Chapter IV

_Landing at Malta.--Description of the city and inhabitants.--
Excursion into the interior.--Visit to the catacombs.--
Wonderful subterranean abodes.--St. Paul’s Bay._

When we were through with the quarantine, we hauled round into the great harbor of Malta. The city, which is called Valetta, made a most stately appearance as we passed the castle of St. Elmo. It lies close to the sea, and the whole mass of buildings bursts upon you at once, with its long rows of castellated walls, bristling with cannon, tier upon tier, towering battlements, turrets and bastions and pinnacles in the most picturesque profusion--a grand and magnificent spectacle. The harbor was full of ships--men-of-war, merchantmen, and all sorts of small Mediterranean craft, rigged in the strangest style imaginable.

Whole fleets of row-boats came crowding round us, filled with people. Some of them had bands of music, playing “Yankee Doodle,” “Washington’s March,” and “Hail Columbia,” for which they expected we should give them a quarter of a dollar or so. Others brought fruit, fresh provisions, sea-shells and curiosities, for sale. Most of them spoke a little English, and, in their eagerness to sell their commodities, would make the most ludicrous speeches imaginable. One comical fellow had a pig for sale, which he praised very highly: “Buy pig, captain?--nice pig, sweet pig, ’merican pig: won’t heave nothing overboard, eat brick-dust, eat anything.” It was difficult to get rid of the importunities of these people. They would offer a thing for a dollar, and then gradually come down to nine-pence.

When we landed on the quay, we found a still greater crowd besetting us, offering to carry our trunks, amidst immense confusion and jabbering. Donkeys and mules were trotting about, but we saw no horses. We passed through a great gate in a wall, and went up into the city, by climbing flights of stone steps. The donkeys go up and down with heavy loads on their backs, and never stumble. All the streets were narrow, with high stone houses on each side, and full of people. The main street occupies the summit of the rock on which the city is built, and all the cross streets run up and down the hill, and are paved stair-fashion. The city is one of the handsomest in the world, and looks like an assemblage of palaces. The streets are straight, and all the houses are built of a light yellow stone. Nothing can be more picturesque than their architecture. The fronts are studded with bold masses of carved stonework, balconies, cornices, pilasters, projections, and sculptured ornaments of various descriptions. The prospect through one of the streets is a perfect picture. I could not help contrasting it with our American cities, with their quadrangular monotony of architecture!

After we had secured our baggage at the hotel, I walked out to take a view of the city. The population seemed to be all in the streets, and to live out of doors. The crowd was immense in every public place, and everything visible was full of character and variety. I do not believe there is a spot in the world that exhibits a more striking and motley spectacle than the streets of Malta. This island is the central point of the whole Mediterranean commerce, which brings it a constant succession of visitors from all the countries around. The crowd looks like a fancy ball, where the people dress so as to differ from each other. Here is the fantastical Greek in his picturesque drapery of red and white; the turbaned Turk with his bushy and flowing beard; the swarthy Arab in his coarse _haick_ or cloak; the grave Austrian, the scowling Moor, the squab Dutchman, the capering Sicilian, the hawk-eyed and tawny Calabrian, the native Maltese; the Spaniard, the Frenchman, the John Bull, and the Yankee, all in strange mixture, and with their various manners and languages. The whole group is perfectly dramatic. Little boys, about as high as my knee, were running about, dressed in black small-clothes and those great cocked-hats which we call “three-cornered scrapers.” The women of the island looked like nuns in black silk hoods; they cover most of the face, and peep out with one eye. This habit makes almost all the women squint-eyed.

After I had gone over the greater part of the city and visited its elegant churches, of which it contains a large number, I set forth for a walk into the country. I went out at a massive gateway and across a draw-bridge, which offer the only passage-way into the interior of the island. I was struck with astonishment at the strength and extent of the fortifications. It seemed impossible that any force, either of human arms or cannon-balls, could ever break through the walls. The French took the place in 1800, and when Bonaparte entered at this gate, he said it was lucky there was somebody inside to open it, or they could never have got in. Immense walls and bastions, one above another, towered over my head. I looked down into one of the ditches; it appeared to be a hundred feet deep, and there were flower-gardens and orchards at the bottom. After travelling a few minutes, I saw before me a long row of arches, fifteen or twenty feet high, which I found to be an aqueduct: the road passed under it. Here I had the first glimpse of the country, and I was struck with the odd appearance of everything. There were no fields nor pastures, such as we have in our country, but the whole land lay in terraces, faced with thick stone walls, making little square inclosures, where crops of wheat and other vegetables were growing. The whole face of the island presented a succession of stripes of light yellow rock and fresh green vegetation. Here and there were low hills dotted with dark green locust trees, and a great many country houses and villas were scattered round. All along under these walls grew wild fig-trees and immense clumps of prickly pear, and thousands of lizards were darting up and down with the liveliest movements. Peasants were passing along the road driving donkeys loaded with bundles of grass, and now and then I met a chaise drawn by a mule, thumping over the stony road. I was surprised that any person could be found willing to risk his bones by such a jolting.

One would suppose, by the looks of the country here, that the inhabitants had covered it with stone walls to keep the grass from blowing away. Indeed, the soil is so thin, and the surface so irregular, that but for these walls, half the island would be washed bare by the rains. It is a solid rock, with only a foot or two of soil. Having gone several miles, I reached Citta Vecchia, or the old city, the ancient capital of Malta. It stands in the centre of the island, and looks very antique, being a confused assemblage of fantastical structures, gray with age. It is probably three thousand years old or more. I went into a little shop kept by an old woman, and amused myself with staring at the odd appearance of everything. A man sat at work cutting a pair of sandals out of a raw hide; a little boy, with a desperately dirty face, was munching a handful of green stuff in a corner; and a queer-looking blue cat, with half a tail, rolled her green eyes up at me: she had doubtless never seen a Yankee before. The old woman sold bread, greens, oranges, wine, &c. I drank a tumbler of wine, for which I paid a half-penny; it was a dark red wine like claret, and about the strength of common cider. Some wine is made in the island, but most of what is used comes from Sicily.

I went to the top of the great church, which has a very lofty dome, where I had a prospect of the whole island. The view is picturesque and striking in the highest degree. The island looks like an immense chess-board, the surface being chequered out into squares of green verdure and stone wall. Villages without number were scattered about in every direction, each with the tall dome of a church rising above its cluster of houses. Many of these churches I visited in my walk, and was astonished to find every one of them richly adorned in the interior with gold, silver, and precious stones. The private houses in these villages are very far from exhibiting the same wealth.

I had a guide with me, who showed me over the cathedral of Citta Vecchia, and then asked if I wanted to see the catacombs. I had never before heard of them, but replied in the affirmative; whereupon he led the way through a narrow street, till he came to a door, at which he thumped lustily. It was opened by a little tawny-faced fellow in a monk’s dress. He bustled about and got a bunch of keys, and some torches and candles. We each took a torch and candle, and followed him through a series of long narrow lanes, till we came to a great gate in a wall. Here we struck fire, lighted our torches and candles, and entered the passage. It looked dark and dismal, and we continued going down long flights of steps till we came to a sort of landing-place at a great distance below the surface. I know not how to describe the scene that I witnessed here. For miles around, there was a labyrinthian extent of dark passages cut in the rock, winding and zigzagging in all directions; sometimes expanding into the breadth and loftiness of spacious halls, and sometimes contracting into a strait so narrow as hardly to admit a single person.

Along the sides of these galleries were innumerable niches and recesses cut in the rock as places of deposit for corpses; they were probably all full, thousands of years ago. Here and there we found a solitary bone, which I gazed at with feelings of awe as the relic of an ancient generation. The place appeared to me like a great subterranean city whose inhabitants had all deserted it. The age of it is unknown; not even tradition can tell it. It was used as a hiding-place by the early Christians during times of persecution, and must have been found admirably suited to that purpose: thousands and thousands of people might conceal themselves beyond all search in its immense extent of winding and perplexing avenues, which run into one another, and would lead any one astray who was not perfectly familiar with all their turnings and windings.

In one of the large halls we found two ancient hand-mills for corn and oil, which had been used by the inhabitants of this dark abode. Every passage and room is full of secret nooks and openings, into which the inmates might creep for safety in case of surprise. Great numbers of names and inscriptions are cut in all parts of the rock; and the sides and ceiling of the narrow galleries are blackened with the smoke of torches. Strange and overpowering were the sensations that came upon me as I followed my guide through these drear avenues and halls of death. In spite of my confidence in him, it was impossible not to feel an apprehension of being lost among the innumerable turnings and windings of this dark labyrinth. Now and then we would stop and contemplate the striking effect of our flickering torches, which threw red gleams of light along the walls, and seemed to show us indistinct forms flitting hither and thither amid the darkness beyond.

We stood still, held our breath, and marked the drear silence that reigned around, where the sound of a footstep or a whisper struck the ear like an unhallowed intrusion breaking the still repose of the ancient dead. Then we shouted and listened to the hollow echoes that rumbled through the rocky mansion, and died away in the distance, among miles of long galleries and reverberating caverns. No scene could be more impressive--I almost expected the dead inmates of this gloomy abode to start up before my face, and greet me with the accents of three thousand years ago. We traversed one long passage after another, but the labyrinth appeared to be endless. The excavations are said to be fifteen miles in extent; they may be twice as long for aught I know: the only wonder is that any man ever undertook to measure them. After all I have said, the reader will have no adequate conception of these wonderful abodes: he must go to the spot to know what they really are.

I never knew the light of day so cheerful, delicious, and exhilarating as when I got out of this dark place, into the open air; it seemed like passing from death to life. The little monk was very thankful for a ninepence which I gave him for his trouble in showing me through the catacombs.

Going along one of the streets of the town, I saw a statue of St. Paul, shaking the viper from his hand. This is believed to be the spot where the house stood in which he lodged while in the island. There is a bay on the southwestern shore, where, according to tradition, he was shipwrecked. This I determined to visit, and hired a stout boy, whom I found in the street, to show me the way. We travelled over a road on the bare rock, very rough, and which grew rougher every mile. The country was pretty much like what I have mentioned, parcelled out into little square inclosures, with low cabins in the sides of the walls, looking like dog-kennels, but designed as lodging-places for the men who guard the fields by night. By-and-by the road began to descend, and I soon found we were close to the sea. I was obliged to clamber down the ragged rocks, but my companion jumped from cliff to cliff like a goat. We soon reached the margin of the bay, and he conducted me to a bold projection in the rocky shore, which tradition has marked out as the precise spot where the ship which was bearing St. Paul to Rome, struck the land, as related in the twenty-seventh chapter of the Acts of the Apostles.

I walked out to the extremity of the point, against which the sea was dashing, and sat down upon the rock to enjoy the feelings excited by the history of this interesting place. I gazed for some time upon the wild scene around me, and called up in imagination the shadows of the beings who, 1800 years ago, had figured in these events. Here stood the shipwrecked apostle and beheld the same wild and rugged prospect that strikes the eye at the present moment, for hardly a single point in the landscape appears to have undergone any change since his time. There is a chapel on the shore a few yards from the water, and two or three castles on the eminences around; these are all the buildings in sight. Three or four ragged boys were picking up shells on the beach, but no other living creature was to be seen. I saw the sun sink into the ocean, and was obliged to hasten my return, lest the city gates should be closed.

(_To be continued._)

* * * * *

WIT.--Some one observed to a wag on one occasion, that his coat seemed to have been made too short; to which he replied, that “it would be long enough before he got another.”

* * * * *

IN delay, there lies no plenty.

The Kingfisher and the Nightingale;

A FABLE.

Once upon a time, a meeting took place between a kingfisher and a mocking-bird. The latter, being dressed in very plain feathers, at first felt a little humbled by the brilliant plumage of his neighbor. The kingfisher, perceiving the admiration of the mocking-bird, jerked his tail and tossed his head, so as to show off all the changing hues of his feathers to great advantage.

While this was going on between the two birds, a sportsman chanced to be passing by, and seeing them, paused to watch their proceedings. Readily understanding the scene, and disgusted with the conceit and vanity of the kingfisher, he drew up his gun, and shot him down. As he went to pick up the fallen bird, he made the following reflections:

“This silly kingfisher is like a person who is vain of his dress or his outward beauty. His skin, when stuffed with tow, is just as valuable as when the bird’s living flesh and bones are in it; his outside is all there is of him. But the modest mocking-bird is like a person who contributes to our pleasure or our instruction, and relies upon the good he does to others for his standing among mankind. How contemptible is pride; how amiable and attractive is modesty allied to merit!”

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A SAGACIOUS DOG.--A grocer in Edinburgh had a dog, which for some time amused and astonished the people in the neighborhood. A man who went through the streets ringing a bell and selling penny pies, happened one day to treat this dog with a pie. The next time he heard the pieman’s bell, the dog ran to him with impetuosity, seized him by the coat, and would not allow him to pass. The pieman, who understood what the animal wanted, showed him a penny, and pointed to his master, who stood at the street door and saw what was going on. The dog immediately supplicated his master by many humble gestures and looks. The master put a penny into the dog’s mouth, which he instantly delivered to the pieman, and received his pie; and this traffic between the pieman and the grocer’s dog continued to be daily practised for many months.

Absence of Mind.

This is that habit which some people have, of thinking of one thing, while they are doing another. The famous Sir Isaac Newton was a philosopher, and he thought a great deal about the heavenly bodies, and such mighty matters. Of course, he could hardly be expected to think much about common things. However, he did once have a fancy for a lady, and one evening he went to see her. As he was sitting with her by the fireside smoking his pipe, he became absorbed in his mathematics, and in his absence of mind he took hold of the lady’s finger and stuck it into the fiery bowl of his pipe, thus making it a tobacco-stopper!

I once knew an old lady who would go about the room, looking upon the shelf, peeping into the table drawer, tumbling over a cupboard that served as a kind of Noah’s ark, where every strange thing was deposited--all the time teasing and fretting because she could not find her spectacles, until at last she discovered that the said spectacles were snugly sitting astride of her nose!

But this is a trifling instance of absence of mind, compared with some others. An old maid of Edinburgh, in Scotland, had taken an unaccountable fancy to a pig, which she kept as a kind of pet about the house, and often took it into her lap. The poor thing seemed to be forever pinched with a pain in its bowels, and therefore kept up an almost perpetual squealing. Still, the kind woman loved it all the better, and cherished it the more for its very infirmities. The lady was withal a literary lady, and fond of reading and writing books, and her head ran upon these operations so much, that she often forgot where she was, and what she was doing.

One day, she appeared at the door of a neighbor in a good deal of trouble, with the pig under her arm, squealing with all its might, as usual; upon which the following dialogue ensued:

_Woman._ Good morning, neighbor! Good morning! I called to see you about--about--something or other--but in fact I forget what it was I was after.

_Neighbor._ Oh! you wanted something or other, and you thought you’d come and ask me what ’twas you wanted?

_Woman._ Why yes--no. Be still, you naughty pig! be still! Yes, I am looking for something. Stop your everlasting squealing! Oh! I remember! I’ve lost my pig. Have you seen anything of him?

_Neighbor._ Why, what’s that you have under your arm?

_Woman._ Gracious! I’ve got the pig under my arm all this time! Poor, dear thing--that I should have forgotten you, while I was all the time thinking of you! and that I should have lost you while I was clasping you to my breast! Well done! I must be a genius, as aunt Dorcas says!

Some years ago there lived at the city of Washington a famous Englishman by the name of Thomas Law. He was very absent-minded, and often forgot his christian name. One day, he was writing a letter, and when he came to the end, and wanted to sign his name, he was in great trouble because he could not remember the first part of it. At last, Claxton, the door-keeper, chanced to be passing, and Law remembered that his christian name was the same as Claxton’s. Accordingly he said, “Claxton, what is your christian name?” “Thomas,” was the answer. “Oh yes, Thomas,” said Law, and immediately wrote his name, “Thomas Law!”

These instances are somewhat amusing, but I can tell you of an instance in which absence of mind proved more serious. A famous courtier once wished to ingratiate himself into the favor of two persons of great rank and power, but who were deadly enemies to each other. These were Lord B. and Lord Q. In order to please these two persons, the courtier wrote a letter to each of them. That of Lord B. was as follows:

My dear Lord B.

I met with Lord Q. last evening at Lady Lackaday’s. It was
the first time I had seen him. I felt instinctively an
aversion similar to that which is inspired by the presence
of a serpent. I can easily enter into your feelings
respecting him. Indeed, I do not see how any one can differ
from your lordship in this matter. It is impossible not to
feel a sympathy with the man who stands in open and manly
opposition to one upon whose forehead “knave” is written by
the hand of his Creator.
I am, dear Lord, yours,
B. L.

The next letter was as follows:

My dear Lord Q.

Lord B. is an ass, and I ask no better proof of it than
that he seems to hate you, whom all the world beside agree
to love and admire. He is stark mad with envy. You have
only to let him alone, and he will make himself ridiculous
before the whole town. This is all you have to do to
destroy your rival. Let him alone! Yours faithfully,
B. L.

Such are the two letters; but unluckily for the success of the courtier’s crafty schemes, he was addicted to fits of absence of mind, and when he came to superscribe the aforesaid letters, he addressed the one intended for Lord B. to Lord Q., and that for Lord Q. to Lord B.; so that when they were read, each of these persons discovered the trick and hypocrisy of the courtier.

Varieties.

PUN.--While the repairs were going on in State street, Boston, two gentlemen of the bar happening to meet, one said, “I think this looks like putting new cloth upon an old garment.” “I think so too,” replied the other; “but it will make the _rent_ greater.”

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HUMOR.--A number of years ago, an eccentric old gentleman, residing in a cottage in England, was greatly annoyed by noctural depredators, who broke the fences in his garden, in order to get at the good things contained therein. As he did not care so much for the loss of the fruit as the damage done to the enclosures, and as he was rather fond of witticisms, he had the following notice put up: “All thieves are in future to enter by the gate, which will be left open for the purpose.”

* * * * *

HAS A DOG WINGS?--“Father, has a dog got wings?”

“No, my son.”

“Well, I thought so--but mother told me, the other day, that as she was going along the road, a dog _flew_ at her.”

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IRISH WIT.--An honest Hibernian, upon reading his physician’s bill, replied, that he had no objections to pay him for his _medicines_, but his _visits_ he would return.

Death of the President.

William Henry Harrison, who became President of the United States on the 4th of March last, died on the night of the 4th of April, just thirty days after he had entered upon the duties of his high office.

This event is calculated to cast a gloom over the whole nation, for Gen. Harrison was generally esteemed a good man, and most persons believed that he would govern the country in a manner to promote the happiness of the people. He had lived to be almost seventy years of age; and now, being elevated to the highest office in the gift of the people, he is suddenly cut down, and laid in the same dust that must cover ordinary men. This dispensation of Providence seems almost like quenching a great beacon-light upon the sea-shore at night, just at the moment when its illumination had begun to scatter the darkness around.

A solemn thought is suggested by this event. Gen. Harrison has lived a long life, and has often been in the midst of seeming peril. He has often been in battle with savages and with the British soldiery. He has often trodden the forest amid all the dangers and vicissitudes that beset the traveller there. He has spent many days of toil in the field, laboring as a farmer. In all these situations and conditions--from youth to age--he has enjoyed the protecting care of Providence. But at last he was elevated to a great office; he became the occupant of a palace; he was the hope of a great nation; he was surrounded with friends, with mighty men, with skilful physicians, with tender nurses--with the great, the good, the prayerful--but all in vain. His time had come--the arrow was sped from the bow, and no human arm could stay its flight. And this should warn us all to consider well the lesson conveyed by this event--which is, that life and death are in the hands of God. He can protect us everywhere--in the cottage or the log-cabin, in the forest or the field; or he can take us away in the midst of power and pomp and riches. Let us therefore be ever prepared for the decisions of his wisdom.

THE APRIL SHOWER, A SONG.

THE WORDS AND MUSIC COMPOSED FOR MERRY’S MUSEUM.

Patter, patter, let it pour,
Patter, Patter, let it roar,
Down the steep roof let it rush,
Down the hill side let it gush,
’Tis the wlecome April shower
Which will wake the sweet May flower.

Patter, patter, let it pour!
Patter, patter, let it roar!
Let the gaudy lightning flash--
Let the headlong thunder dash--
’Tis the welcome April shower,
Which will wake the sweet May flower.

Patter, patter, let it pour!
Patter, patter, let it roar!
Soon the clouds will burst away--
Soon will shine the bright spring day,
Soon the welcome April shower
Will awake the sweet May flower!

My own Life and Adventures.

(_Continued from page 71._)