cruder
sisters of the Malay Archipelago. These women are frequently mothers at
the age of fourteen, and work as industriously in the field as at the
domestic hearth. The words "domestic hearth" are used in a conventional
manner, as their houses generally consist of one room, devoid of
windows, and a door so low as to render it necessary to stoop in order
to enter. This door is the only piece of wood in the structure, which is
composed of sun-dried clay. These dens, so utterly unfit for human
beings, are dark and dirty, but the people live and sleep much in the
open air. Such abodes are the natural outgrowth of degradation and
ignorance.

We waited four days at Port Said for the arrival of the P. and O.
steamship Rome, as she was detained by one of the numerous "blocks" in
the canal, but finally embarked on her for Malta and Gibraltar. The Rome
is a five thousand-ton ship, and the favorite of this company's
extensive fleet. Four days' sail, covering about a thousand miles, over
the erratic waters of the Mediterranean, now calm and now enraged,
brought us in sight of Malta. The city of Valetta lies immediately on
the shore; and when we dropped anchor in the snug little harbor, we were
surrounded by lofty forts, frowning batteries, and high stone buildings
of various sorts. There are two harbors, in fact, known as Quarantine
Harbor and Great Harbor. The Rome lay in the former. The island is about
twenty miles long and half as wide, and had a place in historical record
nearly three thousand years ago. We were not prepared, upon landing, to
find so large, and fine a city, numbering, as Valetta does, at least a
hundred and fifty thousand inhabitants. The houses are all large stone
structures, many of which are architecturally noticeable; fronting
thoroughfares of good width, well-paved, and in fine order, an aspect of
cleanliness and freshness pervading everything.

Few countries have known so many changes among their rulers as has this
Mediterranean island. Phoenicians, Greeks, Carthaginians, Romans,
Goths, and Arabs succeeded each other before our era, followed by
German, French, Spanish, and English rulers. During the sovereignty of
the Grand Masters it suffered the curse of the Inquisition, until the
Knights were deposed by the French, and that hateful and bloody agent of
the Romish Church was expelled. Not more heterogeneous are the
nationalities under which the island has been held than is the character
of its dialect