St. Johnsbury Caledonian. [volume] (St. Johnsbury, Vt.) 1867-1919, 1880-02-27
Malta Life.
Editor d. N. Richardson's Letters to his Daven-
port Democrat

ltultOf D. N. Richardson's Letters to his Dayen-
port DemOcrat.I
MALTA, Jan. ., 1880.
In Malta-dead of wnter-fruit ri
pening and blossoming; last and sixth
crop of clover almost ready to be cut;
fourth yearly crop Of turnips and cab
bage coming into market, more plant
ed and some half grown; oranges dead
ripe gu same branch with orange bios
SONS; people going about the stony
streets bare-foOted and bare-headed.
The summer dress of New England
States just right for Malta now. You
go out with light Overcoat or leave it
in the house-it's all the same. If YOU
had it not you might think you needed
it; or, if You have it, think it better
left at home.
Only the houses are cold, the over
coat more needed in your room than on
the street. Cause why? Houses are
built for summer more than winter.
Built with thick walls-fve feet, per-
haps, of solid tuta stone to keep the
heat out. In rooms no place for fire :;
stone floors, stone walls, ceiling of
stone. Look at my hotel chamber, if
you please-a stony cavern-a cave in
the rocks. Stone floor, with a carpet
on in winter, but so thin that YOU can
feel the stone through it. Stone wall
Pll measure tits six feet thick par
titiOn wall between me and the stair
case hall is four feet thick ceiling of
arched stone, to support the floor
above. Walls plastered on the stone
then tinted pale blue-the tinting over
figures in colOred pattern worked in
stencil, initiating paper hanging. Win
dOws, outer blinds, Venetian STYLE,
heavy and strong; then come the sash
and glass, and last the inner-light
board shutter, wiping out the sun in
total darkness in brightest midday.
Door of wood, with rusty iron lock
wrought out by hand, with key of mas
sive weight, and latch and knob, il
bungling blacksmith's work.
Such is my room in the best hotel in
Malta, built to defy the summers sun.
Let such a room get cold, as this one
has, by the action of the little coldness
that comes on in this month, aided by
g three or four days "norther," and it
don't get out till spring. Room rather
raw and chilly this very night, at ten
O'Clock; yet, if l step out upon the
ouOCe, du OVtTCOuJ Is DulOen. Sucl
is Maltese climate. You arrive at your
hotel, and want sunny bedroom.
GreenhOIn Bedrooms are made to
avoid the sun in Malta-made for sum-
mer sleeping-and summer lasts nine
tenths the whole year round. Put on
your overcoat if you are chilly, and
take it off when you go out.
A fine old place is Malta | rather
like 1T. The entire island is only sixty
miles around originally solid tufa
rock, which time has so far rOtted as to
change the top of it to soil. Drive
through the country and it is walled
and walled and walled. Mention stone
walls IN Vermont Why, man alive
there are a hundred miles in Malta of
stout stone wall to one in any state in
the Union. Pm speaking by the book.
The roads are narrow and rock-bot-
toned. The walls that fence them are
high and thick. Then the fields are
walled into small patches and then
again the side hills are terraced up with
walls to hold the soil they have in
place, that plants may live and thrive.
Some run along the roads, are only
walls-the eye glancing from one stone
renee to another-seeming nothing else
but wall. No trees are there-exeept
a precious few-and SO the country is
rather mOnOtOnOus. But look little
further No country in the world in