Morning journal and courier. [volume] (New Haven [Conn.]) 1848-1894, 1892-03-26

| IL was rlmmeG with summer OF RlieteD'
ing ripples as my, shining and slumber.
GUS as though but echoing the dreamful
songs of siren, inviting to haven Of end
less sleep.
High upon hill seven miles to the south
west of Valetts stsnds Citta Vecchia.. the
| walled capital of the island before Grand
Master John de Valette built the splendid
city which now crowns Mount Sceberras.
| At the beginning of the Christian era IL
contained the house of the ''ehief man of
| the island" who 80 ''courteously entreat-
ed" the shipwrecked Paul. Its cathedral
| of St. Paul had its traditional origin dur
| ing the three months' residence of the
| apostle, as Publius is said to have given
/ a portion of his own pAlace as q site for
| the first church and to have officiated in
/ 1t as Mslta's first bishop
That was a long time ago; but the anti
| auafed character of the city draws one
| kindlily to these old and loved traditions
| Seen from a distance, its mighty walls,
cumbrous structures, fiat roofs, vast pal
| aces and immense domes, rising like some
| far and fanciful mountain of drrsm-built
cubes, pillars, arches and Gaping domes
render it the most impressive structural
perspective in Europe. When Valetta was
built the former grandeur of Citta Vec-
CHA departed. By and by the great man
sions were transformed into seminaries,
monasteries and converts, and thus they
remain. Its tremendous walls shut IN few
others than monks, religious students,
nuns and novitiates. The great statue of
Juno, queen of all the gods who presided
over marriage, which is embedded in the
main gateway, seems strangely ont of
place as the escutcheon of a city of reli-
gious recluses.
The buildings are massive, ashen colored
by time, and strangely silent. The streets
are narrow, shadowful and still. The
great dungeons beneath the huge Sanitori-
ua,, once the palace of the Giursti, or the
three magistrates of the city, are no more
palpable with silence than are these high
walled narrow streets. No sound is heard
save the changing of bells as the call to
endless devotions. Then the thorough
fares are suddenly filled with bowed and
dark-robed figures for a moment, and
again as suddenly become lifeless, dark
and still.
The catacombs beneath Citta Vecchia
and the prehistoric rock-hewn tombs of
Mnaidra are almost q welcome relief from
the solemnity and solemn shades of this
old place. The passages and chambers of
the catacombs are lacking mural decora-
ton, but they are of the same character
as those at Syracuse, and are much larger
than any single examples to be found at
Rome. They are hewn out of the soft
stratum of the upper limestone on which
Citta Vecchis stands. You reach them
through perpendicular shaft, and a few
steps bring you into perfect maze of tun-
nels leading in every direction, with erypts
on each side and at every possible level.
These tunnels and their branch tunnels
seem interminable. 1 counted upwards of
eight hundred separate sepulchres, and
there are no doubt many thousands. One
passage or gallery of very large proper
tions was found which opened into caps-
cious squares or chambers, where the
crypts were fashioned as though for the
more distinguished dead. Their proper
tions were more ample and they We're bet
ter formed in every respect. In many
rest for the head and neck was raised and
followed in excellent contour; and by the
side of others were excsvated inches for
urns and the lamp for votive and other
sepulchral Offices.
However ancient was the race that excs-
waited or required such vast area for bur
ial, il is c-rtain that these crypts Were
equally as extensive in the days of the
Romans, two thousand years ago. They
are completely barren of all remains, as
they were for long time used as abodes
for the living, the primitive Christians
having fed to them for refuge; and they
have been on various occasions the sbodes
of the early Maltese when flying from the
swords of the Goth, Vandal, Moor and
Turk. No one has ever fully explored
them; and find from the natives that the
belief among them is universal that sub
terrsnean passages lead TO Vsletta and to
other remote points in the island.
These are not the only prehistoric re-
mains of great interest to be found on the
islands. Diminutive oatscombs and rock
hewn tombs are accessible in nearly every
important valley ravine or rocky gorge in
both Malta and Gozs. Extensive cata-
combs are found in Micabba, Tower Ma
dur, st. Pauls and Melliha bays, and
Mnaidra; while at Hhagiar-Kim and Mnsi-
dra in Malta and at the Giants Tower, in
Coco, saw megslithic monuments rival
ing in massiveness and mystery the Stone
henge of England aud the vast pagan mon
ument of New Grange, on the Boyne in
Ireland. l was shown q great and solitary
monolith standing near Har Hssssn cave,
on the south coast of Malta. There is
dolmsn-like ruin on Cordino Hill over
looking Valetta. And l measured upright
blocks in the Hhagiar-Kim ruin twenty
four feet high, while in the cyclopean Gil
ants Tower l found several with height
of twenty-eight aud thirty feet Their
additional length beneath the debris sur
rounding them must have been considers
BILE. All of these tremendous monoliths
were put in place thousands of years ago
by people capable of qusrrying and
transporting them from sandstone beds,
nearly mile distant, for the purpose of
some form of alteration. They did their
work SO well that, while all other traces of
their race are lost, these mute monuments
have brought the story true from almost
unrecorded time of the eternal principle
of worship in the heart of man.
From my habit of wandering alone. and
much in the country, in foreign lands,
have come to regard their birds as my
most charming chance acquaintances. Alb
solutely without trees, save those trans
planted and nurtured like exotic flowers,
Malta would hardly be regarded as the
haunt of birds. And yet have seen or
heard here in midwinter nearly every one
of the loved and humble sort we'll known
in summer time in northern climes.
Along the stony roads / have kept ex-
ultant pace with the hopping stonechat
and redstart, and chirped back a CHEEKY
greeting to hocks of chafinches among the
white and gold of the orange trees
Climbing the cliffs, or pothering among
the ruins, the melodies of thrush or lin
net have flooded the sky from the olive
trees in the valleys below. Crossing the
walled helds have often come upon mar
shalled hosts of titlarks. Rocks, wrens,
cross bills and fieldfares all welcomed me
in a homeland language 1 knew. The call
notes of the reed-sparrow peopled the ia
nous island of the sword and cowl with
olden forms and faces; and as the bslmy
evenings came, the stillicidic, murmurous
and ever-plaintive songs of the blackbirds
thrilled me with half forgotten voices, un-
til my heart cried out
Thus, angel of our later days.
With ever-hovering, unseen hand
Are flas"ed upon our blinded ways
The hi den shrines understand
We climb the rugged sleeps of Truth,
And falter l. thy hplpings bring
The lesser to the larger Youth!
note, a tou-, the hum blest thing
Sweeps irr-sistless all between,
And there the Now prays with the Then
Where once our heaven was lived unseen,
And where, like pilgrims come again,
We hear the blackb rds, nesting, sing
| Their tender songs of evening"
4 II