120 
For the Monthly Magazine. 
ACCOUNT of a recent VOYAGE t0 MALTA, 
and SiCiLy. 
(Continued from p17, of laf? Number.) 
HAD the happinefs of experiencisg 
on my return the fame fincere welcome 
from my former very kind friends, which 
IT had met with on my firft arrival from 
England, and therefore felt much the more 
feverely the early departure of the chief of 
them, the C——and his family on their 
return to England, a few days after my 
artival. 
Our old hoft and hoftefs, a Venetian, 
long a fervant to a very refpectable old 
Spanith Baill of the Order, and his wife, a 
Roman, were heartily glad to fee us again. 
Their attentions during the fublequent 
three weeks which I paffed here, in com- 
pany, and the five weeks I atterwards 
{pent in their houfe alore, contributed very 
effectually to relieve the enmuz, which two 
months’ refidence in this place of arms, 
during the heats of July and Auguft, mutt 
otherwife have rendered very grievous. 
We had returned here with confiderable 
hafte from Sicily, under an idea that a 
number of tranfports would immediately 
be ordered to Egypt; defirous of taking 
our pafiage in one of them. Our infor- 
mation on this fubje& proved incorreét, 
and determined us to relinquifh that plan 
per force at the end of three weeks 5 
after which period, I waited alone in 
Malta the arrival of a frigate, commanded 
by an acquaintance of mine, dceftmed, as 
was faid, for Smyrna, and likely to touch 
at Athens. In this {econd expectation I 
was difappointed; for on the arrival of 
the frigate from Sicily at the end of five 
weeks, I had the mortification of finding 
her deftination changed to Leghorn and 
Genoa. 
I employed thefe two months after my 
fecond armval in Malta, in retracing 
much of the ground I had already trod, 
and in corre€iing or confirming my palt 
more curfory ebfervations. They are, 
however, all thrown together, a little dif- 
fering from the order of time in fome in- 
ftances to avoid perplexity and inconve- 
Nient repetition. 
The rainy fcafon of Malta continuing 
from tne latter end of O&tober, with Hittle 
intermiffion, till the middle of December, 
and two or three of the following months, 
though without any froft or fnow, being 
often chilly and ungenial; I may con- 
fidey the pericd I was familiar with the 
ifland to have been the moft interetting 
part of the year, from the end of April 
Account of a recent Voyage to Malta, and Sicily. 
[Sept. 1 
till the latter end of Auguft: within that 
time the corn, which I found on my arrival 
from England in the ear, ripened and 
yielded to the operation of harveft, which 
is here performed not with the fickle, but 
by pulling up the whole plant. 
The cotton, whofe jieaf was fcarcely 
perceptible, podded. The blofloms, or 
green embryos of the vine, apricot, melon, 
nectarine, almond, and pomegranate ripen- 
ed to delicious fruit; and the whole floral 
feafon, fuch as the arid complexion of Mal- 
ta can afford, from the fpring-violet and 
the midfummer-rofe or prickly fig to the 
blooms of early autumn, pafled by. — The 
orange feafon was nearly paft, to return 
only in November. 
I bad now abundant leifure to revilit 
again and again the fine churches of La 
Valetta to gaze at its numerous reli- 
gious pageantries, to toil over its feem. 
ingly interminable fortifications, and to 
faunter through the noble gardens of St. 
Antonio, and the cooler fequeftered retire- 
ments of the Bofquetta. I pafled many 
mornings at the public library, preparing 
outlines of my intended route eaftwaid, 
converfing with the learned librarian there, 
or filling up too much tedium of leifure 
with my friends or my intelligent hoft. 
Sometimes I took a fparonaro, to explore 
the feveral crannies and divifion of the 
harbours of La Valetta, and once pre« 
pared to vifit Gozo; but the arrival of a 
friend from the Levant arrefted me; and 
the fear of the expected frigate arriving 
during my abfence from La. Valetta, 
obliged me to forego, thenceforward, that 
or any other excurfion of diflance. I 
found but few objeéts in the animal king- 
dom particularly deferving ne tice in Malta. 
What ftruck me molt was the infinity of 
fmall brown and green lizards, not only 
in every rocky road .and every wall, bat 
on every part of the fortifications of La 
Valetta. I faw, alfo, once or twice a 
larger fpecies of the fame tribe, which the 
Sicilians term a licherdone, brown and 
afh coloured, about ten or twelve inches 
in Jength ; the common lizard feldom ex- 
ceeding feven inches: ail thefe are per- 
fe&tly harmlefs. Some very fmaii {cor- 
pions, two inches and a helf long, were 
fhewn me, that had been picked up in the 
commiffary’s ftores of wood; but Iam 
perfuaded they muit be rare. I found 
two {mall dead {nakes, about two feet and 
a half long: I was really not naturalift 
enough todetermine whether venomous or 
not: they were brown and ath-coloured, 
Tie Maltele labourers, to whom I fhewed 
them, pronounced them harmlefs. In- 
deed, 
