mild. Pleasant north-east winds blow for an average of 150 days a

year, cool northerly winds for 31 days, east winds 70 days, west for 34 days. The north-west "Gregale" (Euroclydon of Acts xxvii. 14) blows about the equinox, and occasionally, in the winter months, with almost hurricane force for three days together; it is recorded to have caused the drowning of 600 persons in the harbour in 1555. This wind has been a constant menace to shipping at anchor; the new breakwater on the Monarch Shoal was designed to resist its ravages. The regular tides are hardly perceptible, but, under the influence of barometric pressure and wind, the sea-level occasionally varies as much as 2 ft. The average rainfall is 21 in.; it is, however, uncertain; periods of drought have extended over three years. Snow is seen once or twice in a generation; violent hailstorms occur. On the 19th of October 1898, exceptionally large hailstones fell--one, over 4 in. in length, being brought to the governor, Sir Arthur Fremantle, for inspection. Mediterranean (sometimes called "Malta") fever has been traced by Colonel David Bruce to a _Micrococcus melitensis_. The supply of water under pressure is widely distributed and excellent. There is a modern system of drainage for the towns, and all sewerage has been intercepted from the Grand Harbour. There are efficient hospitals and asylums, a system of sanitary inspection, and modernized quarantine stations.

Flora.

It is hardly possible to differentiate between imported and indigenous plants. Among the marine flora may be mentioned _Porphyra laciniata_, the edible laver; _Codium tomentosum_, a coarse species; _Padina pavonia_, common in shallow water; _Ulva latissima_; _Haliseris polypodioides_; _Sargassum bacciferum_; the well-known gulf weed, probably transported from the Atlantic; _Zostera marina_, forming dense beds in muddy bays; the roots are cast up by storms and are valuable to dress the fields. Among the land plants may be noted the blue anemone; the ranunculus along the road-sides, with a strong perfume of violets; the Malta heath, which flowers at all seasons; _Cynomorium coccineum_, the curious "Malta fungus," formerly so valued for medicinal purposes that a guard was set for its preservation under the rule of the Knights; the pheasant's-eye; three species of mallow and geranium; _Oxalis cernua_, a very troublesome imported weed; _Lotus edulis_; _Scorpiurus subvillosa_, wild and cultivated as forage; two species of the horseshoe-vetch; the opium poppy; the yellow and claret-coloured poppy; wild rose; _Crataegus azarolus_, of which the fruit is delicious preserved; the ice-plant; squirting cucumber; many species of _Umbelliferae_; _Labiatae_, to which the spicy flavour of the honey (equal to that of Mt Hymettus) is ascribed; snap-dragons; broom-rape; glass-wort; _Salsola soda_, which produces when burnt a considerable amount of alkali; there are fifteen species of orchids; the _gladiolus_ and _iris_ are also found; _Urginia scilla_, the medicinal squill, abounds with its large bulbous roots near the sea; seventeen species of sedges and seventy-seven grasses have been recorded.

Fauna.

There are four species of lizard and three snakes, none of which is venomous; a land tortoise, a turtle and a frog. Of birds very few are indigenous; the jackdaw, blue solitary thrush, spectacled warbler, the robin, kestrel and the herring-gull. A bird known locally as _Hangi_, not met elsewhere in Europe, nests at Filfla. Flights of quail and turtle doves, as well as teal and ducks, stay long enough to afford sport. Of migratory birds over two hundred species have been enumerated. The only wild mammalia in the island are the hedgehogs, two species of weasel, the Norway rat, and the domestic mouse. The Maltese dog was never wild and has ceased to exist as a breed.

Malta has several species of zoophytes, sponges, mollusca and crustacea. Insect life is represented by plant-bugs, locusts, crickets, grasshoppers, cockroaches, dragon-flies, butterflies, numerous varieties of moths, bees and mosquitoes.

Among the fish may be mentioned the tunny, dolphin, mackerel, sardine, sea-bream, dentice and pagnell; wrasse, of exquisite rainbow hue and good for food; members of the herring family, sardines, anchovies, flying-fish, sea-pike; a few representatives of the cod family, and some flat fish; soles (very rare); _Cernus_ which grows to large size; several species of grey and red mullet; eleven species of _Triglidae_, including the beautiful flying gurnard whose colours rival the angel-fish of the West Indies; and eighteen species of mackerel, all migratory.

Population and Language.

The real population of Malta, viz. of the country districts, is to be differentiated from the cosmopolitan fringe of the cities. There is continuous historical evidence that Malta remains to-day what Diodorus Siculus described it in the 1st century, "a colony of the Phoenicians"; this branch of the Caucasian race came down the great rivers to the Persian Gulf and thence to Palestine. It carried the art of navigation through the Mediterranean, along the Atlantic seaboard as far as Great Britain, leaving colonies along its path. In prehistoric times one of these colonies displaced previous inhabitants of Libyan origin. The similarity of the megalithic temples of Malta and of Stonehenge connect along the shores of western Europe the earliest evidence of Phoenician civilization. Philology proves that, though called "Canaanites" from having sojourned in that land, the Phoenicians have no racial connexion with the African descendants of Ham. No subsequent invader of Malta attempted to displace the Phoenician race in the country districts. The Carthaginians governed settlements of kindred races with a light hand; the Romans took over the Maltese as "dedititii," not as a conquered race. Their conversion by St Paul added difference of religion to the causes which prevented mixture of race. The Arabs from Sicily came to eject the Byzantine garrison; they treated the Maltese as friends, and were not sufficiently numerous to colonize. The Normans came as fellow-Christians and deliverers; they found very few Arabs in Malta. The fallacy that Maltese is a dialect of Arabia has been luminously disproved by A. E. Caruana, _Sull' origine della lingua Maltese_.

The upper classes have Norman, Spanish and Italian origin. The knights of St John of Jerusalem, commonly called "of Malta," were drawn from the nobility of Catholic Europe. They took vows of celibacy, but they frequently gave refuge in Malta to relatives driven to seek asylum from feudal wars and disturbances in their own lands. At the British occupation there were about two dozen families bearing titles of nobility granted, or recognized, by the Grand Masters, and descending by primogeniture. These "privileges" were guaranteed, together with the rights and religion of the islanders, when they became British subjects, but no government has ever recognized papal titles in Malta. High and low, all speak among themselves the Phoenician Maltese, altogether different from the Italian language; Italian was only spoken by 13.24% in 1901. Such Italian as is spoken by the lingering minority has marked divergences of pronunciation and inflexion from the language of Rome and Florence. In 1901, in addition to visitors and the naval and military forces, 18,922 Maltese spoke English, and the number has been rapidly increasing.

In appearance the Maltese are a handsome, well-formed race, about the middle height, and well set up; they have escaped the negroid contamination noticeable in Sicily, and their features are less dark than the southern Italians. The women are generally smaller than the men, with black eyes, fine hair and graceful carriage. They are a thrifty and industrious people, prolific and devoted to their offspring, good-humoured, quick-tempered and impressionable. The food of the working classes is principally bread, with oil, olives, cheese and fruit, sometimes fish, but seldom meat; common wine is largely imported from southern Europe. The Maltese are strict adherents to the Roman Catholic religion, and enthusiastic observers of festivals, fasts and ceremonials.

In 1906 the birth-rate was 40.68 per thousand, and the excess of births over deaths 2637. In April 1907 the estimated population was 206,690 of whom 21,911 were in Gozo. This phenomenal congestion of population gives interest to records of its growth; in the 10th century there were 16,767 inhabitants in Malta and 4514 in Gozo; the total population in 1514 was 22,000. Estimates made at the arrival of the knights (1530) varied from 15,000 to 25,000: it was then necessary to import annually 10,000 quarters of grain from Sicily. The population in 1551 was, Malta 24,000, Gozo 7000. In 1582, 20,000 quarters of imported grain were required to avert famine. A census of 1590 makes the population 30,500; in that year 3000 died of want. The numbers rose in 1601 to 33,000; in 1614 to 41,084; in 1632 to 50,113; in 1667 to 55,155; in 1667 11,000 are said to have died of plague out of the total population. At the end of the rule of the knights (1798) the population was estimated at 100,000; sickness, famine and emigration during the blockade of the French in Valletta probably reduced the inhabitants to 80,000. In 1829 the population was 114,236; in 1836, 119,878 (inclusive of the garrison); in 1873, 145,605; at the census in 1901 the civil population was 184,742. Sanitation decreases the death-rate, religion keeps up the birth-rate. Nothing is done to promote emigration or to introduce manufactures.

_Towns and Villages._--The capital is named after its founder, the Grand Master de la Valette, but from its foundation it has been called Valletta (pop. 1901, 24,685); it contains the palace of the Grand Masters, the magnificent Auberges of the several "Langues" of the Order, the unique cathedral of St John with the tombs of the Knights and magnificent tapestries and marble work; a fine opera house and hospital are conspicuous. Between the inner fortifications of Valletta and the outer works, across the neck of the peninsula, is the suburb of Floriana (pop. 7278). To the south-east of Valletta, at the other side of the Grand Harbour, are the cities of Senglea (pop. 8093), Vittoriosa (pop. 8993); and Cospicua (pop. 12,184); this group is often spoken of as "The Three Cities." The old capital, near the centre of the island is variously called Notabile, Città Vecchia (q.v.), and Medina, with its suburb Rabat, its population in 1901 was 7515; here are the catacombs and the ancient cathedral of Malta. Across the Marsamuscetto Harbour of Valletta is a considerable modern town called Sliema. The villages of Malta are Mellieha, St Paul's Bay, Musta, Birchircara, Lia, Atterd, Balzan, Naxaro, Gargur, Misida, S. Julian's, S. Giuseppe, Dingli, Zebbug, Siggieui, Curmi, Luca, Tarxein, Zurrico, Crendi, Micabbiba, Circop, Zabbar, Asciak, Zeitun, Gudia and Marsa Scirocco. The chief town of Gozo is called Victoria, and there are several small villages.

_Industry and Trade._--The area under cultivation in 1906 was 41,534 acres. As a rule the tillers of the soil live away from their lands, in some neighbouring village. The fields are small and composed of terraces by which the soil has been walled up along the contours of the hills, with enormous labour, to save it from being washed away. Viewed from the sea, the top of one wall just appearing above the next produces a barren effect; but the aspect of the land from a hill in early spring is a beautiful contrast of luxuriant verdure. It is estimated that there are about 10,000 small holdings averaging about four acres and intensely cultivated. The grain crops are maize, wheat and barley; the two latter are frequently sown together. In 1906, 13,000 acres produced 17,975 quarters of wheat and 12,000 quarters of barley. The principal fodder crops are green barley and a tall clover called "sulla" (_Hedysarum coronarum_), having a beautiful purple blossom. Vegetables of all sorts are easily grown, and a rotation of these is raised on land irrigated from wells and springs. Potatoes and onions are grown for exportation at seasons when they are scarce in northern Europe. The rent of average land is about £2 an acre, of very good land over £3; favoured spots, irrigated from running springs, are worth up to £12 an acre. Two, and often three, crops are raised in the year; on irrigated land more than twice as many croppings are possible. The presence of phosphates accounts for the fertility of a shallow soil. There is a considerable area under vines, but it is generally more profitable to sell the fruit as grapes than to convert it into wine. Some of the best oranges in the world are grown, and exported; but sufficient care is not taken to keep down insect pests, and to replace old trees. Figs, apricots, nectarines and peaches grow to perfection. Some cotton is raised as a rotation crop, but no care is taken to improve the quality. The caroub tree and the prickly pear are extensively cultivated. There are exceptionally fine breeds of cattle, asses and goats; cows of a large and very powerful build are used for ploughing. The supply of butchers' meat has to be kept up by constant importations. More than two-thirds of the wheat comes from abroad; fish, vegetables and fruit are also imported from Sicily in considerable quantities. Excellent honey is produced in Malta; at certain seasons tunny-fish and young dolphin (lampuca) are abundant; other varieties of fish are caught all the year round.

About 5000 women and children are engaged in producing Maltese lace. The weaving of cotton by hand-looms survives as a languishing industry. Pottery is manufactured on a small scale; ornamental carvings are made in Maltese stone and exported to a limited extent. The principal resources of Malta are derived from its being an important military station and the headquarters of the Mediterranean fleet. There are great naval docks, refitting yards, magazines and stores on the south-east side of the Grand Harbour; small vessels of war have also been built here. Steamers of several lines call regularly, and there is a daily mail to Syracuse. The shipping cleared in 1905-1906 was 3524 vessels of 3,718,168 tons. Internal communications include a railway about eight miles long from Valletta to Notabile; there are electric tramways and motor omnibus services in several directions. The currency is English. Local weights and measures include the cantar, 175 lb.; salm, one imperial quarter; cafiso, 4½ gallons; canna, 6 ft. 10½ in.; the tumolo (256 sq. ca.), about a third of an acre.

The principal exports of local produce are potatoes, cumin seed, vegetables, oranges, goats and sheep, cotton goods and stone.

To keep alive, in a fair standard of comfort, the population of 206,690, food supplies have to be imported for nine and a half months in the year. The annual value of exports would be set off against imported food for about one month and a half. The Maltese have to pay for food imports by imperial wages, earned in connexion with naval and military services, by commercial services to passing steamers and visitors, by earnings which emigrants send home from northern Africa and elsewhere, and by interest on investments of Maltese capital abroad. A long absence of the Mediterranean fleet, and withdrawals of imperial forces, produce immediate distress.

_Finance._--The financial position in 1906-1907 is indicated by the following: Public revenue £513,594 (including £51,039 carried to revenue from capital); expenditure £446,849; imports (actual), £1,219,819; imports in transit, £5,876,981; exports (actual), £123,510; exports in transit £6,127,277; imports from the United Kingdom (actual), £218,461. In March 1907 there were 8159 depositors in the government savings bank, with £569,731 to their credit.

_Government._--Malta is a crown colony, within the jurisdiction of a high commissioner and a commander-in-chief, to whom important questions of policy are reserved; in other matters the administration is under a military governor (£3000), assisted by a civil lieutenant-governor or chief secretary. There is an executive council, now comprising eleven members with the governor as president. The legislative council, under letters patent of the 3rd of June 1903, is composed of the governor (president), ten official members, and eight elected members. There are eight electoral districts with a total of about 10,000 electors. A voter is qualified on an income from property of £6, or by paying rent to the same amount, or having the qualifications required to serve as a common juror. There are no municipal institutions. Letters patent, orders in council, and local ordinances have the force of law. The laws of Justinian are still the basis of the common law, the Code of Rohan is not altogether abrogated, and considerable weight is still given to the Roman Canon Law. The principal provisions of the Napoleonic Code and some English enactments have been copied in a series of ordinances forming the Statute Law. Latin was the language of the courts till 1784, and was not completely supplanted by Italian till 1815. The partial use of English (with illogical limitations to the detriment of the Maltese-born British subjects who speak English) was introduced by local ordinances and orders in council at the end of the 19th century. The Maltese, of whom 86% cannot understand Italian, are still liable to be tried, even for their lives, in Italian, to them a foreign language. The endeavour to restrict juries to those who understand Italian reveals glaring incongruities.

_Education._--There were, in 1906, 98 elementary day schools, and 33 night schools. The attendance on the 1st of September 1905 was 16,530, the percentage on those enrolled 84.6; the total enrolment was 18,719. The average cost per pupil in these schools was 35s. 11d. a year on daily attendance. There is a secondary school for girls in Valletta, and one for boys in Gozo. A lyceum in Malta had an average attendance of 464. The number of students at the university was about 150. The average cost per student in the lyceum was £8, 0s. 11d.; in the university £26, 10s. 1d. The fees in these institutions are almost nominal, the middle-classes are thus educated at the expense of the masses. In the 18th century the government of the Knights and of the Inquisition did not favour the education of the people, after 1800 British governors were slow to make any substantial change. About the middle of the 19th century it began to be recognized that the education of the people was more conducive to the safety of the fortress than to leave in ignorance congested masses of southern race liable to be swayed spasmodically by prejudice. At first an attempt was made to make Maltese a literary language by adapting the Arabic characters to record it in print. This failed for several reasons, the foremost being that the language was not Arabic but Phoenician, and because professors and teachers, whose personal ascendancy was based on the official prominence of Italian, did not realize that educational institutions existed for the rising generation rather than to provide salaries for alien teachers and men behind the times. Various educational schemes were proposed, but they were easier to propose than to carry into effect: no one, except Mr Savona, had the ability to urge English as the basis of instruction, and he agitated and was installed as director of education and made a member of the Executive. The obstruction which he encountered alarmed him, and he compromised by adopting a mixed system of both English and Italian, _pari passu_, as the basis of Maltese education; he resigned after a brief effort. Mr Savona's attempt to teach the Maltese children simultaneously two foreign languages (of which they were quite ignorant, and their teachers only partially conversant) without first teaching how to read and write the native Maltese systematically was continued for some years under an eminent archaeologist, Dr A. A. Caruana, who became Director of Education. He began to give some preference to English indirectly. On his resignation Sir G. Strickland established a new system of education based on the principle of beginning from the bottom, by teaching to read and write in Maltese as the medium for assimilating, at a further stage, either English or Italian, one at a time, and aiming at imparting general knowledge in colloquial English. A series of school books, in the Maltese language printed in Roman characters, with translations in English interlined in different type, was produced at the government printing office and sold at cost price. The parents and guardians were called upon to select whether each child should learn English or Italian next after learning reading, writing and arithmetic in Maltese. About 89% recorded their preference in favour of English at the outset; then, as a result of violent political agitation, this percentage was considerably lowered, but soon crept up again. Teachers and professors who were weak in English, lawyers, newspaper men and others, combined to deprive these reforms of their legitimate consequence, viz. that after a number of years English should be the language of the courts as well as of education, and to protect those belonging to the old order of knowledge from the competition of young Maltese better educated than themselves, whose rapid rise everywhere would be assured by knowing English thoroughly. An order in council was enacted in 1899 providing that no Maltese (except students of theology) should thenceforth suffer any detriment through inability to pass examinations in Italian, in either the schools or university, but the fraction of the Maltese who claim to speak Italian (13.24%) still command sufficient influence to hamper the full enjoyment of this emancipation by the majority. In the university most of the textbooks used are English, nevertheless many of the lectures are still delivered in Italian--for the convenience of some professors or to please the politicians, rather than for the benefit of the students. The number of students who enter the university without passing any examination in Italian is rapidly increasing; the longer the period of transition, the greater the detriment to the rising generation.

_History and Antiquities._--The earliest inhabitants of Malta (Melita) and Gozo (Gaulos) belonged to a culture-circle which included the whole of the western Mediterranean, and to a race which perhaps originated from North Africa; and it is they, and not the Phoenicians, who were the builders of the remarkable megalithic monuments which these islands contain, the Gigantia in Gozo, Hagiar Kim and Mnaidra near Crendi, the rock-cut hypogeum of Halsaflieni,[1] and the megalithic buildings on the hill of Corradino in Malta, being the most noteworthy. The contemporaneity of these structures has been demonstrated by the identity of the pottery and other objects discovered in them, including some remarkable steatopygic figures in stone, and it is clear that they belong to the neolithic period, numerous flints, but no metal, having been found. Those that have been mentioned seem to have been sanctuaries (some of them in part dwelling-places), but Halsaflieni was an enormous ossuary, of which others may have existed in other parts of the island; for the numerous rock-cut tombs which are everywhere to be seen belong to the Phoenician and Roman periods. In these buildings there is a great preference for apsidal terminations to the internal chambers, and the façades are as a rule slightly curved. The numerous niches, generally containing sacrificial (?) tables,[2] are often approached by window-like openings hewn out of one of the flat slabs by which they are enclosed. The surface of the stones in the interior is often pitted, as a form of ornamentation. Even the barren islet of Comino, between Malta and Gozo, was inhabited in prehistoric times.

To the Phoenician period, besides the tombs already mentioned, belong some remains of houses and cisterns, and (probably) a few round towers which are scattered about the island, while the important Roman house at Cittavecchia is the finest monument of this period in the islands.

The Carthaginians came to Malta in the 6th century B.C., not as conquerors, but as friends of a sister Phoenician colony (Freeman, _Hist. Sicily_, i. 255): Carthage in her struggle with Rome was at last driven to levy oppressive tribute, whereupon the Maltese gave up the Punic garrison to Titus Sempronius under circumstances described by Livy (xxi. 51). The Romans did not treat the Maltese as conquered enemies, and at once gave them the privileges of a _municipium_; Cicero (_in Verrem_) refers to the Maltese as "Socii." Nothing was to be gained by displacing the Phoenician inhabitants in a country from which any race less thrifty would find life impossible by agriculture. On the strength of a monument bearing his name, it has been surmised that Hannibal was born in Malta, while his father was governor-general of Sicily; he certainly did not die in Malta. There is evidence from Cicero (_in Verrem_) that a very high stage of manufacturing and commercial prosperity, attained in Carthaginian times, continued in Malta under the Romans. The Phoenician temple of Juno, which stood on the site of Fort St Angelo, is also mentioned by Valerius Maximus. An inscription records the restoration of the temple of Proserpine by Cheriston, a freed-man of Augustus and procurator of Malta. Diodorus Siculus (L. V.,