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Show city and the performers were threatened, threaten-ed, in a mysterious, yet effective manner, man-ner, these blackmailing: orcanlzatlons spread the word all over In the Inst few days that dire consequences would result to those who patronized the performance per-formance It had Its effect." BLACK HAND NOW IS A POWER TO BE FEARED I DREAD OF ASSASSINS HAS ITS EF- EFFECT ON PEOPLE. Benefit Performance for Widow and Daughter of Petrosino Is Not the Success Expected. ,- New York. May 3. The remarkable fear which the Black Hand Is able to instil Into the minds of many was emphatically shown last night at a widely advertised benefit performance held in the Academy of Music for the widow and daughter of Lieutenant Petrosino, Pe-trosino, who was assassinated in Italy. It was expected that fully $5,000 would be raised, especially as the Timothy Sullivan association was back of It. Hardly half that amount was raised. This was explained after the performance perform-ance 'by a member of the theatrical firm which had the matter In charge, who said that, a few days before the date 6et, letters had been received by many persons, including the large and influential in-fluential Italian colony which had been expected to lend liberal patronage, threatening their lives If they attended or assisted In the benefit. Several well-known well-known Italian singers had signed contracts con-tracts to appear, last night, but they strangely failed to reach the theater. Hundreds of seats which had been engaged en-gaged by Italians aud Italian societies remained vacant. "We can only explain the failure of the benefit performance." fald a representative rep-resentative of the- managers, "by the activity of the Black Hand society. We ourselves were threatened if w persisted per-sisted In giving the performance. Threatening lettors were scattered j throughout the -Italian colonies of the |