The handful of French soldiers defending Acadie were hungry and tired of war on Monday, October 6, 1710, when ships from New England returned to the Annapolis Basin, this time under the command of Francis Nicholson, and under the eye of Samuel Vetch, an ambitious Scotsman who had a promise of governorship of Canada if he could take it from the French. Vetch had put together the attacking force and made Nicholson it commander in chief.
This time, the siege lasted a week, but Subercase did not have the men or material he needed. On Saturday, October 11, Subercase wrote to Nicholson, "I now write to you to tell you, Sir, that for to (sic) prevent the spilling of both English and French Blood, I am ready to hold up both hands for a Capitulation that will be honorable to both of us."
The final articles of surrender were signed on October 13, 1710. They decreed, among other things, that inhabitants of Port Royal "within cannon shot of the fort...shall remain upon their estates, with their corn, cattle, and furniture...they taking the Oaths of Allegiance and Fidelity to Her Sacred Majesty of Great Britain."
The banner of France was raised for the last time at Port Royal at sunrise on Thursday, October 16, 1710. Midway through the morning, French officials and soldiers and their families, 258 people, paraded from the little fort, boarded British ships, and sailed for home. As they left, British and American troops and officers marched into the fort, hoisted the Union Jack, toasted Queen Anne, and gave the town her name. It has been Annapolis Royal since then.
In 1713, the Treaty of Utrecht ended the War of Spanish Succession in Europe. It ceded Acadie and Newfoundland to England. This time it stayed in British hands.
According to the language of the treaty, "...all Nova Scotia or Acadie, with its ancient Boundaries; as also the City of Port Royal, now called Annapolis Royal, and all other things in those Parts, which depend on the said Lands and Islands; together with the Dominion, Propriety, and Possession of the said Islands, Lands, and Places; and all Right whatsoever, by Treaties, or by any other way obtained, which the most Christian King, the Crown of France, or any of the Subjects thereof, have hitherto had to the said Islands, Lands, and Places, and the Inhabitants of the same, are yielded and made over to the Queen of Great Britain and to her Crown for ever."
On this date in 1260, 750 years ago, was consecrated Cathédrale Notre-Dame de Chartres, perhaps the finest example of Gothic ecclesiastical architecture and one of the greatest temples of Christendom, in the presence of King St. Louis IX and the royal family.
Therefore, when we, and the crushed crowd of kneeling worshippers around us, lift our eyes at last after the miracle of the mass, we see, far above the high altar, high over all the agitation of prayer, the passion of politics, the anguish of suffering, the terrors of sin, only the figure of the Virgin in majesty, looking down on her people, crowned, throned, glorified, with the infant Christ on her knees. She does not assert herself; probably she intends to be felt rather than feared. Compared with the Greek Virgin, as you see her, for example, at Torcello, the Chartres Virgin is retiring and hardly important enough for the place. She is not exaggerated either in scale, drawing, or colour. She shows not a sign of self-consciousness, not an effort for brilliancy, not a trace of stage effect--hardly even a thought of herself, except that she is at home, among her own people, where she is loved and known as well as she knows them. The seven great windows are one composition; and it is plain that the artist, had he been ordered to make an exhibition of power, could have overwhelmed us with a storm of purple, red, yellows, or given us a Virgin of Passion who would have torn the vault asunder; his ability is never in doubt, and if he has kept true to the spirit of the western portal and the twelfth-century, it is because the Virgin of Chartres was the Virgin of Grace, and ordered him to paint her so. One shudders to think how a single false note--a suggestion of meanness, in this climax of line and colour--would bring the whole fabric down in ruins on the eighteenth-century meanness of the choir below; and one notes, almost bashfully, the expedients of the artists to quiet their effects. So the lines of the seven windows are built up, to avoid the horizontal, and yet not exaggerate the vertical.
The architect counts here for more than the colourist; but the colour, when you study it, suggests the same restraint. Three great windows on the Virgin's right, balanced by three more on her left, show the prophets and precursors of her Son; all architecturally support and exalt the Virgin, in her celestial atmosphere of blue, shot with red, calm in the certainty of heaven. Any one who is prematurely curious to see the difference in treatment between different centuries should go down to the church of Saint Pierre in the lower town, and study there the methods of the Renaissance. Then we can come back to study again the ways of the thirteenth century. The Virgin will wait; she will not be angry; she knows her power; we all come back to her in the end.
Or the Renaissance, if one prefers, can wait equally well, while one kneels with the thirteenth century, and feels the little one still can feel of what it felt. Technically these apsidal windows have not received much notice; the books rarely speak of them; travellers seldom look at them; and their height is such that even with the best glass, the quality of the work is beyond our power to judge. We see, and the artists meant that we should see, only the great lines, the colour, and the Virgin. The mass of suppliants before the choir look up to the light, clear blues and reds of this great space, and feel there the celestial peace and beauty of Mary's nature and abode. There is heaven! and Mary looks down from it, into her church, where she sees us on our knees, and knows each one of us by name. There she actually is--not in symbol or in fancy, but in person, descending on her errands of mercy and listening to each one of us, as her miracles prove, or satisfying our prayers merely by her presence which calms our excitement as that of a mother calms her child. She is there as Queen, not merely as intercessor, and her power is such that to her the difference between us earthly beings is nothing. Her quiet, masculine strength enchants us most. Pierre Mauclerc and Philippe Hurepel and their men-at-arms are afraid of her, and the Bishop himself is never quite at his ease in her presence; but to peasants, and beggars, and people in trouble, this sense of her power and calm is better than active sympathy. People who suffer beyond the formulas of expression--who are crushed into silence, and beyond pain--want no display of emotion--no bleeding heart--no weeping at the foot of the Cross--no hysterics--no phrases! They want to see God, and to know that He is watching over His own. How many women are there, in this mass of thirteenth century suppliants, who have lost children? Probably nearly all, for the death rate is very high in the conditions of medieval life. There are thousands of such women here, for it is precisely this class who come most; and probably every one of them has looked up to Mary in her great window, and has felt actual certainty, as though she saw with her own eyes--there, in heaven, while she looked--her own lost baby playing with the Christ-Child at the Virgin's knee, as much at home as the saints, and much more at home than the kings. Before rising from her knees, every one of these women will have bent down and kissed the stone pavement in gratitude for Mary's mercy. The earth, she says, is a sorry place, and the best of it is bad enough, no doubt, even for Queen Blanche and the Duchess Alix who has had to leave her children here alone; but there above is Mary in heaven who sees and hears me as I see her, and who keeps my little boy till I come; so I can wait with patience, more or less! Saints and prophets and martyrs are all very well, and Christ is very sublime and just, but Mary knows!
On June 28, 1914, word is sent from Sarajevo that the Heir Apparent, Archduke Franz Ferdinand, is assassinated, making Karl the new Heir Apparent and changing his life forever. As a consequence of the assassination, war breaks out and quickly engulfs Europe. Karl is called to lead various military actions, and comports himself with valor and honor. He leads victorious efforts on the eastern and southern fronts, and is known for incorporating his moral convictions into his battle plans. In Italy, he commands his officers to avoid needless bloodshed, and:
. . . to ensure that the wounded are taken care of as quickly as possible and that the troops are always provided for as well as possible…I forbid the order to take no prisoners…I forbid most emphatically stealing and plundering and wanton destruction. Every soldier in the 20th Corps must be filled with the conviction that we are the bearers of culture, even in the land of traitors.
For Karl, the culture he bears is Christianity, and in the face of being in a war he considers immoral, he insists that he and the army act morally.
In the midst of war, Karl is summoned to the side of a weary and elderly Emperor Franz Josef. On November 30, 1916, Karl is near the Emperor’s deathbed praying the rosary with Zita when he hears the words “Your Majesty” addressed to him for the first time. His first priority as Emperor is to bring peace and security back to Europe and his empire. He begins secret peace negotiations through his brother-in-laws, the Princes Sixtus and Xavier of Bourbon-Parma, who are in a position to smuggle letters from Karl to the Entente leaders in France and England. These negotiations occur from November 22, 1916 through February 20, 1917, when a new government in Paris puts a halt to the talks.
He begins a second series of attempts that last until the end of the war. In these negotiations, his Foreign Minister Count Czernin and the French Representative Count Armand, discuss terms in Switzerland. However, these talks come to nothing, and are damaged by the French revelation to the world press of the “Sixtus Affair.” The leak also hurt Karl’s reputation and ability to function as an intermediary in the effort to bring peace to the world.
Pope Benedict XV proposes a plan for peace as well, but only Emperor Karl accepts the Pontiff’s solutions—the other belligerents are intent on continuing the war for their own selfish advantages. With the advent of the United States in the war, President Wilson issues “Fourteen Points” necessary for the war’s conclusion. Karl accepts all of them, but by this time the Entente no longer recognizes him as a legitimate ruler.
Although Karl’s attention is focused on peace throughout his reign, the Emperor still has to wage a war that is not of his making, and care for his suffering people. Upon his accession to the throne, he grants a general amnesty.
Militarily he prohibits the fighting of duels, and the practices of flogging and binding wrists to ankles. He despises and forbids the use of mustard gas on the enemy, and the employment of submarine warfare. He orders that soldiers, prisoners, and the wounded must be humanely treated, and creates a great books program for soldiers. Whenever possible he commutes death sentences— both military and civil.
Civilly, he organizes soup kitchens, uses the palace’s horses and carriages to deliver coal to the Viennese, he fights against usury and corruption, and gives away his personal wealth— distributing alms beyond his means. He is the first world leader to establish a Ministry of Social Welfare, which is commissioned to deal with youth welfare, the war-disabled, widows, orphans, social insurance, labor rights and protection, job placement, unemployment relief and emigration protection and housing.
Spiritually, Emperor Karl shares in the same privations as his people, and orders the palace to observe food rationing and smaller portions. He invokes the name of God in all decrees and governmental acts, creates a Catholic press, and plans the building of more churches in Vienna to serve the growing needs of the faithful.
Exile, Restoration Attempts and Death
Despite working himself to exhaustion, the war continues to erode the empire until it collapses on November 11, 1918. The war is finally over, but so too is the concord of the Habsburg Empire. Karl is asked to abdicate, but he refuses, stating that his crown is a sacred trust from God, and he will never betray God, his subjects, or his dynastic inheritance. His ministers finally coerce him to withdraw from personal participation in government, and go into seclusion with his family at a family-hunting lodge in Eckartsau. However, the new, socialist government continues to deem Emperor Karl a threat because he has not abdicated; so they send him into exile in Switzerland.
In Switzerland the family lives a quiet, humble lifestyle for a time—until the Emperor hears from many of his subjects begging him to return to his Hungarian Kingdom and take the reins of power once more. Karl makes two attempts to regain his throne. During the first attempt, his regent, Admiral Horthy, persuades the Emperor that the time is not yet auspicious, and that he should return to Switzerland until all of the necessary preparations are made. When it becomes clear that Horthy has betrayed him, and plans to illegally retain power, Karl makes a second attempt, which has the support of the people who appeal to his coronation oath. Furthermore, a“White Terror” against Jews, union members and political opponents is taking place in Hungary. However, Horthy once again betrays his true monarch, arrests him and hands him over to the Entente as a prisoner. Zita accompanies him on the second attempt, and joins him on the long journey into final exile on the island of Madeira.
On Madeira, the Imperial Couple is penniless, without any means to support themselves. Their children, who are initially kept separated from them, do not join their parents for several months. Finally, the family is reunited on February 2, 1922, and the family takes comfort in each other’s presence.
Their joy is short-lived, when a few weeks later Karl becomes ill with pneumonia and influenza. Emperor Karl prays and suffers for several days, saying: “I must suffer like this so that my peoples can come together again.” When he realizes he is dying, he calls his son, Archduke Otto, to his bedside to say goodbye and to show him “how a Catholic and Emperor conducts himself when dying.”
On April 1, 1922, he whispers to his wife, “I long so much to go home with you. Why won’t they let us go home?” She holds him in her arms for most of the morning, and he receives Holy Communion and the Sacrament of the Dying. The Eucharist is exposed in his bedroom, and Karl tries to hold a crucifix in his hands. Shortly after noon, he tries to kiss the crucifix and whispers: “Thy Holy Will be done. Jesus, Jesus, come! Yes—yes. My Jesus, Thy Will be done— Jesus.” He whispers “Jesus” a final time and expires. The Peace Emperor, husband, father, and man of faith, is dead at the age of 34. more
Andrew Cusack speaks more about the last emperor here.
When I lived in beautiful Québec City in late 2006, one could go nowhere without hearing this song. Reflecting on the canonization of Frère André, and noting that earlier this week was the memorial of the North American Martyrs, whose bravery for the sake of the Gospel cannot fail to inspire, I am finding myself today increasingly nostalgic for la belle province. More specifically, I'm experiencing the same nostalgia as Mes Aïeux here, a nostalgia for a simpler, healthier, more traditional, more Catholic Québec before the Quiet Revolution, the land whence my ancestors came, the land whence Frère André came.
Thus, I'll post some more traditional-style music today, in commemoration of the eldest daughter of the Eldest Daughter of the Church.
I recall older relations telling me, when I was a small boy, about how when members of my family would always visit Frère André when they visited Montréal. Much has changed in that city since that time, no doubt, but the magnificent shrine built by this small, humble porter in honour of St. Joseph still stands on the mountain, along with the cross, brilliantly illumined at night, to remind us of the glorious heritage and, we can hope, destiny of the city of Montréal and the province of Québec. Like my kinsmen of old, I too make it a point to visit the Oratoire Saint-Joseph whenever I am in Montréal.
Today Frère André is raised to the honours of the altar by our Holy Father, Pope Benedict XVI, along with several others, including Mother Mary MacKillop, the first saint from Down Under. May their intercession gain us the graces and favours we need in this world.
O Dieu qui est admirable dans tes saints, Nous te demandons de nous accorder Par l'intercession du Frère André, l'apôtre de saint Joseph, la faveur que nous sollicitons... Afin qu'il soit glorifié dans l'Église Et que nous soyons portés à imiter ses vertus. Par le Christ, notre Seigneur.
Amen.
Brother André Marie of the Saint Benedict Center speaks more about St. André here.
It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then the dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like the morning star full of life and splendor and joy. O, what a revolution! and what a heart must I have, to contemplate without emotion that elevation and that fall! Little did I dream, when she added titles of veneration to those of enthusiastic, distant, respectful love, that she should ever be obliged to carry the sharp antidote against disgrace concealed in that bosom; little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fallen upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor, and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look that threatened her with insult.
But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded, and the glory of Europe is extinguished forever. Never, never more, shall we behold that generous loyalty to rank and sex, that proud submission, that dignified obedience, that subordination of the heart, which kept alive, even in servitude itself, the spirit of an exalted freedom! The unbought grace of life, the cheap defense of nations, the nurse of manly sentiment and heroic enterprise is gone. It is gone, that sensibility of principle, that chastity of honor, which felt a stain like a wound, which inspired courage whilst it mitigated ferocity, which ennobled whatever it touched, and under which vice itself lost half its evil, by losing all its grossness.
From Columbus' letter regarding his first voyage: Truly great and wonderful is this, and not corresponding to our merits, but to the holy Christian religion, and to the piety and religion of our sovereigns, because what the human understanding could not attain, that the divine will has granted to human efforts. For God is wont to listen to his servants who love his precepts, even in impossibilities, as has happened to us on the present occasion, who have attained that which hitherto mortal men have never reached. For if anyone has written or said anything about these islands, it was all with obscurities and conjectures; no one claims that he had seen them; from which they seemed like fables. Therefore let the king and queen, the princes and their most fortunate kingdoms, and all other countries of Christendom give thanks to our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, who has bestowed upon us so great a victory and gift. Let religious processions be solemnized; let sacred festivals be given; let the churches be covered with festive garlands. Let Christ rejoice on earth, as he rejoices in heaven, when he foresees coming to salvation so many souls of people hitherto lost. Let us be glad also, as well on account of the exaltation of our faith, as on account of the increase of our temporal affairs, of which not only Spain, but universal Christendom will be partaker.
Monsieur de Brantigny speaks about the controversy regarding Columbus here.
A recent anniversary:
