In or around September 1790 the two volumes of this book appeared in France. Written by a mysterious "Carasi" the book describes the adventures of the author during his two years of service in the Regiment of Malta between 1780 and 1782.
Before this book's appearance there had been other books and pamphlets which criticised the Order of Malta and its rule of the country but none were so outspoken as this book by the mysterious "Carasi" who savagely attacked the government and morals of the Order while even the morality of the Maltese comes in for some spicy comments.
The date of publication is important. The French Revolution had began in 1789 and within eight years the Order would be kicked out of Malta.
The Order had lost its original inspiration and had grown arrogant and lazy. It lived in the reflected glory of the Great Siege of 1565. The French Revolution had deprived it of a substantial part of its revenue and it had grown poor and unable to do the bare minimum which was expected from it.
There is some mystery about the authorship of this book. It is clear that "Carasi" is a pseudonym. Some point to various persons with a common surname, Baron, perhaps with some Masonic connections, from Lyon.
Many of the details mentioned in the book tally with historical known facts and figures.
The hero of the book claims to have been in the newly established Regiment of Malta. The Rising of the Priests in 1775 had showed that the Order had too few troops on the island to suppress any attempted revolt.
Hence the decision in November 1776 to establish a new regiment of 1,200 men. In 1782 the total personnel amounted to 932 men coming from the Vatican state, Sicily, Piedmont, Parma, Genoa, Corsica, Germany, Tuscany, Venice and Milan. By 1784 the regiment had been increased by 429 Maltese.
The persons mentioned in the book are all historical persons who existed in reality except maybe for "Carasi" and his immediate friends.
The adventures begin in France, near Marseilles, when the protagonist leaves his immediate family to seek adventures in the big city. He soon gets robbed and tastes hunger (apart from tasting the pleasures of the flesh).
Then someone mentions the Regiment of Malta which was recruiting and he and his bosom friend join up. Even here, his first taste of Malta under the Knights was not a pleasant one and he was to spend his first months on the island in a sort of arrest in quarantine.
In these first months he had to deal with a real tyrant, Marquis Freslon who boasted he had more power than the grand master. Gradually, however, he and his companions got used to living in Malta and he could look around and describe Malta as he found it in the latter half of the 18th century.
That is where his anger at Malta, the Maltese and the Order erupts. He describes the fortifications especially around the harbour as formidable but seems to look into the future when he questions how these could be manned when the Order had huge money problems.
A clear sign of this situation was the bad state of the Order's fleet. On the other hand the vessels owned by the Maltese were mainly corsairs paying the Grand Master to be allowed to plunder shipping.
He describes Grand Master Pinto as a frivolous Portuguese leading a life of frivolity and shame, wasting the Order's income and repairing nothing. His successor, de Rohan, is described as ignorant and careless who does not stop the injustices and bad habits begun by his predecessor.
The author may not be completely logical - at one point he praises the fortifications but then he says some can be easily attacked and overwhelmed. And there is too much red tape for the fortifications to be really defended.
He then defends the anger which led to the "Revolt of the Priests" in these words "a number of citizens finally became fed up with the government of the Knights and their aristocratic arrogance and oppression. Until then they had accepted the iron rod of these foreigners; they accepted seeing their property, wives and children violated and mistreated...."
The island of Malta is not self-sufficient. There is not one factory and every refined product is imported from Sicily or France. There is not much choice for the people to find work and employment. It is therefore no surprise that many Maltese sell themselves as galley rowers to the Order for the sum of 20 dollars.
"Everything contributes to make this island a place of lasciviousness, frivolity and loose morals. The loose morals of the Knights, the heat of the climate, the desires of the foreigners, but foremost the poverty of the locals make each woman a Messalina and every young man a Ganymede."
"Grand Master Pinto sometimes organised Coccagnas of a different kind. The grille was constructed in the main hall of the palace. Instead of animals and foodstuffs, it was hung with gold and silverware. As soon as the people, who were chosen to participate in the hunt for these presents had gathered, the palace gates would be closed. All the hunters undress themselves and at a given signal they would rush to the structure and climb it up from all sides to get the treasured objects. The grand master watched this scene with much enjoyment: the climbers were all women."
The Maltese are described as very superstitious, and the priests, abetted by the Inquisition, keep the Maltese in their stupidity and their blind faith. One such superstition regarded what came to be known as the "canzir (hanzir) del Purgatorio" pigs let free to roam the streets and get fattened at no extra cost.
Having described with some exaggeration the riches in St John's, the author concludes that the Knights had lost their raison d'être. They do more harm to humanity than good and the Maltese would do better to engage in trade than continue corsairing and privateering.
He then describes the hospital of the Order but in very derogatory terms, far from the usual praise for caring for the sick with tenderness and using silver plates. The sick, himself included when he fell sick, are cared for by rough characters while the knights, who should be doing the caring, never appear and it is they who eat from silver plates.
Towards the end of the book the author describes, with examples, the corruption to be found at court and the flaunting by the knights of the rule of chastity. Many Maltese women, he says, played the game - they became mistresses of some knight who kept them in comfort. As for the husbands they either turned a blind eye or else were sent to the galleys.