As we drew nearer, our field-glasses enabled us to trace the rocky outline of the greater isle—the hilly range of which is only about a hundred feet higher than the dome of St. Paul’s—and the steep, rugged coast to the north-east, beyond which lie the _casals_, or villages of the lank, yellow-visaged, black-bearded, and malicious-looking Maltese, concerning whom I do not mean to afflict my reader with either a description or a dissertation. The evening gun flashed redly from the Castle of St. Elmo, and the harbour lights of Valetta were sparkling brightly amid the golden evening haze, as we ran into the harbour, round which a thousand or more pieces of cannon were bristling on battery and platform, and on coming to anchor found that we were only a pistol-shot astern of the _Ganges_, which had on board Wilford’s troop of ours, and which had come in two days before us. We were only to wait the refilling of our tank with fresh water, of which, being a horse transport, we required an unusual quantity; and now our poor nags were neighing in concert in the hold, for, as Captain Binnacle termed it, "they smelt the land." No officer or soldier was permitted to go on shore, unless on duty, for already Malta was crowded with troops, so much so that the 93rd Highlanders were actually bivouacking in a burying-ground. But these orders did not prevent us from visiting our comrades in the _Ganges_; so Binnacle sent off his gig, with the colonel, Studhome, Sir Harry Scarlett, and me. We found that all were well on board, and had suffered no casualties, save the loss of four horses by disease. Unlike us, however, they had been favoured by that remarkable illumination known in those waters as St. Elmo’s light, which had shone on their main-topgallant mast for a space of three feet below the truck in the night, when they were off the volcanic isle of Pantalaria. My old friend Fred Wilford received us with warmth and welcome. Thus far our voyages had been equally unmarked by danger or adventure. In the cabin we found Berkeley, reading one of the London morning papers, which was only a week or so old. It had come by the steam packet from Marseilles. He addressed a few remarks, in his usual languid way, to the colonel and to Scarlett, made a pencil-mark on his paper, as if half casually, and tossing it on the cabin table, retired, with his strange smile and lounging gait, on deck.