Among these less commonly cultivated languages, I may also class Maltese. In this Mezzofanti was equally at home. As Maltese can scarcely be said to possess anything like a literature,[464] it may be presumed that he acquired it chiefly by oral instruction, partly from occasional visitors to Rome, partly from some Maltese servants who were in the Propaganda at the time of his arrival. This much at least is certain, that, in the year 1840, he spoke the language freely and familiarly. Father Andrew Schembri, of La Valetta, during a residence in Rome in that year, having conducted the preparatory spiritual exercises for a number of youths to whom the Cardinal administered the first communion in the church of San Vito, met his Eminence at breakfast in the convent attached to this church. No sooner was Father Schembri presented to him as a Maltese, than he entered into conversation with him in his own language.[465] Another Maltese ecclesiastic, Canon Falzou of the cathedral, met the Cardinal in Rome at a later date, in 1845-6. In the course of his sojourn he “had frequent opportunities, for a period of eleven months, of conversing with him in Maltese, which he spoke very well.”[466]
I need scarcely observe that, although in the capital and the principal towns of Malta, the prevailing language is Italian, the dialect spoken by the rural population contains a large admixture of foreign elements, chiefly Arabic and Greek. To what a degree the former language enters into the composition of Maltese, may be inferred from the well-known literary imposture of Vella, who attempted to pass off a forgery of his own as an Arabic history of Sicily under the Arabs.[467]
Before closing this chapter, I shall add a short note of the Count de Lavradio, Portuguese ambassador in London, and brother of the Marquis de Lavradio, who for many years held the same office in Rome. It regards Mezzofanti’s acquaintance with Portuguese, another language which very few foreigners take the trouble to acquire.
“I have always heard,” writes his excellency, “both from my brother and from other learned Portuguese who knew Cardinal Mezzofanti, that he was perfectly conversant with the Portuguese language, and that he spoke it with facility and with elegance. I myself have read letters written by him in excellent Portuguese; particularly one very remarkable one, addressed by him to the learned M. de Souza, for the purpose of conveying his thanks for the offer which M. de Souza had made to him, of a copy of the magnificent edition of Camoens, which he had published in 1817.”
The Marquis de Lavradio here referred to, while ambassador at Rome, expressed the same opinion to Cardinal Wiseman. The Marquis, in Mezzofanti’s Portuguese, was particularly struck by the precision of his language and the completeness of his mastery over even the delicate forms of conversational phraseology. He instanced in particular one of his letters. It was perfect, he said, not only in vocabulary but in form, even down to the minutest phrases of conventional compliment and formal courtesy.
CHAPTER XII.
[1834-1836.]
I resume the narrative.
The Librarian of the Vatican, or as he is more properly called the “Librarian of the Roman Church,” (Bibliotecario della Chiesa Romana,) is always a Cardinal, commonly the Cardinal Secretary of State. His duties as such, however, are in great measure nominal; and the details of the management practically rest with the Primo Custode, or chief keeper of the Library, who is assisted by a second keeper, and seven scrittori, or secretaries, among whom are distributed the seven departments,—Hebrew, Syriac, Arabic, Greek, Latin, Italian, and modern foreign languages—into which the books are classified.