Spring of the year 425 before Christ, a stream of lava ravaged the region of Catania, and he says, that this was the third eruption since the colonizing of Sicily by the Greeks. The second of these eruptions occurred 475 before Christ, and was described by Pindar two years afterwards, in his first Pythian Ode. The passage referred to has been translated thus:

"Etna his giant form restrains,

Whose towering height the cloud sustains,-
Nurse of the sharp perennial snow.

Forth from her inmost caverns urge their way
Fountains of pure and unapproached fire,
Rivers of smoke, that blot the face of day,
And from their source of lurid flame aspire.
But flashes of bright hue illume

The horrors of nocturnal gloom;

And hurl the rocks, with thundering sound,
Whelmed in the watery gulf profound.

The restless monster, from his burning seat,

Sends up to heaven the springs of direst heat;

And strikes with mute surprise their eye and ear,

Who see the wondrous fire, and sounds prodigious hear!"

One form of desolation resulting from the volcanic action of Etna has been the deluges caused by the melting of snow by lava. On the 2d of March, 1755, two streams of lava from the highest crater of Etna suddenly fell upon an enormous mass of snow, which then covered the whole mountain to a great depth. The melting of this frozen mass by the fiery torrent of lava, three miles in length, produced a frightful inundation, which laid waste the sides of the mountain for eight miles in length, covering its lower portions, and the plains below with vast deposits of sand, scoriæ, and blocks of lava.

The length of time required for the decomposition of the surface of a bed of lava so as to form a good soil, varies with the nature of the rocks which have been melted in order to form the lava. That composed of schistus, hornstone, and trap, and abounding in iron and sulphur, decomposes in two or three centuries, while lava in the form of obsidian, pumice, and other vitreous matter, such as is produced by the fusion of silex, felspar, or asbestos, may resist the action of the elements for thousands of years. Thus we find, that while some masses of lava in the Eolian islands bear no verdure, though they have existed beyond the reach of history, others have a spontaneous vegetation, though dating back 10

VOL. II.

but about 200 years. Since the destruction of Herculaneum, also, in the year 79, six eruptions have flowed over the town, and on each of these layers are veins of good soil, making about 250 years for each layer. Hence, we see the folly and ignorance of those infidel writers who, from some isolated facts, concluded that 2,000 years was required for the natural formation of a soil on a bed of lava, and, finding in a given place, seven layers of soil on as many beds of lava, one above the other, sagely decided, that the earth must have existed at least 14,000 years, and that, therefore, Moses labored under a serious mistake as to the age of our world. Truly, "A little learning is a dangerous thing."

CHAPTER XIX.

MALTA.

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La Valette; the Island. Agriculture. History.- Knights of Malta; their History and Morals. Church of St. John.-Capuchin Convent. Government Palace. Ancient Armour. - Libraries.-University of Malta. Instruction in Hebrew.-Seminary for Priests. - Population. - Beg. gars. - Lady Georgiana Wolff. - Hospital. - House of Industry.- Asylum for the Poor.-Catholic Persecution and Perjury. - Military Force. Morals of Military Men. - Calêche. - Female Dress. - Maltese Ladies.Fortifications. Aqueduct. Gardens. - Civita Vecchia. - Cathedral. Grotto of St. Paul.- Catacombs.-St. Paul's Bay. Meleda. - Shipwreck of Paul.- Ancient Burial Places. - Tombs.- Caves. -Catacombs of Rome; of Naples.- Campo Santo of Naples.- Horrid Scene.

WE were at Malta during the heat of midsummer, and a hotter place than the harbour where we lay, enclosed as it was on each side by the bare limestone rocks of which the island is composed, I sincerely hope it may never be my lot to visit. The town of La Valette is built upon an elevated neck of land which divides the harbour into two parts, one of which is occupied by ships in quarantine, and the other by those which have obtained prattique. Though our visit there, as far as social intercourse was concerned, was peculiarly pleasant, yet, such was the heat, that at times we might well exclaim with the poet,

"And now, O Malta! since thou 'st got us,
Thou little military hot-house,

I'll not offend with words uncivil,

And rudely wish thee aught that 's evil;

But only stare from out my casement,

And ask,-for what is such a place meant?"

The island of Malta is about twenty miles long, twelve broad, and sixty in circumference. It is one great rock of, white calcareous freestone, covered extensively with an artificial soil, which is kept in its place by means of walled terraces. This soil has been obtained in part from the valleys where it was formed from the decomposition of the rocks around, and in some cases, it has been imported from Sicily. The rock of the island, though so soft as to be easily cut into blocks for building, and carved at a small expense into a great

variety of beautiful urns, vases, and other ornamental articles for exportation, and, as it is claimed, imparting moisture to the plants which grow upon it, yet, on exposure to the air for a length of time, it becomes so hard as to form a valuable and durable building material. The terraces rise one above another, without any regular form, regard being had only to the direction of the declivities on which they are built, and to properly securing the soil from being washed away by violent torrents of rain. In preparing it for cultivation, the upper and hardened surface of the rock is first removed, and the larger fragments being placed in a layer at the bottom, the smaller next above, and the finest at the top, as in the case of Macadamized roads, a bed of soil and manure about a foot in depth is spread over these stones, and then the whole is ready for planting. The products of the island are wheat, barley, cotton in considerable quantities, fine figs, and the delicious Sicily or blood orange, produced by engrafting the bud of the common orange upon the pomegranate tree. I also visited, in the centre of the island, a silk manufactory, enclosed in a fertile and delightful valley, watered by a copious fountain, and shaded by the rich and luxuriant foliage of overhanging trees.

Malta was anciently called Melita, from a Greek word signifying honey, which article it yielded in great abundance. Cicero speaks of it as superior to that of any other country, and others remark, that it equalled if it did not surpass that of Hybla. The interior of the island still abounds with honey, the hives being made, as in the East, horizontal, and often placed in ranges one above another. Malta was early used by the Phoenicians as a dépôt for their trade in the West, and the Tyrians built, near the centre of the island, the city now known as Civita Vecchia.

From the Phoenicians, Malta came into the possession of Carthage; and the Arabic dialect, which is still spoken in the island, is said to retain many traces of its Phoenician origin. In the first Punic war, it was plundered by the Romans, and in the second taken by them. This change of masters causing its commerce to decline, it became a haunt of pirates. At length, falling into the hands of the Goths, it was taken from them by Belisarius, in the year 533. The Arabs subdued it in 870, and the Normans in 1090. It was given for a possession to the Knights of St. John, by the Emperor Charles the Fifth, in 1530, from whom it was taken by

the French under Bonaparte, when on their way to Egypt in 1798; and, two years afterwards, the British subdued and still hold it.

There is much of romantic interest in the history of the Knights of St. John, or, as we commonly call them, the Knights of Malta, from the time when, in the eleventh century, they founded at Jerusalem a hospital for the care and relief of poor and weary pilgrims, and, by the fame of their noble and generous hospitality, secured the gift of immense riches and extensive domains in every part of Europe, as a means of increasing their charitable benefactions; and from thence, onward, through a period of seven centuries, when, as a military order, girded with the panoply of war, residing at first at Jerusalem, then on the seacoast of Palestine, and afterwards on the islands of Rhodes and of Malta, they were, both by sea and land, the shield and the buckler of Christendom, and the scourge and the terror of the Moslem power in the East. History scarce furnishes a parallel to the acts of heroic valor, of chivalrous daring, and self-sacrificing devotion, which marked the numerous wars and sieges in which these Christian knights were engaged. For several centuries they were the main defence of the commerce of Southern and Western Europe, in the Mediterranean, protecting it alike from the corsairs of Barbary, and the aggressions of the Moslem powers of the East. They also did much, by their naval prowess, and their gallant achievements at sea, to prevent the subjection of the whole of Western Europe to the dominion of the Saracens.

At present, however, we have to do with these men only in their connexion with that island which was their last permanent abode, and where, too, they have left such numerous and enduring traces of their power and wealth. When these soldier-monks, after having been driven forth by the overwhelming power of the Turks, from the fertile and delightful island of Rhodes, which for centuries had been their home, and having for seven years been pilgrim exiles in the south of Europe, came to fix their abode in Malta, their prospects were sad, indeed. Save a dilapidated fortress, manned by a single gun, there was not on this then wretched and sterile rock, a single edifice superior to a fisherman's hut. The thinly scattered soil was of so coarse and arid a kind, that grain would not vegetate in it; there were no rivulets, and the only springs were in the interior, so that water for use