the now silent and deserted streets, while the wretches by whom it was attended, maddened by excess, or frantic from despair, too often shocked those whom curiosity attracted to their windows, by their profane mirth, and offensive ribaldry. I advert chiefly to the earlier periods of the plague; for, in course of time, there was less difficulty in procuring more responsible persons for such services, either from amongst those who had recovered from the disease, or from the numerous Levantines who resorted to the island from motives of interest. Several, too, of the prisoners of war, began to volunteer their services, on receiving large wages, and under the promise of being liberated after a stated period of service; and I am happy to add, that a large proportion of them survived to claim the fulfilment of this engagement. The persons thus engaged were now regularly classed. Some were appointed to attend in the pest-hospitals, under the direction of the medical officers; others were exclusively employed in the burial of the dead; and a great proportion were occupied in a service of peculiar danger, that of removing, from infected houses, the various articles of furniture and wearing apparel, which were burned or purified, as circumstances might require. Over each of these departments persons of respectability, and experience, (amongst whom were several merchants who had resided long in the Levant,) were appointed, to preside, while the general superintendence of the executive departments was vested in the Inspector General of Police.

It were difficult to convey an adequate idea of the various and complicated miseries to which the plague gave rise. Besides the suspension of judicial proceedings, the discontinuance of public worship, and the general cessation of social intercourse, there was a total stagnation of commerce; and extreme difficulty was experienced in procuring supplies adequate to the wants of so large a population. Shunned by our Sicilian, and even by our Barbaresque neighbours, upon whom the island mainly depended for provisions, the horrors of famine must have ensued, had not the Government adopted prompt and efficacious measures to ward off this additional calamity. The markets, like other places of public resort, were

shut; and the various necessaries of life were conveyed by means of carts, which plied at regular hours through the different districts of Valletta. Butcher's meat and vegetables were received in water mixed with vinegar. Bread alone might be received with safety; for by a kind provision of Providence, corn is, in the language of the Lazaretto, a non-susceptible article, and, as such, is always exempted from the performance of quarantine. Of the danger of neglecting the precautions I have just mentioned, a remarkable instance now occurs to me. An eminent Maltese physician, one of the members of the Council of Health, happened to be at his door when the provision cart stopped. Having directed a certain quantity of meat to be weighed out for the use of his family, be inadvertently received it from the hands of the butcher, instead of allowing the latter to plunge it, as usual, into water. The butcher, though not conscious of his situation, had been previously infected, for, before completing his usual round, he betrayed unequivocal symptoms of plague. The physician was shortly afterwards taken ill, and in the course of two or three days both died. You are aware, that in nothing is caution more requisite than in the receipt of letters; but after being cut, and for a short time exposed to the fumigation arising from burning straw, mixed with various ingredients, of which the most essential are sulphur and vinegar, the paper may be handled with perfect safety.

Amid the general distress, the Maltese found a great resource in the recitation of their devotional exercises. In the evening especially, the whole town resounded with the Ave Maria, the respective families being assembled at the doors, or on the flat roofs of their houses; and the circumstances of the times seemed to add a fervour to their devotions which rendered them peculiarly impressive. Although the churches were shut, many of the clergy were very actively and usefully employed in the exercise of their professional duties. The friars, in particular, were extremely assiduous in their attendance on the sick and the dying; and several of them used their influence over the minds of the people with great effect, inducing them to comply more readily with the salutary regulations

of Government. Of this I witnessed the following instance. In a district called the Manderaggio, inhabited only by the very lowest order of the people, the streets were so exceedingly narrow, and the houses contained so many families, that when the plague was once introduced, it became impossible to effect a separation of the sick from the uninfected, as in other districts. It was therefore deemed advisable to form an encampment in an airy situation by the sea, to which the inhabitants of the Manderaggio might be removed, while their houses, especially those where the plague had prevailed, should be thoroughly purified and ventilated. When their removal was proposed, they unanimously protested against it, declaring that nothing but absolute force should induce them to quit their houses. A friar of a neighbouring convent, on being apprised of this, came forward and harangued them on the folly of their conduct. He conjured them, as they valued their own lives, and those of their wives and children, to accede voluntarily to a measure which could have no other object than their safety, and the public good, inasmuch as it would be attended with considerable expence, and inconvenience, to the Government. And, above all, he represented their compliance as a duty which, as good Catholics, they were bound to perform. His arguments proved effectual; and the good man witnessed the quiet and orderly evacuation of the district, while he had the satisfaction to reflect that he was instrumental in preserving the lives of so many hundreds of his fellow-creatures. The ceremony of conveying the sacrament, or viaticum, to the dying in Roman Catholic countries, is always impressive. The tinkling of the bell which announces the approach of the host; the plaintive chanting of the priest and his attendants; and the prostration of those who happen to be in the street, unite in giving a great degree of solemnity to the scene. But now the constant recurrence of this ceremony occasioned the most painful reflections, as it denoted the increasing ravages of the plague. So much, indeed, were weak and nervous persons affected, that it was judged expedient to discontinue the usual formalities, and to have the viaticum privately conveyed by the priest, accom

panied by one or two attendants only. I have frequently seen the last offices of religion administered in the open street; for as soon as any one was seized with symptoms which indicated that he was infected, the priest was instantly sent for; and the patient having made his confession, and received absolution, the communion, and extreme unction, seemed quite resigned to his fate. At the commencement of the plague, several of the priests who were thus employed, died in consequence of their culpable neglect of the means of selfpreservation. After the first month or two, however, when the good effects of caution were seen, and appreciated, those pious offices were performed without much risk. I particularly remember a young Dominican friar, who was indefatigable in his attendance on the sick; and having had frequent access to witness his mode of proceeding on such occasions, I could not but admire his prudence, while I applauded his zeal. He approached just near enough to the sick person to hear his confession; he then conveyed to him the consecrated wafer by means of a silver rod; and extreme unction was administered with equal caution, by dipping cotton in the consecrated oil, and fixing it in a silver tube, care being taken, at the conclusion of the ceremony, to burn the cotton. When I add that this exemplary person, and others animated by the same zeal, although they continued their pious labours until the final extinction of the plague, totally escaped the contagion, may it not be inferred that the disease is, generally speaking, to be communicated only by actual contact with an infected body? I do not mean to say, that, in the confined dwellings of the poor, and other airless situations, the atmosphere may not become so highly impregnated with the pestiferous effluvia, as to render it dangerous even to enter the infected chamber; but whenever a thorough ventilation can be obtained, and immediate contact with the person, and the clothes of the sick person is avoided, he may be approached, I conceive, with perfect safety.

To enter into minute details, respecting the symptoms of this dreadful malady, would lead me too far. Besides, these vary so much at differ

such it was surrounded by a cordon of troops, and put under martial law. This measure, by which all intercourse with the Casal was cut off, was followed by the gradual re-establishment of free communication throughout all parts of the island; and before the end of the year, entire confidence was happily restored, and every thing reverted to that state, the suspension of which is almost as much to be deprecated as the malady itself. Early in the spring of 1814 the plague had entirely ceased, even in the illfated Casal Curmi; but to our utter dismay, an express arrived about the beginning of March from the island of Gozo, which had hitherto remained entirely free from infection, announcing that a person had recently died there whose case had excited great alarm. This was followed by a succession of cases, which plainly shewed that the alarm was but too well founded; and no time was lost by the government in adopting the most efficacious measures. The district where the plague had appeared was surrounded, like Casal Curmi, by a cordon of troops, and two months had not elapsed before the contagion was entirely suppressed. There was something so extraordinary in the cireumstances attending the introduction of the plague into Gozo, that although I have trespassed so long on your patience, I cannot but advert to them. The person by whom it appeared to have been conveyed, had recently performed a double quarantine of forty days at Malta, in consequence of his wife having died of plague. On his release from the Lazaretto he had readily obtained leave to proceed to Gozo; and having, on his arrival there, given out some clothes to be washed, they were no sooner handled by the laundress than she was seized with pestilential symptoms, and died. The man himself was soon after taken ill, and on his death-bed acknowledged that, previously to his embarking for Gozo, he had solicited leave to visit his own house, which had undergone a thorough purification; but he confessed, that, notwithstanding his having been attended by a health of fice guardian, he had privately dug up some wearing apparel of his deceased wife, which, during her illness, he had concealed in the garden, under the apprehension that it would

be burned. These articles he had taken with him to Gozo, and they formed a part of those which he had given out to be washed. Thus, it ap pears, that the pestilential miasmata inust have remained in the clothes for at least three months, and how much longer they might have continued while the clothes were excluded from the air, is matter of great uncertainty. A year had now elapsed from the first appearance of the plague at Malta until its final extinction in the island of Gozo; and when I state, that, during that period, the total amount of persons who died under the malady was considerably under 5000, out of a population exceeding 100,000, may it not be fairly inferred, that much was, under Providence, effected by the various means so anxiously and unremittingly applied towards mitigating the virulence, and arresting the progress of the disease? So much, indeed, may be effected, as I conceive, by a well regulated police, that, were the plague unfortunately to be again introduced into Malta, I have no doubt that it would be instantly suppressed, as the people, taught by sad experience, would readily submit to coercive measures, which, on the first suspicion of infection, cannot be too promptly arranged, or too rigidly enforced.

I might easily extend, my narrative by dwelling on the heart-rending scenes which were constantly occurring during this afflicting period; but having already detained you too long, I will confine myself to one or two of those which came under my own observation, and which are connected with some traits of generosity not unworthy of being recorded.

In passing one day along the street, I remarked that something must have recently occurred to have excited a more than ordinary degree of interest. The women especially appeared to be much affected; and on inquiring the cause, I was informed, that the Beccamorti having entered an infected house in the neighbourhood to remove the body of a man who had recently died, had discovered that the only surviving member of the family was an infant whom they found at the breast of the mother, who had just expired. It was not long before a Maltese woman came forward to receive the child, at the imminent risk of