period had great and increasing difficulty in preserving the Order's
neutrality. Many Knights broke their Oath of Obedience by enlisting in
the French and Spanish armies. When this was discovered, the offended
King would make out that the Order had taken sides and would threaten
it with his vengeance. As the Order possessed many estates in both
kingdoms, the Grand Masters were in constant fear that these would be
encroached upon if an excuse could be found to justify such an
action. But Spain, while it possessed the kingdom of the Two Sicilies,
possessed an even surer method of punishing the Order. Malta,
despite all the care lavished upon it, has never been able to produce
sufficient corn for its population, and for this reason imported food
regularly from Sicily, where the Order had built granaries for storing
the corn while awaiting transshipment. As soon as the Knights offended
the King of Spain Malta was plunged into scarcity, and the unhappy
natives had often to suffer heavily because the Grand Master was a
Frenchman.

Another result of the wars of France and Spain was the frequent
internal quarrels at Malta. As the feelings of the two nations towards
each other were often embittered, it is not surprising to find that
French and Spanish Knights would come to open blows in the streets of
Valetta. The unhealthy life of those young and idle aristocrats was
conducive to turbulence, and the Grand Masters often adopted the
policy of sending them to sea as soon as trouble was foreseen. The
French were generally in the preponderance, as we can see from the
great number of French Grand Masters; and the increasing greatness of
the French monarchy in the seventeenth century was reflected at Malta.

The position of the Maltese became worse and worse as the Order
declined. The natives, who had enjoyed a considerable measure of local