The Story of Malta. Ballou Maturin Murray

indentures, which are well adapted to naval and commercial purposes, for which they are improved, all being embraced within the elaborate lines of the marine fortifications.

      Grand Harbor contains the naval hospital, arsenal, dock-yard, and custom-house, with Fort St. Angelo inside and Fort Ricasoli at the entrance. Quarantine Harbor has at its mouth Fort Tigné, while within is Fort Mangel and Lazaretto Island. The landing designed for the mail steamships is also here. The lazaretto is the most perfect of any arrangement of the kind in Europe. The tongue of land upon which the city stands is a narrow, rocky peninsula, dividing, as we have said, the two harbors, so that Fort Ricasoli at the entrance of Grand Harbor, Fort St. Elmo upon the point of the peninsula, and Fort Tigné at the mouth of Quarantine Harbor are all on a line at the sea front, and are capable of repelling the approach of any ship afloat. A bird's-eye view of the topography of the port of Valletta is at first a little confusing to a stranger, but its plan soon becomes clear, and the object of its arrangement is realized. It is then seen that the natural facilities have been admirably adapted to the general purpose by skilled engineers. We do not hesitate to say that there is not a more complete system of fortifications extant, in any part of the world, than the cordon of defensive structures at Malta. The forts of the harbor, however, form but a portion of the vast system of fortifications which completely surround Valletta. Such a gigantic amount of heavy stone-work as they represent could only be erected where the material was abundant and the labor cheap. The stone excavated in sinking the deep ditches was used in raising the escarps; and as to the necessary labor, that was done by the army of slaves retained on the island by the Knights. When they were not confined at the oars of the galleys, they were compelled to labor in erecting these elaborate defenses. Like the Egyptian builders of the Pyramids, the order was obliged to feed these workmen; but beyond that expense their services cost nothing.

      While the Maltese capital bears, appropriately, the name of the Grand Master who originated and promoted its construction, these defensive works, so remarkable and so perfect in their character from a soldier's point of view, should perpetuate the name of Jerome Cassan, the accomplished engineer of the order, who designed them, and under whose able superintendence they were erected. No wonder they call forth the admiration of all military officers who visit the place. Immense sums of money and incalculable toil were lavished upon the undertaking, regardless of any probable necessity for the expenditure. So far as the science of military defense goes, it would seem as though perfection had been reached when Chevalier Cassan finished his original plans; but each new Grand Master of the Knights seems to have thought it to be his duty to increase the number of forts, giving to the addition his own name, by which each section thus constructed is still known. Exposed points on the coast of both Malta and Gozo were fortified from time to time, until there were no unprotected bays or inlets left. For centuries before this was done, piratical invasions were frequently made by small Algerine or Turkish expeditions landing at unfortified points. A score or two of armed men were able to ravage a whole district, and carry off half a hundred families to be sold into slavery. The Turkish and Algerine war fleets were almost entirely manned at the oars by captives thus secured.

      When these soldier-priests first took possession of the islands, there was but one fort at Malta, namely, that of St. Angelo, which hardly deserved to be called a fort. To-day, as we have shown, there is no unprotected point on the entire coast line of the group. Modern instruments of warfare have revolutionized the requirements of defensive works, and many of these elaborate structures, it must be admitted, are hardly appropriate to our times. Malta is the equal of Gibraltar in a military point of view, though the fortifications of neither are absolutely impregnable. Of the latter, it may be said that nature prepared the place for man's adaptation; but as regards the former, art alone has produced an unequaled amphitheatre of fortifications. On the land side Valletta is protected by a labyrinth of marvelous ditches and ramparts, many of which are cut out of the solid rock, besides having vast chambers, or caves, of the same substantial character, designed for the safe storage of grain in anticipation of the place being besieged. These rock-hewn caves are so arranged that they can be hermetically sealed. It is said that they will preserve grain in perfect condition for a score of years. A quantity of provisions is always kept stored in these receptacles for the use of the garrison, and to meet any sudden emergency, the same policy being adopted at Gibraltar and Aden. The warfare of our day, however, admits of no protracted sieges. Such a struggle as took place before Sebastopol, not very long ago, could not be sustained between two powers with the present means of destruction possessed by both parties. In the future, conflicts will be short and decisive. If anything relating to warfare can be merciful, the sharpest and shortest process is most so. Lingering contests entail such terrible consequent ills that they bring with them sufferings paramount to those caused by the conflict of arms. "The next saddest thing in war to a defeat is a victory," said Wellington, as he looked sorrowfully upon the field which he had won by a fearful sacrifice of human life at San Sebastian.

      The two excellent harbors of Valletta might afford anchorage for six hundred ships of war, as they have bold, well-defined shores, and an average depth of ten fathoms. This was not so originally, but is the result of a thorough system of dredging, which has been faithfully completed.

      As we look upon the scene from an elevated point, beneath the afternoon sun, while freely inhaling the lotus-like air of the Mediterranean, everything is serene and lovely. Over the terraced roofs of Valletta rises the square tower of the Grand Palace, gay with many colored signal flags. Across the harbor the eye rests upon Fort Ricasoli, and here stands stout old St. Elmo, while in the distance Fort San Rocco crowns a hilltop. Much nearer is Fort St. Angelo, with its record of a thousand years and more. The numerous domes and towers of the city, though they are not minarets, have much the same Oriental effect upon the eye. Myriads of small boats, painted in bright, fanciful colors after the florid Maltese style, and having canvas coverings sheltering the stern, shoot hither and thither like birds upon the wing. The boatmen stand while rowing, as do the oarsmen of the Venetian gondolas, pushing, not pulling, at the oars. Hundreds of small feluccas line the shore. A group of fishermen in rude but picturesque costumes are landing the product of their industry. Half a dozen ships belonging to the British navy, and as many huge mail steamers, swing lazily at anchor, while little erratic steam launches dart back and forth from ship to shore; a memorable picture, the sea and sky being its appropriate frame. French, German, Italian, and English flags indicate the nationality of the several vessels, but the eye searches in vain for the stars and stripes of our Union. The same absence of the American flag is only too observable throughout nearly all the ports of the Mediterranean and the far East. The home-keeping citizen who reads these lines can hardly realize the patriotic sensation mingled with dire homesickness which thrills the traveler, long absent from his native land, at sight of our beloved national emblem proudly expanding its folds upon a foreign shore.

      We look in vain for one other significant flag, that of the eight-pointed cross, which for centuries waved over these battlements as the sacred banner of the Knights of St. John, the token of their religious faith and their resolve to conquer or to die, which led them in the van of battle at Jerusalem, at Acre, and at Rhodes, and under which they slaughtered the besieging enemy by thousands beneath the wall of Malta; the gallant flag which so often flashed defiance before the eyes of sanguinary Turks, treacherous Greeks, and rapacious Algerines upon the sea; the flag, alas! which was lowered in disgrace, in 1798, without the firing of a single shot in its defense, to give place to the tricolor of France, and to acknowledge the mastership of Bonaparte. This was an act of cowardice equaled only by that of the arch-traitor Bazaine, who shamefully surrendered a whole army at Metz which was perfectly capable of winning a signal victory over the Germans, if it had been led against them by a brave general. The world knows how that dastard poltroon was tried and punished for his treason, as well as of his miserable subsequent life and unregretted death in a foreign land.

      To return to the Knights of St. John. This act of treachery – the surrender of Valletta to the French – was virtually the end of the famous order; the dying hour, as it were, of a brotherhood which had for hundreds of years defied the whole Ottoman power almost single handed, and whose members, as chivalrous knights, won the respect of Christendom.

      One often reads of the great beauty of the sunset as enjoyed upon this group, and we cheerfully bear witness to the fact that this phenomenon of nature is justly eulogized. Writers are apt to grow enthusiastic over Italian sunsets, especially