land of four hundred and sixteen square cannas; and their average harvest amounts, according to their different lands, from one to two quintals each tumulo.

Antiquities. We viewed these rapidly, and without any design to study them. As they are described in an infinity of books, I shall do no more than notice them, for the purpose of giving a faithful and complete idea of my whole tour. "Temples.-Besides the remains, which are mentioned above, of the temple of Olympian Jove, in that of Minerva, (now the cathedral,) we have to admire some fine co lumns; and the antiquarians shew in a house not far off fragments of columns, which are supposed to have belonged to the temple of Diana.

"The Latomia.-That, vulgarly called the Ear of Dionysius, is the most famous, because it returns a curious and most sonorous echo: there are many others here, as at the church of the Capuchins; which may be regarded as so many monuments of the ancient Syracusan grandeur. All this looks well; but I would take occasion to ask (as an agriculturist) whether with many and such extensive prisons, for such we are informed they were in Achradina, excavated under enormous rocks with so much labour and art, it affords consoling arguments of that public happiness, which Sicily is supposed to have enjoyed in those which they consider its most fortunate epochas ?

"The Theatre-Is in Neapolis; and of it there remains only an outline of the form and the seats shaped out of the living rock; which, how ver, do not partake of the grand. requested Signor Landolina to tell ne if possible how many persons t was calculated for in an assem

blage of the people at a theatrical representation, and what it was capable of holding? and he told me, that according to the most patient calculations of an intelligent English traveller, it was found that it might have contained forty thousand people: to which I answered, That considering all the circumstances of the Greek Sicilian republics, such a capability in the theatre was a proof of a very large population; but not the enormous and inconceivable number of millions, as some learned men, too much inclined to the marvellous, have attributed to the ancient Syracuse."

"The Amphitheatre-Has been lately discovered, tolerably spared by the destructive hand of time, so that the seats may be distinctly observed, and they resemble those of the theatre.

"The Vomitories, the doors and entire portico, with the façade yet remain, &c.-We contemplated it with great attention and interest, but without pleasure; for our imaginations pourtrayed to us the painful scenes that were here exhibited from the horrid ferocity of the Romans, in the less happy times of this republic.

"Catacombs.-These dark and frightful caverns intended for the sepulture of dead bodies, so extend themselves, and are so deep in the bowels of the earth, that it is difficult, without considerable practice, to find the way out.

"The hermit established there and others assured us that they are cool in the summer, and always warm in winter; which may be explained by saying, that the air there communicating little or at all with the external air, preserves nearly the same temperature all the year round as is observed in the celebrated caves at Paris.

The

T o'clock I arrived at

were taken

the

and fine town, of 20,000 inhabitants; but as it has been described by other travellers, and I know you are better pleased to hear of people than things, I will tell you, that upon my arrival in the market place, I was surrounded by a crowd, with cries of Viva l' Inglese,'-all anxious to hear the news from the coast, at this interesting period-for it is inconceivable how little intercourse of information there is to the inland towns of Sicily, that are not immediately in the high road from the capital to Messina, &c. I conceive there is the same sort of information of what is doing at Petersburgh, in the deserts of Siberia-that is to say, by the arrival of a traveller, who says what he pleases. They absolutely know nothing-there are no newspapers published in Sicily, where the press is severely restricted, except the Gazetta' of Palermo, which has only a few extracts from foreign papers, and no domestic news whatever, except the arrival and departure of the royal family; and the Gazette Britannica,' established lately at Messina, since the English have been there, which of course only gives military and circumscribed details, modelled by the hopes and wishes of the writer, which are truly patriotic. At length a spokesman advanced, to beg my Eccellenza (for we are all Eccellenzas), to tell them whether it was true that 10,000 French

peasants? As soon as I had qualified this news so as to leave them in perfect good humour, and particularly with the efforts of their countrymen, the peasants, I hastened to my locanda, which is even here bad, and dirty, and was ushered into a room by a robustious periwig-pated landlady, a woman of forty, dressed to the life, with the voice of a Stentor, who, if she was not perfectly qualified for a queen of the Amazons, could exhibit most formidable and prominent pretensions as Chief of the Staff and while my baggage was bringing in, she ran through her history with surprising volubility;

that she was overjoyed to see me, and delighted in the English; that she was an unfortunate woman, from having married a dolt, and a native of one of the provinces, by which she was condemned, though a native of Palermo, to pass the flower of her days in a wretched country town; but she was not without her hopes of getting there in the winter!" And where is your husband, Donna amabile ?' said I Behold him!' said she-' Come forward, Don Pietro;' and at the door I beheld a miserable looking creature,

"So pale, so woe-begone, "Drew Priam's curtains in the dead of night;"

wbo, making a low bow, said, ' he was entirely at my service.' Then

make

HE entrance to the harbour of Valetta is truly grand. On each side, and in front, the fortifications-rise in stupendous masses, with a watch-tower perched here and there on the corners. The buildings and domes above them have also a very noble appearance. Not a particle of smoke sullies the atmosphere; and every edifice looks as if it were only just finished. The internal appearance of the city corresponds to the magnificence of its exterior. The landing-place is an extensive crescent; from which a gentle ascent, partly excavated in the rock, leads towards a gate. The one side of this way is occupied with the stalls of dealers in fish, fruits, and other necessaries. Immediately in front of the drawbridge is a handsome fountain, ornamented with a bronze statue of Neptune; and, on entering the gateway, the stairs, which conduct to the upper part of the town, immediately commence, making the entrance, in some respects, more like the vestibule of a great mansion, than the portal of a city. Nothing can be more striking than the streets which are first ascended after passing this gateway. They are, in fact, so many vast staircases; and the buildings that rise prospectively in the ascent, are ornamented with cornices and projections, so huge, that the architecture seems to have been designed to correspond in strength and durability with the fortifications.

"The domestic architecture of the Maltese cannot be considered

as regulated by the established rules of good taste; nevertheless, the picturesque effect is grand; and one meets, occasionally, with vistas that seem more like the concep tions of a painter than the limited realities of an inhabited town.

"Inn.-There was no tolerable hotel in Malta while I happened to be there; but one, sufficiently spacious, was preparing, and has since, I understand, been opened. The house, in which I obtained lodgings, had formerly been a tavern; but the owner was induced to give it up for a singular reason. . When it was an inn,' said the waiter, a Sicilian, who spoke English, it was so full of noises, that there was no living in it. The officers of the men of war came making noises. They went to the play, and came back making noises. Then there were the stranger gentlemen, all English, making noises-sitting up in the night, singing, roaring, jumping on the tables, breaking glasses. O, my God! what terrible noises! So we put down the sign from the wall; and, if there be less money now, we have no noises.'

Monopoly of Grain.-The bread in Malta is the worst I ever tasted; and I was not a little surprized, when I learnt the reason. The government, as in the time of the knights, still monopolizes the sale of corn; and the profit derived from the trade is one of the principal sources of the revenue appropriated to defray the expense of the civil establishment. The simple statement of this fact, is, certainly, not calculated to convey a very fa

vourable