ABSTRACT
From 1825, in the face of punitive delays to British and Maltese shipping in western Mediterranean ports, the quarantine concerns of London and Valletta coincided. The position for Malta, although increasingly irksome, was roughly the same as it had been for the previous dozen or so years. For Britain, however, this obstacle to trade was an unwelcome new experience, bringing home to Lord Liverpool’s administration the unpalatable fact that any violation of the sanctity of quarantine, however much reform might seem justified, risked the displeasure of institutions abroad which for one reason or another were unwilling to agree.
