she seems to set
the sea on fire, throwing starry sprays far over our heads on to the
deck where the drops still retain their light.

At early morning on August 22nd, a great jabbering outside the ship, as
though a colony of monkeys had encountered another babel, announced that
we were at Malta. Boats by the hundred swarm around us, and never was
seen such a gesticulating, swearing crowd, as their occupants, nor such
pushing and hauling, such splashing and wrangling, and even fighting to
maintain their stations alongside. One's eyes cannot fail to be
arrested by these boats, but the colouring of them is what attracts
particular attention. We get here our first idea of the criental love
for colour, though at Malta the idea is exaggerated, because the colours
do not blend harmoniously. For instance, the same boat will be painted
with emerald green, vermillion, cobalt, and chrome yellow, put on
without the slightest regard to effect or harmony. The eye on the bow is
universal, no waterman would dare venture from the shore without such a
pilot.

These little crafts, in addition to their legitimate use, have a
secondary, though very important one, that of advertising mediums, not
unworthy the genius of our American cousins. To select an example here
and there. One boat bearing the characteristic and truly Catholic legend
"Nostra Senora di Lordes," also sets forth another legend to the effect
that "Every ting ver cheap here Jack," though _what_ is cheap and
_where_ is not so clearly indicated; on another this extraordinary piece
of English, "Spose you cum my housee, have got plenty." Of these same
"housees" numerous tales are told; of one in particular, where you can
obtain "ebery ting" except the right. You ask for beef steak, or ham and
eggs, and the master of the house, in the blandest manner and with much
shrugging of the shoulders, will answer you, "Me ver sorry, hab got
ebery ting but that," and ditto to your next order, he has also the sang
froid to tell you on your complaining of the toughness of that
succulent, that his cabbage must be tender because it has been boiling
_ever since the "Caledonia" went home_. If you don't enjoy it after
that, all that I can say is you are over fastidious.

But to return to the busy and noisy throng alongside. Its composition
differs very little from that usually encountered by ships of war in all
parts of call. The washerwomen are the undoubted masters of the
situation, and carry