MALTA AND SICILY. 
155 
treme unproductiveness of this island in 
natural curiosities. 
I am informed by those who have resided 
here for some years, that the winter has been 
rather milder than usual. Our short and 
very imperfect observations on the weather, 
will be found at the end of this letter. The 
height of the thermometer has been noted 
at eight o’clock in the morning, and though 
a later hour in the day would, perhaps, have 
been preferable, the uncertainty of our being 
at home at that time would have occasioned 
a much greater number of omissions in this 
column than it already contains. 
But this register certainly presents much 
too favourable a view of the climate; for to our 
feelings the changes in the temperature have 
occasionally been painfully sudden, while the 
variation has appeared very much greater 
than the thermometer has indicated, and had 
