiat, the government would be obliged... to keep [it] going, even if this meant making refrigerators as Christmas presents to the Eskimos."
| |
|
