I took lunch with the Mayor of the town and in the course of conversation inquired of him whether the Italian National Red Cross had participated in the relief work of his town. He replied, with a shrug of his shoulders and in emphatic language, that the Red Cross had given no assistance in Villa San Giovanni; that it might as well have no existence so far as the people of his community had had occasion to know of it. After our luncheon was completed, the Mayor was called away to attend to official matters and I walked up the street toward the municipal headquarters, which were in a small, temporary wooden building. Presently I saw coming down the street in a cloud of dust, a large red automobile. Fluttering from a short staff on the front was a Red Cross flag. The motor drew up with a flourish in front of the Municipal building and two men with Red Cross brassards on their arms dismounted and began unloading several hundred articles of clothing from the tonneau. These they were carrying into the building and stacking up on the floor in one corner of the Mayor’s office. I entered into conversation with the man in charge of the Red Cross car. He told me that the Red Cross was sending out a number of automobiles every day from Reggio and Messina to deliver supplies of clothing to the people in the surrounding small towns. I asked him how it happened that he had not before visited Villa San Giovanni. He looked surprised and replied that he had brought several loads of clothing to this place before. Turning to his companion, they compared notes, and he then informed me that this was the seventh visit which they had paid to Villa San Giovanni, each time bringing a large quantity of clothing. Replying to further inquiries he assured me that he and his companion in no instance distributed clothing direct to the people, but had always brought their goods to the municipal headquarters and turned them over to the Mayor for distribution. _Work of Italian Red Cross._ It is unnecessary here to speak at length of the relief work of the Italian Red Cross, since the public is already familiar with it. Two months after the earthquake the largest part of the work of the Red Cross had been completed and the greater part of its relief funds expended. Immediately after the earthquake the Red Cross had a hospital ship which carried the sick and wounded from Messina to Naples, and ran a hospital train which conveyed many of the victims from Naples to Rome. The Red Cross also established and maintained ten field hospitals in different parts of the earthquake zone, and carried on a work of great magnitude. When the task of dealing with the sick and wounded was about ended the Red Cross turned its activities in the direction of supplying relief, one of its methods being that of sending consignments of clothing to the small towns by means of motor cars. _The Common Soldier._