To an old man, one of the most delightful features in a German
watering-place, is the ease with which he can associate, in the most
friendly manner, with all his brother and sister water-bibbers, without
the fatigue of speaking one single word.
Almost every glass of water you get from the brunnen adds, at least,
one to the list of your acquaintance. Merely touching a man's elbow is
sufficient to procure from him a look of goodfellowship, which, though
it does not inconveniently grow into a bow, or even into a smile, is
yet always afterwards displayed in his physiognomy whenever it meets
yours. If, as you are stretching out your glass, you retire but half
a stride, to allow a thirsting lady to step forward, you clearly
see, whensoever you afterwards meet her, that the slight attention
is indelibly recorded in your favour. Even running against a German
produces, as it were by collision, a spark of kind feeling, which, like
a star in the heavens, twinkles in his serene countenance whenever
you behold it. Smile only once upon a group of children, and the
little urchins bite their lips, vainly repressing their joy whenever
afterwards you meet them.
Shrouded in this delightful taciturnity, my list of acquaintances at
Langen-Schwalbach daily increased, until I found myself on just the
sort of amicable terms with almost everybody, which, to my present
taste, is the most agreeable. In early life young people (if I
recollect right) are never quite happy, unless they are either talking,
or writing letters to their fellow-creatures. Whenever, even as
strangers, they get together, everything that happens or passes seems
to engender conversation--even when they have parted, there is no end
to epistolary valedictions, and creation itself loses half its charms,
unless the young beholder has some companion with whom the loveliness
of the picture may be shared and enjoyed.
But old age I find stiffens, first of all, the muscles of the tongue;
indeed, as man gradually decays, it seems wisely provided by Nature
that he should be willing to be dumb, before time obliges him to
be deaf: in short the mind, however voraciously it might once have
searched for food, at last instinctively prefers rumination, to seeking
for more.
By young people I shall be thought selfish, yet I do confess that I
enjoy silence, because my own notions now suit me best; other people's
opinions, like their shoes, don't fit me, and however ill-constructed
or old-fashioned my own may really be, yet use has made them easy: my
sentiments, ugly as they may seem, don't pinch, and I therefore feel
I had rather not exchange them; the one or two friends I have lost
rank in my memory better than any I can ever hope to gain: in fact,
I had rather not replace them, and at Langen-Schwalbach, as there
was no necessity for a passing stranger like myself to set up a fine
new acquaintance with people he would probably never see again, I
considered that with my eyes and ears open, my tongue might harmlessly
enjoy natural and delightful repose.
But there is a perverseness in human nature, which it is quite out
of my power to account for; and strange as it may sound, it is
nevertheless too true, that the only person at Langen-Schwalbach I
felt desirous to address, was the only individual who seemed to shun
every human being.
He was a withered, infirm man, who appeared to be tottering on the
brink of his grave; and I had long remarked that, for some reason
or other, he studiously avoided the brunnen until every person had
left it. He spoke to no one--looked at no one--but as soon as he had
swallowed off his dose, he retired to a lone bench, on which, with
both hands leaning upon his ivory-handled cane, he was always to be
seen sitting with his eyes sorrowfully fixed on the ground. Although
the weather was, to every person but himself, oppressively hot, he was
constantly muffled up in a thick cloak, and I think I must have passed
him a hundred times before I detected, one exceedingly warm day, that
underneath it there hung upon his left breast the Cross of the Order
of St. John of Jerusalem. As, ages ago, I had myself passed many a
hot summer on the parched, barren rock of Malta,--always, however,
feeling much interested in the history of its banished knights,--I
at once fully comprehended why the poor old gentleman's body was so
chilly, and why his heart felt so chilled with the world. By many
slow and scientific approaches which it would be only tedious to
detail, I at last managed, without driving him from his bench, most
quietly to establish myself at his side, and then by coughing when
he coughed,--sighing when he sighed,--and by other (I hope innocent)
artifices, I at last ventured in a _sotto voce_ to mumble to him
something about the distant island in which apparently all his youthful
feelings lay buried. The words Valetta, Civitta Vecchia, Floriana,
Cottonera, &c., as I pronounced them, produced, by a sort of galvanic
influence, groans--ejaculations--short sentences, until at last he
began to show me frankly without disguise the real colour of his
mind. Poor man! like his eye it was jaundiced--"nullis medicabilis
herbis!" I could not at all extract from him what rank, title, or
situation he held in the ancient order, but I could too clearly see
that he looked upon its extinction as the Persian would look upon
the annihilation of the sun. Creation he fancied had been robbed of
its colours,--Christianity he thought had lost its heart,--and he
attributed every political ailment on the surface of the globe to the
non-existence of the Knights Hospitallers of St. John of Jerusalem.
For several hours I patiently listened to his unhappy tale; for as
lamentations of all sorts are better out of the human heart than
in it, I felt that as the vein was open, my patient could not be
encouraged to bleed too freely: without therefore once contradicting
him, I allowed his feelings to flow uninterrupted, and by the time he
had pumped himself dry, I was happy to observe that he was certainly
much better for the operation. On leaving him, however, my own pent-up
view of the case, and his, continued for the remainder of the day
bubbling and quarrelling with each other in my mind. Therefore, to
satisfy myself before I went to bed, I drew out in black and white
the following sketch of what has always appeared to me to be a fair,
impartial history of these--Knights of Malta.
* * * * *
The Mediterranean forms a curious and beautiful feature in the picture
of the commercial world. By dint of money and shipping we laboriously
bring to England the produce of the most distant regions, but the
commerce of the whole globe seems to have a natural or instinctive
tendency to flow, almost of its own accord, into the Mediterranean Sea.
Beginning with the great Atlantic Ocean, which connects the old world
with the new, we know that, over that vast expanse, the prevailing wind
is one which blows from America towards Europe; and, moreover, that the
waters of the Atlantic are, without any apparent return, everlastingly
flowing into the narrow straits of Gibraltar. When the produce of
America, therefore, is shipped for the Mediterranean, in general terms
it may be asserted that wind and tide are in its favour.
Across the trackless deserts of Africa caravans from various parts of
the interior are constantly toiling through the sand towards the waters
of this inland sea. The traveller who goes up the Nile is doomed, we
all know, to stem its torrent, but the produce of Egypt and the triple
harvest of that luxuriant land is no sooner embarked, than of its own
accord it glides majestically towards this favoured sea; and there is
truth and nothing speculative in still further remarking, that this
very harvest is absolutely produced by the slime or earth of Abyssinian
and other most remote mountains, which by the laws of nature has calmly
floated 1200 miles through a desert to top-dress or manure Egypt, that
garden which eventually supplies so many of the inhabitants of the
Mediterranean with corn.
Again, the Red Sea is a passage apparently created to connect Europe
with the great Eastern world; and as the power of steam gradually
increases in its stride, it is evident that by this gulf, or natural
canal, much of the produce of India eventually will easily flow into
the Mediterranean Sea.
Finally, it might likewise be shown, that much of the commerce of Asia
Minor and Europe, either by great rivers or otherwise, naturally moves
towards this central point; but besides these sources of external
wealth, the Mediterranean, as we all know, is most romantically studded
with an Archipelago and other beautiful islands, the inhabitants of
which have the power not only of trading on a large scale with every
quarter of the globe, but of carrying on in small open boats a sort of
little village commerce of their own. Among the inhabitants of this sea
are to be found at this moment the handsomest specimens of the human
race; and if a person not satisfied with the present and future tenses
of life, should prefer reflecting or rather ruminating on the past,
with antiquarian rapture he may wander over these waters from Carthage
to Egypt, Tyre, Sidon, Rhodes, Troy, Ephesus, Athens, Corinth, Argos,
Syracuse, Rome, &c., until tired of his flight he may rest upon one of
the ocean-beaten pillars of Hercules--and seated there, may most truly
declare that the history of the Mediterranean is like the picture of
its own waves beneath him, which one after another he sees to rise,
break, and sink.
In the history of this little sea, in what melancholy succession has
nation and empire risen and fallen, flourished and decayed; and if the
magnificent architectural ruins of these departed states mournfully
offer to the traveller any political moral at all, is it not that
homely one which the most common tomb-stone of our country churchyard
preaches to the peasant who reads it?
"As I am now, so you will be,
Therefore prepare to follow me!"
However, fully admitting the truth of the lesson which history and
experience thus offer to us--admitting that no one can presume to
declare which of the great Mediterranean powers is doomed to be the
next to suffer--or what new point is next to burst into importance;
yet if a man were forced to select a position which, in spite of fate
or fortune, feuds or animosities, has been, and ever must be, the
nucleus of commerce, he would find that in the Mediterranean Sea that
point, as nearly as possible, would be the little island of Malta;
and the political importance of this possession being now generally
appreciated, it is curious rapidly to run over the string of little
events which have gradually prepared, fortified, and delivered this
valuable arsenal and fortress to the British flag.
In the early ages of navigation, when men hardly dared to lose sight
of the shore, ignorantly trembling if they were not absolutely hugging
the very danger which we now most strenuously avoid, it may be easily
conceived that a little barren island, scarcely twenty miles in length
or twelve in breadth, was of little use or importance. It is true, that
on its north coast there was a spit or narrow tongue of land (about a
mile in length and a few hundred yards in breadth), on each side of
which were a series of connected bays, now forming two of the most
magnificent harbours in the world; but in the ages of which we speak
this great outline was a nautical hieroglyphic which sailors could not
decipher. Accustomed to hide their Lilliputian vessels and fleets in
bays and creeks on the same petty scale as themselves, they did not
comprehend or appreciate the importance of these immense Brobdignag
recesses, nor did they admire the great depth of water which they
contained; and as in ancient warfare, when warriors used javelins,
arrows and stones, scalding each other with hot sand, the value of a
position adapted to the present ranges of our shot and shells would not
have been understood, in like manner was the importance of so large
a harbour equally imperceptible; and that Malta could have had no
very great reputation is proved by the fact, that it is even to this
day among the learned a subject of dispute, whether it was upon this
island, or upon Melita in the Adriatic, that St. Paul was shipwrecked.
Now if either had been held in any particular estimation, the question
of the shipwreck would not now be any subject of doubt.
As navigators became more daring, and as their vessels, increasing in
size, required more water and provisions, &c., Malta fell into the
hands of various masters. At last, when Charles V. conquered Sicily
and Naples, he offered it to those warriors of Christendom, those
determined enemies of the Turks and Corsairs--the Knights Hospitallers
of St. John of Jerusalem. This singular band of men, distinguished by
their piebald vow of heroism and celibacy, had, after a most courageous
resistance, been just overpowered by an army of 300,000 Saracens,
who, under Solyman II., had driven them from the island of Rhodes,
which had been occupied by their Order 213 years. Animated by the most
noble blood of Europe which flowed in their veins--thirsting for
revenge--yet homeless and destitute, it may easily be conceived that
these brave, enthusiastic men would most readily have accepted almost
any spot on which they could once again establish their busy hive: yet
so little was the importance of Malta, even at that time, understood,
so arid was its surface, and so burning was its rock, that, after
minutely surveying it, their commissioners made a report to Charles V.,
which must ever be regarded as a most affecting document; for although
the Knights of Malta were certainly in their day the "bravest of the
brave," although by that chivalric oath which bound them together, they
had deliberately sworn "_never to count the number of their enemies_,"
yet after the strong, proud position which they had held at Rhodes, it
was only hard fate and stern necessity that could force them to seek
refuge on a rock upon which there was scarcely soil enough to plant
their standard. But though honour has been justly termed "an empty
bubble," yet to all men's eyes its colours are so very beautiful, that
they allure and encourage us to contend with difficulties which no
other advocate could persuade us to encounter; and so it was that the
Knights of Malta, seeing they had no alternative, sternly accepted the
hot barren home that was offered to them, and in the very teeth, and
before the beard of their barbarous enemy, these lions of the Cross
landed and established themselves in their new den.
When men have once made up their minds to stand against
adversity, the scene generally brightens; for danger, contrary
to the rules of drawing, is less in the foreground than in the
perspective--difficulties of all sorts being magnified by the misty
space which separates us from them; and accordingly the knights were no
sooner established at Malta, than they began to find out the singular
advantages it possessed.
The whole island being a rock of freestone, which could be worked
with peculiar facility, materials for building palaces and houses,
suited to the dignity of the Order, existed everywhere on the spot;
and it moreover became evident, that by merely quarrying out the rock,
according to the rules of military science, they would not only obtain
materials for building, but that, in fact, the more they excavated for
their town, the deeper would be the ditch of its fortress. Animated
by this double reward, the knights commenced their operations, or, in
military language, they "broke ground;" and, without detailing how
often the rising fortress was jealously attacked by their barbarous
and relentless enemies, or how often its half-raised walls were
victoriously cemented with the blood of Christians and of Turks, it
will be sufficient merely to observe, that before the island had been
in possession of the Order one century, it assumed very nearly the same
astonishing appearance which it now affords--a picture and an example,
proving to the whole world what can be done by courage, firmness, and
perseverance.
The narrow spit or tongue of barren rock which on the north side of the
island separated the two great harbours, was scarped in every part,
so as to render it inaccessible by sea, and on the isthmus, or only
side on which it could be approached by land, demi-lunes, ravelins,
counter-guards, bastions, and cavaliers, were seen towering one above
another on so gigantic a scale, that, as a single datum, it may be
stated, that the wall of the escarp is from 130 to 150 feet in height,
being nearly five times the height of that of a regular fortress.
On this narrow tongue of land, thus fortified, arose the city of
Valetta, containing a palace for its Grand Master; and almost equally
magnificent residences for its knights, the whole forming at this day
one of the finest cities in the world. On every projecting point of the
various beautiful bays contained in each of the two great harbours,
separated from each other by the town of Valetta, forts were built
flanking each other, yet all offering a concentrating fire upon any and
every part of the port; and when a vessel labouring, heaving, pitching,
and tossing, in a heavy gale of wind, now suddenly enters the great
harbour of Malta, the sudden lull--the unexpected calm--the peaceful
stillness which prevails on its deep unruffled surface, is most
strangely contrasted in the mind of the stranger with the innumerable
guns which, bristling in every direction from batteries one above
another, seem fearfully to announce to him that he is in the chamber of
death--in a slaughter-house from which there is no escape, and that, if
he should dare to offer insult, although he has just escaped from the
raging of the elements, the silence around him is that of the grave!
It was from the city and harbour of Valetta, in the state above
described,--it was from this proud citadel of Christianity, that the
Knights of Malta continued for some time sallying forth to carry on
their uncompromising hostility against the Turks and against the
corsairs of Algiers and Tripoli; but the brilliant victories they
gained, and the bloody losses they sustained, must be passed over, as
it is already time to hurry their history to a close.
The fact is, the Knights Hospitallers of St. John of Jerusalem
gradually outlived the passions and objects which called them into
existence, and their Order decayed for want of that nourishment which,
during so many ages, it received from the sympathy, countenance,
and applause of Christendom. In short, as mankind had advanced in
civilization, its angry, savage, intolerant passions had gradually
subsided, and thus the importance of the Order unavoidably faded with
its utility. There was nothing premature in its decay--it had lived
long enough. The holy, or rather unholy, war, with all its unchristian
feelings, having long since subsided, it would have been inconsistent
in the great nations of Europe to have professed a general disposition
for peace, or to have entered into any treaty with the Turks, while
at the same time they encouraged an Order which was bent on their
extermination.
The vow of celibacy, once the pride of the Order, became, in a more
enlightened age, a mill-stone round its neck; it attracted ridicule--it
created guilt--the sacred oath was broken; and although the head, the
heart, and the pockets, of a soldier may be as light as the pure air
he breathes, yet he can never truly be reported "fit for duty" if his
conscience or his stomach be too heavily laden. In short, in two words,
the Order of St. John of Jerusalem was no longer suited to the times;
and Burke had already exclaimed--"_The age of chivalry has fled!_"
In the year 1798, this Order, after having existed nearly 700
years, signed its own death-warrant, and in the face of Europe died
ignominiously--"_felo de se_." On the 9th of June, in that year, their
island was invaded by the French; and although, as Napoleon justly
remarked, to have excluded him it would have been only necessary
to have shut the gates, Valetta was surrendered by treachery, the
depravity of which will be best explained by the following extract from
a statement made by the Maltese deputies:--"No one is ignorant that
the plan of the invasion of Malta was projected in Paris, and confided
to the principal knights of the Order resident at Malta. Letters
in cyphers were incessantly passing and repassing, without however
alarming the suspicions of the deceased Grand Master, or the Grand
Master Hompesch."
As soon as the French were in possession of the city, harbours, and
impregnable fortresses of Valetta, they began, as usual, to mutilate
from the public buildings everything which bore the stamp of nobility,
or recalled to mind the illustrious actions which had been performed.
The arms of the Order, as well as those of the principal knights, were
effaced from the palace and principal dwelling-houses; however, as the
knights had sullied their own reputation, and had cast an indelible
blot on their own escutcheons, they had but little right to complain
that the image of their glory was thus insulted, when they themselves
had been guilty of the murder of its spirit. The Order of St. John of
Jerusalem being now worn out and decayed, its elements were scattered
to the winds. The knight who were not in the French interest were
ordered to quit the island in three days, and a disgraceful salary was
accepted by the Grand Master Hompesch. Those knights who had favoured
the French were permitted to remain, but, exposed to the rage of the
Maltese, and unprotected by their false friends, some fled, some
absolutely perished from want, but all were despised and hated.
In the little theatre of Malta the scene is about to change, and the
British soldier now marches upon its stage! On the 2d of September,
1798, the island was blockaded by the English, and the fortifications
being absolutely impregnable, it became necessary to attempt the
reduction of the place by famine.
For two years most gallantly did the French garrison undergo the most
horrid suffering and imprisonment--steadily and cheerfully did they
submit to every possible privation--their stock of spirits, wine,
meat, bread, &c., doled out in the smallest possible allowances,
gradually diminished until all came to end. Sooner than strike, they
then subsisted upon the flesh of their horses, mules, and asses; and
when these also were consumed, and when they had eaten not only their
cats, but the rats which infested the houses, drains, &c., in great
numbers--when, from long-protracted famine, the lamp of life was
absolutely expiring in the socket; in short, having, as one of their
kings once most nobly exclaimed, "lost all but their honour," these
brave men--with nerves unshaken, with reputation unsullied, and with
famine proudly painted in their lean, emaciated countenances--on the
4th of September, 1800, surrendered the place to that nation which
Napoleon has since termed "the most powerful, the most constant, and
the most generous of his enemies."
During the long-winded game of war which France and England lately
played together, our country surely never made any better move than
when she thus laid hold of Malta. Even if the island had been in the
rude state in which it was delivered to the knights of Jerusalem,
still, to a maritime power like England, such splendid harbours in the
Mediterranean would have been a most valuable conquest; but when we
not only appreciate their noble outline, but consider the gigantic and
expensive manner in which this town has been impregnably fortified,
as well as furnished with tanks, subterraneous stores, bomb-proof
magazines, most magnificent barracks, palaces, &c., it is quite
delightful to reflect on the series of events which have led to such
a well-assorted alliance between two of the strongest harbours in the
world and the first maritime power on the globe.
If, like the French, we had taken the island from the knights, however
degraded, worn out, and useless their Order might have become, yet
Europe in general, and France in particular, might always have
reproached us, and, for aught we know, our own consciences might have
become a little tender on the subject. But the delightful truth is,
that no power in Europe can breathe a word or a syllable against our
possession of the island of Malta--it is an honour in open daylight we
have fairly won, and I humbly say, long, very long, may we wear it!
With respect to the Maltese themselves, I just at this moment recollect
a trifling story which will, I think, delineate their character with
tolerable accuracy.