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inhabitants. In trading with the Maltese merchants, we soon found that
the prices asked by the dealers were about twice the amount the customer
was expected to pay, and that bargaining was as necessary in Malta as in
Algiers.

Almost all the costumes we saw on the streets were of the English style,
but the varied uniforms of soldiers and the distinctive garments of
Greeks, Turks, Spaniards, and Arabs added color and interest to the
scene. The Maltese women wear immense bonnets, called faldettas. These
peculiar bonnets have long skirts which reach to the waist and are
totally black without color or ornament. As the majority of the
inhabitants are Roman Catholics, we saw many priests and monks who wore
black robes and very broad-brimmed black hats turned up at the sides.

The Maltese are lovers of flowers, which are raised in profusion. At the
corners of the principal streets were small fanciful buildings, a few
feet in diameter, in which dark eyed brunettes offered flowers and
bonbons for sale. The people also love music. In the Opera House, an
elaborate structure, which, we were told, cost a quarter of a million
dollars, Grand Opera is given three times a week for six months in the
year.

We visited the old church of St. John, which was built three centuries
ago and lavishly adorned out of the proceeds of plunder that had been
taken from infidels and pirates. The tower above the church contains a
chime of ten bells, and the clock on the tower has a triple face, one
face showing the hour of the day, one showing the day of the week, and
the third, the day of the month. The heavy doors were open, but a
curtain of matting hung over the entrance. A ragged, barefoot boy ran
before us, and, drawing aside the matting that we might enter, extended
his hand for a penny. We walked over the beautiful inlaid mosaic marble
floor, and beheld handsomely painted ceilings with life-size figures
overhead, and richly decorated walls and pillars around us. A priest
with pride pointed out the famous paintings on the walls, the bronze and
the marble statues around the sides, and, in the various chapels, the
three huge iron keys which opened the gates of Jerusalem, Acre, and
Rhodes, and the gates of solid silver in front of the richly decorated
altar. As we stood before the silver gates our guide told us his little
story:

"When the French captured Malta in 1798 they carried away as booty the
most valuable possessions of the church in t