DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.11789#0046
36
ROYAL GARDENS.
smaller. These are called " St. Paul's tongues ;"
it may be that the poor ignorant people of this island
imagine that, as the apostle spoke with "divers
tongues," it was but reasonable that he should leave
some of them to his friends in Melita, as relics.
It is scarcely necessary to remark that Paul is the
patron saint of the Maltese; his statues abound in
different parts of the island, but more especially in
and about Citta, Vecchia.
On our return from St. Paul's Bay, we visited the
Royal Gardens, which are pretty extensive ; they
contained groves of orange and lemon trees, laden
with the most beautiful fruit, also an immense
variety of other fruit-trees, plants, &c. Any one
who should travel over Malta, observing only what
might be seen from the road-side, would have little
idea of the number of orange and lemon trees
which the island produces. Most of the orchards
containing these fruit-trees are inclosed with high
stone walls, which are a complete barrier to the
prying curiosity of the passer-by. There is, how-
ever, a certain talisman, well known to most travel-
lers, through the agency of which gates fly open,
and walls become, so to speak, transparent; as if
they had been expressly intended not to conceal,
but to reveal what they contain within.
ROYAL GARDENS.
smaller. These are called " St. Paul's tongues ;"
it may be that the poor ignorant people of this island
imagine that, as the apostle spoke with "divers
tongues," it was but reasonable that he should leave
some of them to his friends in Melita, as relics.
It is scarcely necessary to remark that Paul is the
patron saint of the Maltese; his statues abound in
different parts of the island, but more especially in
and about Citta, Vecchia.
On our return from St. Paul's Bay, we visited the
Royal Gardens, which are pretty extensive ; they
contained groves of orange and lemon trees, laden
with the most beautiful fruit, also an immense
variety of other fruit-trees, plants, &c. Any one
who should travel over Malta, observing only what
might be seen from the road-side, would have little
idea of the number of orange and lemon trees
which the island produces. Most of the orchards
containing these fruit-trees are inclosed with high
stone walls, which are a complete barrier to the
prying curiosity of the passer-by. There is, how-
ever, a certain talisman, well known to most travel-
lers, through the agency of which gates fly open,
and walls become, so to speak, transparent; as if
they had been expressly intended not to conceal,
but to reveal what they contain within.