fterwards a decree
was passed declaring that any Frenchman belonging to an Order of
Knighthood which demanded proofs of nobility from entrants could not
be considered a French citizen. This was followed by the main attack
on September 19, 1792, when all the property in France was declared
confiscate and annexed to the French national domains. There was
some mention of indemnification to the despoiled Knights, but as the
necessary condition to a pension was residence in France--a dangerous
course for a noble in 1793 and 1794--the scheme came to naught. The
decree of September, 1792, was the death-blow to the Order, and its
extinction was simply a matter of time. The course of the war and the
constant French successes made their position even more perilous. Half
the revenues had gone with the confiscation in France; but this was
not all, for Bonaparte's Italian campaigns meant the loss of the
Order's estates in Northern Italy, and the conquests of the French on
the Rhine diminished the German possessions. With decreasing resources
and dwindling numbers, the fortress of Malta could not long hold out
if attacked, and the position of the Order was becoming desperate.
De Rohan, the Grand Master, temporised and refused to declare war on
France, but he seems to have helped the Spanish and English fleets by
allowing them to recruit at Malta, a privilege hitherto granted very
sparingly by the Knights. But whatever the Grand Master's policy, no
words or pretences could disguise the fact that the French Republic
by its confiscation had assaulted the Order. It was only too probable
that France would seize the first opportunity of attacking the
Order in its own home and by this means increasing its power in the
Mediterranean.

One gleam of light came to cheer the gloom at Malta. The third
dismemberment of Poland had brought the Polish Priory into the hands
of the Tsar Paul I. Among other eccentricities of that monarch was a
passionate admiration for chivalry, which he displayed by changing
the Polish into a Russian Priory, increasing its revenues to 300,000
florins, and incorporating it in the Anglo-Bavarian langue; he also
assumed the title of "Protector of the Order of Malta."

In 1797, at Ancona, Napoleon had intercepted a message from the Tsar
to the Grand Master containing this news. Plans for the capture of
Malta took shape in Bonaparte's mind, and he sent a cousin of the
French consul at Malta, Poussielgue by name, to spy ou