We gained our liberty on the 20th of June, and established ourselves at a comfortable inn kept by an Englishman, who is also a tailor. Our first occupation was to walk about the town. La Valetta, the principal division, is a very handsome city, with straight streets, and large well built stone houses; at least, they appear well built, but I am told the mode of construction is very defective. Most of the houses have stone balconies over the door, or in some part of the front, with bold projections well supported. There is no want of material, for the whole island is a rock of soft, coarse, limestone, of I believe, a very late formation. It is of a good colour, and works easily, but yields to the weather, and is not calculated for nice execution.
Zante looks like a place of importance after the miserable collections of hovels called towns in Turkey, but there is more difference between Malta and Zante, than between Zante and Patras. The streets, for the south of Europe, are wide; they are very much up and down hill, and it is probably owing to this circumstance that they are usually very clean. Besides the balconies already mentioned to the larger houses, those of all sizes have architraves to the windows and doors, with some additional ornament to the latter, and a good cornice. The balcony occurs sometimes only in the centre, at others it extends along the whole front, and is not unfrequently repeated in the second story. I know of nothing in England which will enable you to judge of the effect of these bold and massive, but ornamental projections; our taste has run so exclusively into the opposite and more economical side, that we seem to have forgotten that simplicity without relief is mere tameness and insipidity. We however, thus escape the reproach of having spent much money in badly imagined ornaments, which is so often urged against the Italians; but in spite of the bad taste, or perhaps rather of the bad judgment, which frequently appears, we must still confess, that wherever we can find a little space to distinguish the objects, the interior of an Italian town is beyond comparison superior to that of an English one. Bath has more the appearance of an Italian city, than any other town in England; and in the greater width of the streets, and perhaps in the more correct style of ornament, it has the advantage; the great defect is the littleness both of the useful and ornamental parts.
The churches in Malta are handsome. That dedicated to St. John the Baptist is the principal, and is also the one which pleases me the best. The roof is a continued vault, and when I first visited it, the side arches were covered by a tapestry of rich and handsome colours, leaving only low, square openings underneath into the side aisles. This does not sound well in description, yet it was certainly very handsome; and I thought even better than when the arches were exposed, and I saw the full height of the openings. The floor is composed of the very rich, inlaid, marble tombstones of the knights, and the space is almost filled: the walls of the side chapels are covered with gilt carving. In one of these is a fine painting of St. John the Baptist, which may probably be considered as the masterpiece of Mattia Prete (il Calabrese), whose works are very frequent in this city. Here also are some good paintings by Caracciuoli, a Neapolitan artist.
The Church of Sant Agostino is in the form of a Greek cross, and though the arms are rather too long, and it is rather deficient in simplicity, it is a light and elegant room.
The new Church of San Domenico pleases me in another way; by the size and openness of the side aisles. Where this is effected without the appearance of weakness, it is sure to please, and it is probably a circumstance of this sort which has contributed to the reputation of two very different buildings; the cathedral at Amiens, and the church of St. Stephen, Walbrook.
The governor’s palace is a large, but not a handsome building; the principal defect arises from the irregular disposition of the windows; it has a large balcony at each angle of the principal face, and on each of them a sort of glazed box, and this has a bad effect. These boxes upon the balconies are very frequent in Malta. They are painted of a gray or dull green colour, and do not rise so high as the windows behind them. They might perhaps be admissible occasionally as a source of variety, but are very injurious in a building which makes any pretence to magnificence.
The front of this palace forms one side of the Piazza. Opposite to it is the guard-house, with a handsome portico of Greek Doric, rather out of its place amongst so much Corinthian work, and profuse ornament. Each order is in itself capable of considerable variety of expression and character, and it is better to avail oneself of this, than to introduce another so completely different. A balustrade on the top serves to unite this portico with the body of the building, but it forms an inharmonious appendage to so severe an order. There is another Square on the flank of the palace, one side of which is formed by a building which contains the public library, and this is really a very fine structure. It presents a range of seven arches on the ground plan, and as many windows above, with half columns in the piers. These half columns are set in recesses, which is not the best way of disposing them, but when the proportions are good, the architect avoids by this means the appearance of weakness below, or of too great weight above; evils always avoided with difficulty, when a range of arches is employed to sustain a series of single columns. The staircase of this building is very handsome, at least the lower part of it, rising from a square vestibule with two semicircular recesses.
The most magnificent staircase at Malta is in the Albergo of Castille. A noble, single flight forms the lower part; this divides to the right and left in two branches, up to the principal story. The ascent to the second floor is continued laterally beyond the lower part, and not over it; and where this disposition is practicable, a fine staircase is much more easily obtained, than where the flights are repeated over one another.
