Herbert Ganado studded his memoirs with an unremitting series of anecdotes, many hilarious, others poignant. One of the earliest referred to the assertion by a British scientific commission that the mysterious and insidious ‘Malta fever’, which hit so many inhabitants and visitors to the island, was caused by drinking goats’ milk. Goats then represented a traditional staple on the landscape of Malta and Gozo, almost a symbol of national identity.

Local patriots rose up in arms. What an intolerable outrage! The leading nationalist daily screamed in a front-page headline: ‘Hanno insultato la capra maltese!’ (they have insulted the Maltese goat).

Photo: Geo FurstPhoto: Geo Furst

This novel and revolutionary anti-colonialist battle cry, possibly well-meaning and certainly misguided, came from the fiery pen of Argo, a regular contributor of the patriotic paper Malta. Argo, the nom de plume of Giuseppe Frendo Azzopardi (1852-1932, graduated lawyer in 1881) thought fit to share with his readers why he believed the British had to shift the blame onto the innocent Maltese goat. Undulant fever, the conspiracy theorist averred, was caused by the filth which the imperial fleet constantly polluted Grand Harbour with.

Sir David Bruce, the Scottish physician after whom Brucellosis was later named.Sir David Bruce, the Scottish physician after whom Brucellosis was later named.

Since the building of the breakwater, Anglo-Saxon sewage stagnated in the port – the currents, which previously carried it to the open sea, had been deflected and tamed. So how convenient to fault the virtuous Maltese ruminant for the bowel movements of the British armed services and the bungling of the imperial sea engineers.

Frendo Azzopardi had not plucked his Grand Harbour excreta cover-up out of thin air. He must have come to know that a group of British scientists had actually been working on that hypothesis, only to discard it. Paranoia at the top of the good journalist’s voice but at the service of patriotic pride.

Malta fever (also Mediterranean, undulant, intermittent, deni rqiq) represented no laughing matter. It was easy to contract, almost impossible to get rid of. Giovanni Battista Leoni, an ecclesiastic at the service of Inquisitor Gaspare Visconti, caught it in Malta in 1581 and left what is probably a first and vivid record of his mishap and an accurate account of its “erratic” symptoms, chief among them an “uncomfortable obstruction of the spleen”. Its presence was massive but its origins remained mysterious up to the early 20th century.

Professor Giuseppe Caruana Scicluna, who, together with Temi Zammit, was behind the discovery of the origin of Malta undulant fever.Professor Giuseppe Caruana Scicluna, who, together with Temi Zammit, was behind the discovery of the origin of Malta undulant fever.

This total ignorance about the sources of these puzzling fevers, not infrequently deadly, persisted and the colonial authorities started totting up the economic costs of the abnormal rate of morbidity among British servicemen stationed in Malta. So long as the disease decimated expendable natives, it raised no particular concerns but when the malady started mowing down British soldiers and sailors by the scores, then London finally awoke to the fact that something should be done about it.

An early step had been the work in Malta in 1886 by a young medical doctor in the British Army, David Bruce, later Sir (1855-1931), and Giuseppe Caruana Scicluna (1853-1921), the first Maltese analyst and bacteriologist trained at the world-renowned Pasteur Institute in Paris “who carried out most, if not all, of the bacteriological work”, John Rizzo Naudi writes in his article ‘Brucellosis: The Malta Experience’ in the 2006-7 Institute of Health Care biennial report.

Temi Zammit seems to have accepted, without visibly opposing resistance, being airbrushed out of his rightful place in the annals of medicine

A marble tablet walled up in the laboratory where the origins of Brucellosis were discovered.A marble tablet walled up in the laboratory where the origins of Brucellosis were discovered.

They established without doubt that a microbe, which they called micrococcus melitensis, caused the illness.

Harold W. Wyatt, in his article ‘Dr G. Caruana Scicluna, the first Maltese microbiologist’ in Journal Medical Biography, Vol.8, November 2000, says Bruce “never acknowledged Caruana Scicluna’s contributions” and eventually received all the credit for the discovery.

In his 1989 book Brucellosis, medical historian Monir Madkour says Caruana Scicluna “was a microbiologist and took an active role in Bruce’s research. He prepared the agar-agar plates, the culture media and succeeded in cultivating the causative mechanisms of the Malta fever from the samples taken from the spleens of fatal cases of the disease. His contribution to the work on brucellosis was not acknowledged in any of Bruce’s publications.”

Portrait of Sir Temi Zammit by Edward Caruana Dingli.Portrait of Sir Temi Zammit by Edward Caruana Dingli.

The pathogen had been identified but how it got into the human body or where it came from and how it could be avoided or prevented remained entirely elusive.

There is no doubt that it was Temi Zammit (1864-1935) who, in 1905, through thorough scientific experiments, discovered that the vicious microbe bred and spread inside the meek Maltese goat and was transmitted to humans by drinking infected goats’ milk. Zammit confirmed his friend Caruana Scicluna’s persistent conviction that the origin of pathogen was the goat.

Maltese politicians and physicians had for some time resented and protested why this nasty illness, endemic to other parts of the world, should be defined as ‘Malta’ fever – it did nothing for the nascent tourist industry. But they succeeded in wiping this stigma off Malta very slowly and the alternative name, Brucellosis, in honour of Bruce, only caught on rather late in the day. Zammit was well aware of the determining contributions by himself and another Maltese scientist to the stamping out of undulant fever from the Mediterranean basin. Yet, he seems to have accepted, without visibly opposing resistance, being airbrushed out of his rightful place in the annals of medicine.

Undoubtedly, a gifted polymath of varied and extraordinary talents, Zammit realised that, in colonial Malta, the only way to advance was to be always seen as docile, subservient and compliant; after switching his political allegiance from the patriotic front to the imperialist bootlicking brigade, he consistently held his silence, lest the Brits accuse the native of not knowing his place.

This self-effacement Zammit sadly suffered as a scientist in the undulant fever saga, doubled as an archaeologist. His spectacular field excavations, especially in Tarxien, were delivering loud and unequivocal evidence of the tremendous antiquity of Malta’s neolithic culture but his findings ran counter to British academic dogma. He must have had no doubts how utterly wrong the British archaeologists were but he preferred to mutter faintly under his breath rather than upset the paymasters by spreading the truth.

A herd of Maltese goats, carriers of the micrococcus melitensis. A late 1920s photo by Geo Furst.A herd of Maltese goats, carriers of the micrococcus melitensis. A late 1920s photo by Geo Furst.

The Malta hijack was hardly the only time that David Bruce had worn other people’s feathers in his cap. In fact, what happened in Malta is an almost carbon-copy repeat of another historical misappropriation he is accused of, this time in central Africa, where a mysterious and lethal ‘sleeping sickness’ devastated whole swathes of the land.

Sir David Bruce, who misappropriated two important scientific discoveries.Sir David Bruce, who misappropriated two important scientific discoveries.

Aldo Castellani (1874-1971) from Florence specialised in bacteriology and was, in 1902, selected to form part of the Royal Society’s Commission on Sleeping Sickness which visited Uganda, one of the regions worse hit by the scourge. His research and experiments in the field led to spectacular results. In November 1902, he identified a parasite in the spinal fluid of a number of patients laid down by the illness. The trypanosome parasite was, undoubtedly, the cause of the malady and the tsetse fly its carrier and reservoir.

After this discovery, in 1903, London addressed to Uganda a second Sleeping Sickness Commission, made up of Bruce and David Nabarro. At first, they publicly endorsed and confirmed Castellani’s discoveries. Then, somehow, Castellani was faded out of the picture and all recognition and praise were shifted to Bruce.

Sir Aldo Castellani, the bacteriologist who discovered the origins of the sleeping sickness endemic in parts of Africa.Sir Aldo Castellani, the bacteriologist who discovered the origins of the sleeping sickness endemic in parts of Africa.

But Nabarro waxed indignant at this injustice and publicly protested against it: “In conclusion,” he wrote in the London Times of July 23, 1908, “to Dr Castellani must be given credit of having first found the trypanosome in the cerebro-spinal fluid of sleeping sickness patients, of having first associated the parasite with the aetiology of the disease and of having first published that sleeping sickness is a trypanosome infection”.

Years later, Nabarro, still smarting under the injustice of the misappropriation of the discovery in favour of Bruce, reiterated in the British Medical Journal of October 6, 1917, “in all my publications, as a matter of mere justice, I have always given credit to Castellani: (1) of having first discovered the trypanosome in the cerebro-spinal fluid of sleeping sickness patients; (2) of having connected the trypanosome he discovered in the cerebro-spinal fluid with the aetiology of the disease”.

And, if any hesitation persists as to whom the eradication of sleeping sickness owes most, here is the testimonial of Sir Ronald Ross, the brilliant British Nobel Prize for Medicine, in the Journal of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene, of October 1, 1926: “There cannot be any doubt that the fundamental discovery in the elucidation of the aetiology of sleeping sickness was Castellani’s observations of trypanosomes in the spinal fluid of sleeping sickness patients”.

A postage stamp in honour of Sir Temi Zammit.A postage stamp in honour of Sir Temi Zammit.

Castellani must have been a most colourful and fascinating personality. Over the years, he became the trusted personal physician of an impressive number of internationally high-profile figures – royalty, present or former, dictators, military personalities, scientists and politicians the world over all swore by him, including Mussolini, Umberto, King of Italy, and half the scions of the reigning houses and the aristocracy of Europe. He ran a busy clinic in Harley Street, London and visited patients in several continents by plane.

I had the authentic pleasure of reading his autobiography, A Doctor in Many lands, published in English in 1960. More pleasant, engrossing and urbane memoirs are difficult to imagine. He, admittedly, comes across as a compulsive name- dropper but, at the same time, his narrative oozes humanity, caring, understanding and empathy. Almost impossible to find a hard word against anyone, even those who wronged him.

A devoted lover of his native Italy and its culture, over the years, Castellani also turned into an ardent admirer of the British and their achievements. When he tried to wean his patient Mussolini out of his invincible antipathy for anything British, the dictator was quick to retort: “Of course, everyone knows you are an incorrigible Anglophile.”

Personally, Mussolini despised sycophants – they popped up wherever he looked. Castellani recounts how, after Mussolini came to power, his eldest son who frequented a state school, started being awarded maximum marks in every examination result. The dictator sent for the headmaster and threatened to have him posted to Africa if that travesty persisted.

The tsetse fly, carrier of the germ that causes the lethal sleeping sickness.The tsetse fly, carrier of the germ that causes the lethal sleeping sickness.

This reverential timidity for anything British may explain why, like Caruana Scicluna and Temi Zammit, Castellani’s reaction to the hijack by others of his achievements results timid and deferential. You do not raise your voice when a Brit kicks you. You politely look the other way and force yourself to smile back.

Castellani’s memoirs contain snippets of information I have not found elsewhere: When, at the end of WWII, the Italian government and the monarchy fled Rome, it became clear that between the time the Germans would withdraw and the Allies arrived, a total vacuum of power would prevail throughout the capital city. Anarchy and looting became real prospects. To prevent this, a scheme was put in place by the remnants of the Italian army that it would form a diarchy with the Order of Malta to assume temporary power over Rome. Prince Ludovico Chigi Albani, the grand master of the Order, had secretly agreed.

Thankfully, the retreat of the Germans from Rome and the arrival of the Allies in fact coincided, so the emergency scheme never had to be activated.

Castellani rounds off his autobiography with a short history of the Order of Malta and with lavish praise for the invaluable work the Order had put in for the relief and eradication of leprosy throughout the world.

Sadly, we have to admit it was not the imperial colonisers who insulted the noble Maltese goat. Giuseppe Caruana Scicluna and Sir Temi Zammit beat them to it.

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