Were the same liberal use of easily obtained enrichment, together with a system of irrigation (also well understood in Malta), to be applied to our constantly abandoned farms in New England, we should hear much less grumbling as regards their sterility, while the returns which would be realized in the shape of an ample harvest would liberally compensate for all cost of time and labor. There is no zone where nature will do everything for man; his work upon the farm is only begun with the planting of the seed. The fact is, many of our farmers work on the principle of the Kodak man,--"You touch the button, and we do the rest." Sitting down in indolence and despair, such men wonder that their utterly neglected lands do not yield better crops, talking the while about rich fields and virgin soil which are supposed to exist somewhere, far away in Utopia. Until the author visited Malta, he thought that the British island of Barbadoes, the farthest windward of the West Indian group, was the most densely populated spot on the globe, but here we find human beings numbering over thirteen hundred to the productive square mile. One intelligent statistician places the population at fourteen hundred, but the first estimate is quite extraordinary enough. As a matter of comparison, it may be mentioned that the population of England averages three hundred souls to a similar space. The steady increase of the people in numbers speaks well for the average health of Malta, on whose dry soil and in whose usually pure air children thrive and adults live to an extreme old age. The residents have a saying that invalids are obliged to go away to Nice or Mentone, on the mainland, to die, since no one shuffles off this mortal coil by natural means in Malta. There is certainly nothing in the local conditions or in the geographical position to generate any sort of malady. No vegetable matter is permitted to decompose, nor are objectionable substances allowed to remain aboveground. Malta no doubt has its drawbacks, but its climate, as a rule, is very healthy. "Malta healthy?" responded a local physician to our inquiry. "Why, we professionals are simply starved out for want of practice." "How about the plague and the cholera?" we asked. "Ah, an occasional visit of that sort occurs, to be sure, at wide intervals, otherwise our occupation would be gone." He added, "All the world is liable to such visitations; but as to the general healthfulness of this island, no one can justly find fault." Such is probably the truth. English physicians continue to send certain classes of their patients hither regularly.