I avoided the subject of the Qala Lembi Battery so as not to bore, but once Mr Thake insists, it turns out that after all I do not need “a course in basic map-reading” as he suggests.

According to Stephen Spiteri, the very authority quoted by Mr Thake, Grognet, the cartographer, got the position of the coastal Battery wrong, placing it much further inland than it actually was, thus giving the impression that it was in the approximate area of High Street.

As for Conrad Thake’s claim that the house shown is the battery’s ancillary building I quote Mr Spiteri: “the battery only had a small blockhouse – hardly the dimensions of a house”.

Still less a house with a garden! It appears my persistence was not that diabolical after all.