Читать книгу The Sea: Its Stirring Story of Adventure, Peril, & Heroism (Vol. 1-4). The History of Sea Voyages, Discovery, Piracy and Maritime Warfare онлайн

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The poorest natives live in capital stone houses, many of them with façades and fronts which would be considered ornamental in an English town. The terraced roofs make up to its cooped inhabitants the space lost by building. There are five or six hundred promenadable roofs in the city. Tallack says that the island generally is the abode of industry and contentment. Expenses are high, except as regards the purchase of fruits, including the famed “blood,” “Mandolin” (sometimes called quite as correctly “Mandarin”) oranges, and Japan medlars, and Marsala wine from Sicily. The natives live simply, as a rule, but the officers and foreign residents commonly do not; and it is true here, as Ford says of the military gentlemen at Gibraltar, that their faces often look somewhat redder than their jackets in consequence. As in India, many unwisely adopt the high living of their class, in a climate where a cool and temperate diet is indispensable.

The four great characteristics of Malta are soldiers, priests, goats, and bells—the latter not being confined to the necks of the goats, but jangling at all hours from the many church towers. The goats pervade everywhere; there is scarcely any cow’s milk to be obtained in Malta. They may often be seen with sheep, as in the patriarchal days of yore, following their owners, in accordance with the pastoral allusions of the Bible.