Island of Hyperia.--Where St. Paul was Wrecked.--An
Historical Bay.--Rock-Cut Tombs.--Curious and Unique
Antiquities.--Sovereignty of the Knights of St. John.--An
Anomalous Brotherhood.--Sailor-Monks.--Ancient Galleys.--A
Famous Barbary Corsair.--Antique Norwegian Vessel.--Navy of
the Knights.--Barbaric Warfare.--About the Maltese Nobility.
--Romantic History.--"Arabian Nights."--Valletta the
Beautiful.
Lovers of classic fable will remember that one of the islands of this
group was named Hyperia by Homer, and was the supposed residence of the
mystic nymph Calypso, where she entertained--not to say detained--the
shipwrecked Ulysses by her siren fascinations, when he was on his way
home from Troy. Her grotto, entirely shorn of its poetic adornment, is
exhibited to the curious stranger at Gozo. It was while under the
Phoenician dynasty that Calypso is supposed to have kept Ulysses
prisoner for seven years. Such ingenious allegories impart a certain
local and romantic interest, though they rather obscure than illumine
history. Homer threw a glow of poetic fancy over the localities which he
depicted, while Scott--to present a contrasting instance--gives us
photographic delineations of the times and places to which he introduces
us. In "Kenilworth," for instance, the novelist teaches the average
reader more about the days of Queen Elizabeth than a labored history of
her reign would do, presenting it also in such a form as to fix it
firmly upon the mind.
It would seem that fable, like history, is bound to repeat itself, since
thousands of years subsequent to Ulysses' shipwreck here, another
disaster of this sort, but of far greater import, took place upon the
group.
According to Biblical record, St. Paul, when a prisoner, on his way from
Jerusalem to Rome to plead his case before the Emperor Nero, about sixty
years after the beginning of the Christian era, was wrecked in a rocky
bay of Malta which still bears his name,--_La Baia di San Paolo_. It is
situated seven or eight miles northwest from Valletta, and forms a broad
inlet, the entrance to which is nearly two miles wide, running inland
about three miles. It has some twenty fathoms of water at the entrance,
gradually shoaling towards its upper extremity. Seaward, and near the
mouth of the bay, is a small island. The shore is dominated by the Tower
of St. Paul, a square stone structure erected February 10, 1610. The day
indicated is the supposed anniversary of the wreck. Near the tower is a
chapel, in which are some paintings and frescoes, which depict in a
crude manner the catastrophe which occurred to the Apostle. A small
fishing village exists here to-day, as in the time of the famous wreck.
The creek just below the stone church is still the refuge for
fishing-boats when the weather is stormy.
A dark, threatening, straggling ledge of rocks rises above the surface
of the water some distance from the shore, over which the restless sea
breaks in fleecy clouds of spray. Upon this ledge, after being
tempest-tossed for fourteen days and nights, the bark which bore St.
Paul is supposed to have foundered.
"They ran the ship aground; and the forepart stuck fast, and remained
unmovable, but the hinder part was broken with the violence of the
waves." On Selmoon Island, just referred to, there is a colossal statue
of St. Paul, which was erected by the devout Maltese some fifty years
ago. The popular reverence for the Apostle's name in this region is very
general, bays, churches, streets, and chapels being designated by it,
while in the inland villages may be found wayside shrines, small outdoor
altars, and springs of delicious drinking-water, dedicated to this
revered name. A grand annual festival takes place on February 10,
commemorative of the shipwreck of the Apostle to the Gentiles,--Paul,
the poor tent-maker of Tarsus. The church of San Paolo, Valletta, in the
street of the same name, is the headquarters of this annual
demonstration, which takes the form of processions, illuminations, and
church ceremonials. This special style of public display is very dear to
the average citizen of Malta.
It was a little over fourteen hundred years after the event of the wreck
in St. Paul's Bay, which occurred about A. D. 60, that Malta
was deeded by the Emperor Charles V. to the then homeless Knights of
St. John, together with Gozo and Tripoli, a fact which will be more
fully referred to as we progress with our story of the group.
There has been much ink wasted in controversy as to whether this was
really the island and this the bay where St. Paul met with his maritime
adventure, but it certainly seems to answer every necessary requirement,
and has for several centuries been thus universally designated. The
average visitor feels no doubt that he gazes upon the "certain creek
with a shore, into the which they were minded, if it were possible, to
thrust in the ship" (Acts xxvii. 39). A fresh northeaster was blowing as
we viewed the scene, driving the waves in gallant style upon the ledge
and shore, while at the same time filling the air with misty spray and
rank sea-odors. The long line of milk-white combers, after expending
their force upon the shore, rushed swiftly back, drawn by a mysterious
undertow towards the deep waters. The noise of the vexed and boisterous
element created a continuous roar, as the waves followed each other in
endless succession. It was the _gregale_, the northeasterly blast so
much dreaded by the fishermen, and which in the olden time, before
navigation was better understood, created such havoc in this midland
sea. It would have been difficult to effect a dry landing, even from a
well-managed boat, with such a troubled sea running. One naturally
remembered "a tempestuous wind called Euroclydon" which the Apostle
encountered, while the imagination was busy in depicting the struggle of
Paul and his companions to reach the shore on broken timbers of the
ship.
The beach of St. Paul's Bay seems to be composed of the very smallest of
sea-shells, together with some larger ones, which have been mostly
broken and powdered by the endless hammering of the waves. There is a
fine sand, or something which represents it, probably composed of the
powder from the shells. This place is a favorite resort of the people
from Valletta for bathing purposes, but it was not an inviting day when
we stood by the shore, and no bathers were seen. It was very natural for
one to recall the Biblical words, "He maketh the deep to boil like a
pot."
In this neighborhood there are numerous prehistoric rock-hewn tombs, cut
by ingenious and skilled hands with effective tools. That these are
Phoenician remains, there seems to be little if any doubt. Those
aboriginal colonists were the commercial people of their time, who
settled much earlier at Rhodes, and other islands of the Levant, than
they did at Malta. They planted colonies in Sicily, Sardinia, and Spain.
Carthage was founded by them. Malta afforded a convenient stopping-place
between Carthage and the mother country, and was naturally prized on
that account, having such ample harbors of refuge, and it doubtless
afforded the means of repairing any damages which resulted from storms
at sea.
Out of the rock-hewn tombs, of which we were speaking, interesting
relics bearing Phoenician characters have been taken from time to
time, such as vases and mural urns, together with articles of domestic
use made from burnt clay, some of which are preserved in the Museum at
Valletta. Other curiosities from the same source are to be seen in the
private collections of English officials, and of wealthy Maltese. Years
of research would not exhaust the interest which the student of the past
must feel in these antiquities. We know of no more fruitful theme or
more promising field, for the historian and the archaeologist, than is
here presented. It is not an untried one, but it is very nearly
inexhaustible, in pursuing which little expense and no hardship is
necessarily encountered. Every facility is freely accorded, both by the
resident population and by the government.
Some of the best examples of Phoenician inscriptions now to be seen in
the British Museum were brought to light at Bighi, in these islands,
where this ancient people worshiped Juno in a stately temple which stood
on the spot now occupied by the moat of Fort St. Angelo. There are few
parts of the world so varied in antiquarian interests as the islands of
this group. Professor Sayce, the eminent Orientalist of Oxford, England,
tells us that Malta contains Phoenician antiquities of a kind found
nowhere else, and he pronounces the sanctuaries of the Giant's Tower, in
Gozo, together with its companion ruin in the larger island, absolutely
unique. These islands undoubtedly occupied an important position in the
history of those remote days. The few Maltese who have written about
this period dwell with great emphasis upon the glory of Malta while
under Phoenician rule, though they are quite unable to give us any
reliable details of the long ages in which this people held sovereignty
here.
Within a few years some remains were unearthed which were attributed to
the Goths, but of all the people who have been mentioned, they probably
left fewer evidences of their presence in Malta than did any other race.
After becoming masters of Italy and Sicily, they came hither about
A. D. 506, and held possession of the group for nearly forty
years, until they were expelled by the army of Justinian under
Belisarius.
The most romantic period of the ever-changing history of this group of
islands, subjected first and last to the control of so many different
nationalities, is undoubtedly that embraced in the two centuries and a
half of the eventful sovereignty of the Knights of St. John,--Knights
Hospitallers, as they were very properly called at first, the most
famous order of mediaeval chivalry, whose name is more familiar to us as
Knights of Malta. The first convent of the founders at Jerusalem was
dedicated to St. John; hence the original name of the order. It was the
earliest systematized charity of the sort concerning which we have any
authentic record. If the true history of this organization could be
written, it would overshadow the most vivid romance. It began in
Palestine during the darkness of the tenth century, when the Saracens
were masters of Jerusalem, and it extends to the verge of the
eighteenth. It is but the outline of important events, which live
through the ages to reach us. The individual is sunk in the mass, and
yet real history is but enlarged biography. The truth of this is shown
in the life of La Vallette, as handed down through three centuries. His
biography gives us a better history of the order of which he was Grand
Master than do writers who attempt it by treating the brotherhood as a
whole. Had the moral character of the Knights of St. John been equal to
their dauntless courage, the order would have formed a worthy example
for all time; but their record shows them and their deeds to have been
of mingled good and evil, the latter quality oftenest predominating. In
the period when their material prosperity was at its height, they were
equally celebrated for wealth, pomp, and vice. While they were boastful
and claimed to be invincible, unlike most braggarts, they were
undeniably brave. Nor was this by any means the only anomaly in the
character of this singular and famous fraternity. Their career
exemplified vice and self-abnegation, hospitality and piracy, the
devoted care of the sick and the slaughter of their fellow-men, in about
equal proportions. These clerical warriors presented a unique phase of
human nature, the outgrowth of a period which, while demanding much
sternness of character to cope with its exigencies, was also peculiarly
amenable to the influence of religious superstition. The brotherhood
owed a large degree of its influence to the cloak of sanctity which it
so boldly assumed, but the humble spirit of which it so unhesitatingly
and persistently outraged.
The attempt to unite two professions so remote in principles was like
trying to make oil and water mingle.
The Grand Master, whose authority was absolute, was elected by the
Knights from their own body, and held the office for life. In the choice
of this individual, the order seemed to be almost always influenced by
more than common wisdom, their election being guided by the best
influences and wisest judgment. They realized the proper qualities which
should characterize one placed in this responsible position, and chose
accordingly. They did not seek to elect such a leader as should favor
this or that "language," this or that section of the fraternity, but one
who was endowed with sufficient courage and conscientious piety to rule
over them with impartiality. That there was an element of weakness ever
present among them, emanating from the division into languages, is very
true, and it was this influence which the Grand Master had always to
guard against. National rivalry was inevitable, no matter how much the
fraternity endeavored, as a body, to avoid it.
The Knights of St. John made the island of Malta the bulwark of
Christendom against the advance of the pale, but bloodstained standard
of the Turks. Even after settling here, which proved to be their final
home, a bitter and murderous conflict was carried on by them with the
Ottoman power, both on sea and land, but especially in their galleons,
until at last, after triumphantly sustaining an unprecedented siege,
during which they actually killed the enemy in the trenches, three times
their own number, the Knights, with ranks seriously thinned, were left
in undisputed possession of these islands. Victory not only crowned
their sanguinary warfare with the Turks, but they also rid the
Mediterranean, at least for a considerable period, of a much-dreaded
scourge, which had so long hampered the commerce of these waters,
namely, the rapacious Greek, Turkish, and Algerine pirates. In the
armory of the Grand Palace at Valletta, there may be seen to-day, among
other trophies taken from the enemy by the Knights, the sword of the
renowned pirate chief, known as Admiral Dragut, who was also Pasha of
Tripoli. The owner of the sword was fatally wounded in the siege of
Malta, before the walls of St. Elmo, in 1565.
This daring man, entirely wanting in the attribute of mercy, and known
as the most reckless and successful corsair of his day, yet preserved
some chivalrous instincts which were exhibited on occasion. A gallant
saying, which is often attributed to others, was first uttered by him,
if we may believe contemporary authority. It was at the time when the
Turkish forces, with whom Dragut had joined in the attempt to take
Malta, after struggling for months in the vain endeavor to capture the
fort of St. Elmo, were engaged in the last decisive assault. The pirate,
now advanced in years, lay sorely wounded and dying, when he asked the
surgeon, who was by his side, "How goes the battle?" "Our soldiers have
taken the fort and massacred its defenders," was the reply. "Allah be
praised!" gasped the sinking corsair, "then I die content." These were
his last words. Dragut was very humbly born, beginning his profession as
a common seaman, at the lowest round of the ladder, that is, as cabin
boy. His fortune was a strangely varied one, now a galley slave, now a
soldier in the Sultan's service, now a pilot on the sea, and now a
daring pirate, working his way upward by patient determination, until
finally he stood as master upon the deck of his own galley, and was the
terror of these seas. It was not long before he became admiral of the
entire Turkish navy. Dragut had pursued his piratical and warlike career
for nearly half a century. He possessed executive qualities which fitted
him to act both as an admiral and as a general, a large share of his
victories having been achieved upon the land. He had agreed with the
Sultan of Turkey to join forces with him in the attack upon Malta, but
was delayed for a few days, so the Sultan's commander began the siege
without him. Mustafa Pasha made a bad piece of business of it, and did
not open his attack with true soldierly skill. When Dragut arrived,
important changes were promptly made, and it was while directing these
movements that the famous corsair received his death wound.
We have seen that the organization of St. John did not confine itself
to warfare upon the land; many of the order were trained seamen, and
were always ready to take the aggressive in marine enterprises when
occasion offered. The strict vows of the brotherhood compelled the
members to wage ceaseless warfare against the infidels. This was the
most clearly defined and determined of their purposes, in the
prosecution of which they adhered tenaciously to the last. In these sea
fights their well-known courage, superior weapons, and persistency
nearly always insured success. Their galleys, well equipped for that
period, were held in readiness for service, moored in the land-locked
creeks of Grand Harbor. These were efficient vessels for the immediate
service they were designed to serve. They were over one hundred feet in
length and twenty-five wide, being propelled by oars or sails, according
to the wind. The sails were not designed for use unless the wind was
aft, as the art of tacking and sailing to windward was not then
practiced. Fifty oars, that is, twenty-five on a side, was a common
arrangement, and there were from three to six galley slaves at each oar,
according to the size of the vessel. These men were chained in their
places, and if they did not work to the satisfaction of the boatswain,
the lash fell without mercy upon their bare backs. A galley was rigged
with two masts, upon each of which a large square sail was hoisted. When
the oars were in use, these sails were clewed up. Several cannon were
fitted to each side, and one was designed to fire from the stern; but
when in action, the usual plan was to ram the enemy's craft, and thus
disable him, or, by boarding, to effect a capture in a hand-to-hand
fight. The half-naked, half-starved slaves often dropped dead at the
oars, and were ruthlessly cast into the sea. No more cruel punishment
could be inflicted upon a criminal than to condemn him to the life of an
oarsman in the galleys.
There is probably no more striking and significant example of the
material progress of the times than that afforded by contrasting the
iron-clad warship of to-day with a fighting caravel of the period of
which we are speaking.
Contrary to what might reasonably be supposed, the people who lived upon
the shores of the Mediterranean did not build vessels which were at all
comparable in general excellence with those constructed by the Northmen
at the same period. The galleons used by the Greeks, Turks, and
Algerines, as well as by the Knights of St. John, were awkward and
unwieldy; their hulls represented no true lines of nautical beauty or
usefulness. They were not seaworthy, as the term is usually applied.
When the weather was severe, the vessel was always anchored under the
lee of the nearest land, or was put into some sheltered bay. These
vessels carried far too much top hamper, and exposed too much surface to
the wind, to be safe when a storm raged. Their free board was enormous,
compared with their draught. The author has seen at Christiania, in
Sweden, the hull of an ancient war craft which was dug out of the clayey
soil of the country, where it had been preserved for centuries, that
antedated these galleons used by the Knights at Rhodes and at Malta, it
having been built at least nine hundred years ago. Its lines and
construction combined three important qualities, storage capacity,
buoyancy, and speed, and it was intended to lie low in the water, thus
presenting but small surface to a storm on the ocean. Not one of these
characteristics could be claimed for the galleys of this inland sea. The
latter were crude, top-heavy, with high-curved poop and stern, and
designed only for fair weather service, while the northern-made craft
could ride out the fiercest storm in safety when properly managed, and
were built for open ocean navigation. In fact, this model, still to be
seen at the Museum in Christiania, is such as bore the Northmen across
the Atlantic to our shores, centuries before the time of Columbus, whose
discoveries we commemorate. The naval branch of the Order of St. John
was originated soon after their expulsion from Jerusalem, and was
rapidly developed while they occupied the island of Rhodes, but it did
not reach its highest efficiency until after their settlement at Malta,
where the situation of the island and its extraordinary harbor
facilities particularly favored maritime enterprise. There they built
many armed galleys, though all the material which entered into their
construction was necessarily imported. There was no available wood to be
found upon the island, except that which was brought from the mainland
of Italy. A people entirely surrounded by water naturally came to be
good boat and ship builders, and the galleons produced during the
sovereignty of the Knights showed great improvement, and were famous for
their staunch character compared with those of their neighbors. These
vessels, however, would be considered nothing less than marine
monstrosities in our day.
The galleys of the Knights did not remain long idle. When a restless
spirit moved their owners, they promptly set sail for the coast of
Barbary, where, surprising some unprotected settlement, they burned the
place to the ground, enslaving those whose lives they spared. If there
were any high officials among their prisoners, or persons of special
importance, such were held for ransom. If the payment demanded for their
release did not come promptly, they too became common slaves and worked
with the rest at the trying galley oars. This service, if they were not
in good health and strength, soon put an end to their lives. Such were
the deeds of professed Christians, who, in their ignorant and bigoted
zeal, actually seem to have thought themselves to be serving God by
robbing, destroying, and enslaving those whom they called infidels. In
the light which comes to us through the long ages, we can see another
and baser motive which must have actuated these monkish freebooters,
namely, the desire for plunder and to kill, "an appetite which grows by
what it feeds upon." Though they tempered their piratical career with
deeds of chivalry and the outward forms of religious devotion, they
were none the less blood-seeking corsairs. The red flag would have been
more appropriate at the masthead of their vessels than the eight-pointed
cross of St. John. The spirit which had originally given birth to the
order--then well named Hospitallers--had long since been lost sight of.
In Jerusalem, Turk and Pilgrim alike shared their hospitality, and their
model was that of the Good Samaritan. Alas, for the degeneracy that
followed!
The conflict as carried on for centuries by both the Christians and the
Mohammedans was equally characterized by diabolical cruelty, while
tinctured by a spirit of blind fanaticism and religious frenzy. On the
part of the Turks this was a genuine instinct, since they could not
expect, even in the event of victory, to realize anything by way of
remunerative plunder. In regard to the Knights, everything goes to show,
as we have already declared, that religion was used as a convenient
cloak to cover up their questionable purposes. The candid student of
history will, however, honestly admit that there were many and striking
exceptions to this rule. Some of the Grand Masters were undoubtedly
sincere, though they were grossly bigoted. Of this, L'Isle Adam and La
Vallette are striking examples.
Each fresh onslaught between the contending Christians and infidels led
to increased bitterness and a desire for revenge. The terrible courage
and indifference to death evinced by the followers of the crescent were
more than matched by the cool, determined bravery of those who fought
under the banner of the cross. Let the truth be frankly recorded. If the
Turks were guilty of the most barbaric atrocities, and we very well know
that they were, the Knights of St. John were not slow to retaliate in
kind. History tells us that the latter, at the siege of Malta in 1565,
not only decapitated their defenseless prisoners of war upon the
ramparts of the forts, in full sight of the enemy, but afterwards fired
their ghastly heads from mortars, and projected them by other means into
the camp of the besieging army. Alas, for the brutality of warfare,
ancient and modern! Who can forget that English officers professing to
be Christians, during the unsuccessful attempt of the natives of India
to regain their freedom, lashed their living prisoners of war to the
cannon's mouth, and applying the match, blew them into eternity? This
diabolical act, it should be remembered, was perpetrated not by
irresponsible guerrillas, or lawless banditti, but by regular English
army officers, in the nineteenth century. Wild African tribes, the
Maoris of New Zealand, or the cannibals of Fiji could do no worse, while
England poses as representing the highest degree of modern civilization
and refinement. All war involves a greater or less lapse into barbarism.
It was the first Napoleon who uttered the significant saying, born of
his own experience, "The worse the man, the better the soldier!"
But let us endeavor not to diverge too far from the immediate purpose of
these pages.
We were speaking of the peculiar order of the Knights of St. John. The
natives of Malta furnished no members to the ranks of the brotherhood.
They might and did serve effectively as men at arms, and joined in
defensive and offensive warfare as common soldiers. A certain
exclusiveness was always maintained by the fraternity as to admitting
individuals to full membership, it being realized from the outset that
an indiscriminate policy in this respect would tend to belittle the
order and weaken its influence, as well as to introduce an undesirable
element into its ranks. Hundreds of the Maltese were paid auxiliaries of
the different "languages" of the order, and others were volunteers in
fighting for the sacredness of their homes when the Turks invaded the
island. This they did in large numbers during the last memorable siege,
but they were in no sense Knights of St. John. The order proper was
exclusively composed of Europeans, who, before admission to the first
rank of the brotherhood, were obliged to produce indisputable proofs of
nobility of birth, to a degree which varied according to the custom of
the nationality whence they came.
The Grand Masters created a certain rank of nobility among the Maltese,
which was conferred upon individuals for extraordinary considerations,
and for valuable services rendered in behalf of the order, but it is
difficult to discover the advantage of the titles thus bestowed. The
persons thus complimented were not eligible for admission to the
brotherhood, nor was any pecuniary compensation attached. Their
descendants to-day, though they are quite impoverished, are more
tenacious of these empty titles than ever before. The presumption
founded thereon is simply ludicrous to an American. The French, during
their brief sovereignty of the island, abolished by special edict all
titles, but this amounted to nothing, and was soon forgotten. As these
meaningless distinctions descend indiscriminately to all male members of
the family whose progenitor was thus endowed, the prospect is that
titled people will by and by become as plenty here as Maltese oranges,
or the "Legion of Honor" in France.
Remembering the marvelous history of the Knights and their often tragic
taking off, while we stroll through the palace-lined streets of the
capital in the still hours of the night, when the moon throws pale,
suggestive shadows across the squares and street corners presided over
by effigies of saints, one can easily imagine the ghostly, armor-clad
figure of a dead Knight, like Hamlet's father, revisiting its earthly
haunts. If these defunct soldier-monks did not leave ghosts behind them,
the power of such spirits after death must be effete. Every turn and
each surrounding in Valletta, whether in the department of arms or of
art, speaks of the vigorous doings of these many-sided knightly friars.
It was the Grand Master Jean de La Vallette, who founded the charming
capital of Malta, after his murderous but successful repulse of the
infidels in their last attempt to capture the island. Though Vallette
did not live long enough to see it reared to its present attractive
completeness, still the stamp of his genius, as shown in the grandeur of
its architecture, its palaces, churches, hospitals, and fortifications,
is his most lasting and appropriate monument. So rapidly did the
building of the new city progress after it was begun, that it is said to
have been practically completed in six years. To accomplish this,
hundreds of able mechanics and skilled artisans were brought from Italy
and other parts of Europe. If these stones, whose surfaces three
centuries have so wrinkled with age, could but speak, what interesting
facts might be revealed by them to illumine this period of the world's
history! We have famous telescopes which enable us to search out the
characteristics of far-away Mars. Would we could turn one of these giant
lenses upon the olden days in Malta, and obtain a tableau of its history
with photographic fidelity!