Sometimes Providence chooses to employ peculiar agents whereby to accomplish its purposes. Thus the French, who were birds of ill-omen wherever they appeared in those days, were the means of bringing about one great and much-needed reform during their sovereignty here in 1798, for which they deserve much credit. They promptly banished from the island that hateful and bloody agent of the Romish church, the Inquisition, which had taken deep root in Malta, and which was reveling in its bigotry, cruelty, and despotism, defying the authority of all recognized and regularly constituted laws. The spacious stone edifice formerly devoted to the use of these inquisitors, situated in the Strada Porta Maggiore, is now occupied as barracks for an English regiment. So it is with those priestly harems of Mexico, the late convents and nunneries, which, having been forbidden by the national government to be used for such purposes, are now improved for district schools, hospitals, libraries, and sundry other useful and respectable purposes, much to the improvement of the morals of the community. An impressive personal experience in the church of St. John occurs to us as we write. The soft light from the wax candles did not banish the sombre hues inside the ancient place, though it was midday on one occasion as we stood examining the rich old tapestry near the high altar. It was very still, and we were quite alone. No services were going on. Suddenly a strong ray of sunlight penetrated some opening from above and rested upon the illumined hangings. It brought out the dim colors and figures as though they had been touched by the wand of an enchanter. The eye involuntarily followed this shaft of light to its source, the rays being made up, apparently, of buoyant and infinitesimal sands of gold. The translucent column slowly changed its angle, until it rested for a moment, like a halo, upon the severed head of St. John, in Caravaggio's canvas, then suddenly disappeared. It seemed like an artificially produced theatrical effect, cleverly managed, but the memory of the singularly impressive experience is indelibly fixed upon the brain.