Banners of France

A lovely new blog, Et Lux In Tenebris Lucet!, has kindly provided a fascinating history of traditional French flags.

Part I, HERE.

Part II, HERE.

Belgian National Day

On this day in 1831, Prince Leopold of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha swore his constitutional oath, becoming the first King of the Belgians. This anniversary has been commemorated as Belgium's national day ever since.

Long live Belgium!

(elsewhere: The Mad Monarchist)

A Feminine Queen

Queen Elisabeth of Belgium was once described as "the most feminine female since Marie-Antoinette." Delicate and loving, devoted to home and family, she seemed a model of womanly refinement, domesticity and tenderness. Today, many portray these ideals as a way of enfeebling and enslaving women. Yet, here was a bold, independent spirit, a powerful mind, a daring horsewoman, an intrepid mountaineer and a valiant war heroine who was, nonetheless, intensely feminine, and, first and foremost, a wife and mother.

Countless testimonies bring to life a petite, refined, slender, nimble, youthful figure. Unlike her aunt, the famous Empress Sissi, Elisabeth of Belgium was never a stunning beauty. Yet, she achieved striking loveliness through her charm, dignity, and grace. With her intellectual interests, her poetic personality, her passion for art and music, she entranced her intimates. Lively and learned, she was blessed, in one contemporary's words, with "the charm of the mistresses of the famous French salons without their vice." Illustrious for her virtue, she combined blithe, unconstrained manners with pure morals. With her deep, innate sense of propriety and delicacy, she was offended by the slightest innuendo. Even Leopold II, notorious for his scandalous living, and no paragon of refinement in his own circle, took care to avoid any hint of coarseness in Elisabeth's presence.

Like all the Wittelsbachs, Elisabeth was a free spirit, imaginative, independent and unconventional. Yet she excelled in the traditional roles of a royal consort. There is no doubt that she viewed herself, first and foremost, as the wife of her beloved Albert. Shortly before his accession to the throne, she wrote to him: "You deserve to have a wife who lives for you, which is what I will try to do all my life." From her first meeting with the tall, handsome, modest and gentle young man, a passionate affection and admiration sprang up in her heart. Elisabeth had barely made Albert's acquaintance when she confided to her aunt, the Queen of Naples: "I will marry no one but him!" (Siccardi, p. 14). During their engagement, she showered him with letters of rapturous devotion. "If only I could enter this letter, and, when you open it, leap up to your neck and kiss you, "wild," passionately, my dearest Albert," she once wrote (Regolo p. 16). "...I adore you and I love you with my whole being...I would leap through fire and water for you." (Siccardi, p. 18) She was deeply impressed by his noble character. Mary Roberts Rinehart, an American reporter who visited the Queen during World War I, relates that Elisabeth, in response to German criticism of Albert's conduct at the beginning of the war, cried: "Anyone who knows King Albert knows he cannot do a wrong thing. It is impossible for him. He cannot go any way but straight!"

The royal couple's children, King Leopold III of Belgium and Queen Marie-José of Italy, testified that their parents' profound love endured throughout their marriage (see HERE and HERE). The Russian sculptress Catherine Barjansky, an intimate of the royal family during the 1920's and 1930's, recalled Albert and Elisabeth as a deeply devoted and happy couple (see HERE and HERE). Their love, in fact, endured even beyond death. Albert's tragic loss plunged Elisabeth into devastating, numbing grief. Refusing food and comfort, isolating herself from the world, she took to wandering outside on chilly, damp nights. Fearing for her precarious health, people tried to persuade her to come inside, but she impatiently responded: "Let me be. If I fall ill, so much the better. I want to die, I want to go to my Albert" (Regolo, p. 141). After the tragic death of her daughter-in-law, Queen Astrid, Elisabeth forced herself to rally, to support her grieving son, King Leopold, and assist his motherless children. Yet, throughout her life, Albert remained her inspiration. Many years after his death, she confided to her daughter, Marie-José: "Ever since the cruel separation from your father, I have not been able to live a single day, without his memory being present to me, and everything I have done, I have done out of fidelity to his memory."

Elisabeth's love for Albert also embraced his children. She was a devoted mother, especially to her eldest son, Leopold. While others, he recalled, might remember Elisabeth as a war heroine, or a great patroness of the arts, he would always think of her, above all, as a true mother. For Leopold, Elisabeth was a mother "in the noblest sense of the term, one who, throughout her entire life, would assist, protect, and love me." She fiercely defended him from the false accusations of treason during World War II and the Royal Question. During his post-war exile, she wrote him letters filled with tender maternal love. On one occasion, she sent him a poignant birthday greeting: "My dear Léop. Once again I will not be with you for your birthday. I will be thinking of you! What a memory! One of the most beautiful of my life, hearing the first cry of my first child! You were so pretty, and later, so handsome!" She was a loving mother to her people, too, working selflessly, during World War I, to alleviate the sufferings of combatants and noncombatants alike.

A tragic, yet deeply moving story epitomizes all Elisabeth's delicate, tender, yet valiant femininity. When King Albert's broken body, covered in blood and mud, was brought back to Laeken from the tragic cliffs of Marche-les-Dames, his entourage feared it would be too heartbreaking for Elisabeth to see him before his body had been washed and his wounds covered. So, at first, nobody dared tell the Queen of the King's death. Finally, a courtier arrived and broke the terrible news. Stunned with shock, Elisabeth froze and closed her eyes. At last, she rallied and asked to see the King. When she found that he had already been prepared for his lying-in-state, she was furious: "It was the last service I could render him!"

References:

Marie-José, Queen, Consort of Humbert II, King of Italy. Albert et Elisabeth de Belgique, mes parents. 1971.

Dumont, Georges-Henri, and Dauven, Myriam. Elisabeth de Belgique, où les défis d'une reine. 1986.

Regolo, Luciano. La Regina Incompresa: tutto il racconto della vita di Maria José di Savoia. 2002.

Siccardi, Cristina. Maria José, Umberto di Savoia. 2004.

"The Solid Respectability of the New King of the Belgians," in Current Literature, v. 48, edited by Edward Wheeler, New York, 1910, pp. 158-162.

The Belgian Kings

In his memoirs, Robert Capelle, former secretary of Leopold III, quotes Paul Crockaert, a Belgian defense minister, in describing the first four Belgian Kings:

Si l'on voulait résumer chaque règne des souverains belges, on dirait que Léopold 1er personnifie la sagesse politique, Léopold II le génie créateur, Albert 1er le sens de l'honneur, Léopold III le sens du devoir.

If one wanted to summarize the reigns of the Belgian sovereigns, one would say that Leopold I personifies political wisdom, Leopold II, creative genius, Albert I, the sense of honor, Leopold III, the sense of duty.

Do you agree? What is the difference between "sense of honor" and "sense of duty?" And what qualities would Baudouin I and Albert II represent?

(Credits for coat of arms)

Survey Results

The results for this week's poll, asking who was the greatest King of the Belgians, are as follows:

Total votes: 12

• Leopold I: 1 (8%)
• Leopold II: 1 (8%)
• Albert I: 4 (33%)
• Leopold III: 1 (8%)
• Baudouin I: 5 (41%)
• Albert II: 0 (0%)

A new poll will be up next week.

Ciergnon

A lovely country chateau, the Royal Castle of Ciergnon, near the village of the same name. The castle is a residence and summer retreat of the Belgian royal family.

Photo credits here.

There are touching stories associated with Ciergnon. One illustrates the piety and simplicity of Albert I. When he visited Ciergnon, he would go to Confession in the village church, taking his place in line, and declining to go before his turn.

Queen Astrid loved Ciergnon; after all, she had been raised, to a great extent, in the countryside herself, in Sweden.

Princess Marie-Esmeralda of Belgium, daughter of Leopold III and his second wife, Princess Lilian, recalls, in her book, Léopold III, mon père, visiting Ciergnon with her family and playing on the grounds of the chateau, with great enjoyment.

A Beautiful Portrait

This is my favorite portrait of the first Queen of the Belgians, Louise-Marie of Orléans. I love the rich, contrasting colors and the Queen's expression; it seems to mingle gentleness, humor, intelligence and sadness.

Prince Albert Visits the Congo, 1909

In Albert, King of the Belgians (1929), Evelyn Graham provides an account of the expedition to the Belgian Congo undertaken by Prince Albert (future King Albert I) in 1909. A year earlier, the area, formerly the "Congo Free State," a private possession of King Leopold II, had been annexed by Belgium. The reports of atrocities and abuses suffered by the indigenous people under the Congo Free State had deeply distressed Prince Albert, and he was determined to embark upon a program of reform.

Probably the most notable event in the years following Prince Albert's becoming Heir- Apparent was his journey to the Congo in 1909. There is no doubt that the ceaseless agitations, and the unsparing criticisms of the administration of Congo affairs, had troubled Prince Albert considerably more than they had disturbed King Leopold. There was an entire contrast between their outlook on life, for whereas Prince Albert always recognized that his first duty was to his country, King Leopold seemed, in certain actions at all events, to consider his duty to himself paramount.

For several years previous to Belgium's annexation of the Congo, Prince Albert had studied with the closest attention all questions relating to the State. He was a frequent visitor to the Colonial Museum, reading everything of importance published on the subject of the Congo and its development. He lost no opportunity of meeting and conversing with all persons whose experience had put them in a position to enlighten him on any matter regarding affairs in the "Dark Continent," as it was called.

Being highly conscientious in his treatment of all men, the allegations regarding the treatment of Congo natives grieved and distressed him. He knew, of course, that many of the reports of wrong-doing were exaggerated, but he felt that any doubt at all as to the matter was a slur on the fair fame of Belgium, and something in the nature of a challenge to himself as its future ruler.

He had many conversations with King Leopold on the subject — one or two of them being of a very piquant nature. In these interviews the Prince spoke his mind with a freedom and courage that his uncle by no means relished. King Leopold was always impatient of criticism in any form, and, to the day of his death, he never admitted that there had been any defects in his administration of the wonderful colony which he had gained for his people.

Prince Albert welcomed the appointment of M. Renkin as Colonial Minister, for the reason that he had always shown himself zealous in all manner of reforms on the Congo. M. Renkin and the Heir to the Throne held lengthy discussions as to the best means of putting these reforms into practice. M. Renkin's first Budget surprised the country, for, with great boldness and a supreme faith in the future of the Congo, he sanctioned an outlay far in excess of any sum hitherto assigned to the administration of the colony. In this Budget there was allowed for administration in Africa over 7,000,000 francs ; for health, nearly 900,000 francs ; and for justice nearly 2,000,000 francs. It may be added that M. Renkin had his reward in seeing the price of rubber rise by over fifty per cent, by which rise Belgium was saved the necessity of raising another Colonial loan. His foresight and courage were therefore rewarded financially as well as in improving the condition of the Congo.

During M. Renkin's tenure of office, Prince Albert achieved what had been for several years his great ambition — he toured the Congo. Over and over again he had expressed his wish to make this visit in order that he might see for himself what truth there was in the constant charges against King Leopold's administration, and that he might consider what could be done to put matters on a more satisfactory basis. In Court circles, it was well understood that the only thing that had prevented the Prince hitherto from carrying out his desire was the attitude

of King Leopold himself.

Although Prince Albert was his direct heir, the King's grasp on the reins of government was tenacious to the very hour of his death. He knew and acknowledged — not only in public speeches made for the world's ears, but in private conversations not meant to pass beyond the walls of the room in which they were held — that his nephew had in him the makings of a successful ruler. He realized that the Prince was highly popular with his future subjects, and that he had qualities which would enable him to fill the throne with dignity, firmness, and courage. At the same time King Leopold seemed determined that Prince Albert should have no added opportunities of demonstrating his fitness for the position he was destined to fill.

In the end, however, the Prince had his way ; defeating his uncle's stubborn anger and mocking cynicism with unwearying persistence, he held to a firm resolve to further the ends of justice, and do what he considered his duty to his future African subjects.

In the spring of 1909 he set out for the Congo.

It was arranged that M. Jules Renkin should accompany him, but, in order that the survey might be thorough, it was decided that the Prince should traverse the country from east to west, while the Colonial Minister should start from the west. The Prince, accompanied by Baron de Moor, left Southampton on April 3rd, 1909, and spent the following four months travelling throughout the length and breadth of the Congo. He covered nearly 3,000 miles — partly by land, partly by river, and, in a lesser degree, by rail. Only the members of his suite can really appreciate the thoroughness of his investigations. He was not content with seeing things and asking questions. He had his staff supplied with notebooks, and saw that they used them, while he himself filled book after book with his own personal comments. These copious notes helped him greatly in the reforms which he inaugurated subsequently.

On foot, in a steamer, in a train, he passed day after day, seeing all that was to be seen. He inspected the hospital ; he attended service in the churches ; he visited the schools, and made friends with the scholars at once ; and called at several of the mission posts.

Prince Albert talked with everyone with whom he came contact. Often these conversations were of the most informs character. It was useless for officials to wait upon him with written reports, expecting him to accept them without further investigation. It was more than useless to attempt to put him off with ready-made information. Prince Albert had come to make his own discoveries in his own way, and he accomplished his task.

The European residents and officials were delighted with his visit for, tired though he might be, yet not so tired as certain members of his staff, he responded with characteristic courtesy to all their efforts to entertain him. Officials and their wives, many of them now retired and scattered in different parts of the country, still speak with pleasure of the tour when Prince Albert was among them, and made so gallant and gracious a figure at the receptions at which they were presented to him.

But it was to the natives that Prince Albert paid the greatest attention. When it was learned — and the news spread in the amazing way peculiar to native communities — that King Leopold's heir was coming among them, the chiefs of every tribe clamoured for an audience. They besieged him with the story of wrongs which demanded to be redressed. With untiring patience, the Prince listened, questioned, investigated the truth...and promised to see that just grievances should be put right and each man have his due. These promises he redeemed with scrupulous care on his return.

His fine stature and kingly bearing impressed greatly the Congolese. They conferred upon him a native title meaning "Tall Man, Breaker of Stones," There is no doubt that Prince Albert's tour of the Congo State did much to reconcile the natives to the new regime and to give them confidence in the future.

The Prince who, as has been mentioned, had been greatly troubled by the reports of Congo atrocities, was determined that he would take not merely European statements on these, but would get the natives to talk freely. To the consternation of his staff, he would often disappear, and be found later in the native quarters, surrounded by a group of Congolese, all intent upon pouring their life histories into his attentive ears.

On one occasion he was discovered squatting upon the ground before the hut of a native chief, vis-a-vis with his host, who, in somewhat peculiar English, was recounting his version of the history of the past decade. The Prince, with the unfailing notebook open on his knee, was endeavouring to translate the story into the kind of language that could be written down.

It was this eagerness to obtain first-hand information that deepened the respect which the natives had been prepared from the first to accord to one of Royal rank. They realized that he had a brotherly nature and was anxious to help them to the best of his ability.

The tour, interesting though it was, offered many discomforts and even hardships, not to mention the difficulties peculiar to tropical climates. M. Renkin's health suffered greatly from the trials of the tour, but Prince Albert faced it all unperturbed. His robust frame and excellent constitution enabled him to withstand the heat, to ward off the tropical fevers to which the white visitor succumbs so often, and to finish his tour in as good health as when he set out. Again and again he had to "rough it"...

The Belgian people and the Press had welcomed the prospect of Prince Albert's travels with enthusiasm. They had had no part in whatever malpractices had occurred in the Congo, but the world's criticism had been directed against Belgium, and they felt that Prince Albert's visit would do much to remove any grounds for the campaign of bitter criticism which was being conducted not only against their Sovereign but against his people.

When the date of the Prince's return was announced, Antwerp prepared a wonderful welcome for the Prince, on the occasion of his joyeuse entrée, as one Antwerp paper called it. The Congo steamer, the Bruxellesville, was due on Monday, August 16th, 1909, and from the earliest hour Antwerp was packed with sightseers from the surrounding district, anxious to greet their Prince. They desired to express their gratitude publicly for the labours he had undertaken...

St. Dymphna

Here is a fanciful image of St. Dymphna, a 7th century Irish virgin and martyr who became one of Belgium's most beloved saints. I have always been fascinated by her story. According to tradition, she was the beautiful daughter of Damon, an Irish king. Her father was pagan, but Dymphna and her mother were Christians. At the age of fourteen, Dymphna lost her mother. Insane with grief, Damon sent his messengers searching the land for another bride who matched his dead queen's beauty. When no other substitute could be found, the king's wicked advisers recommended he wed his own daughter! To protect her chastity, Dymphna fled abroad with her confessor, St. Gerebran. They sought refuge near the Church of St. Martin, in Geel, near Antwerp, Belgium. Damon, however, hunted them down, killed Gerebran and begged Dymphna to return to Ireland as his bride. When she steadfastly refused, the king flew into a rage, drew his sword, and beheaded her. She was only 15 years old. The young martyr of purity was buried in the church of Geel, and became a revered local saint.

Since medieval times, St. Dymphna has been invoked as the patroness of the mentally ill. Many cures of insanity and epilepsy have been attributed to her relics and intercession. Her cult inspired Geel's centuries-old tradition of charitably caring for the mentally ill. An infirmary was founded in the 13th century and today the city boasts a world-class sanatorium. Geel is famous for its early adoption of the "deinstitutionalized" mode of psychiatric care. For hundreds of years, patients have been placed with local families, taking part, during the day, in the life and work of the town. It is only at night that they return to the hospital. Thus, they benefit from a gentle, kind surveillance, while living as normal a life as possible.

Here is a prayer to St. Dymphna:

Hear us, O God, Our Saviour, as we honor St. Dymphna, patron of those afflicted with mental and emotional illness. Help us to be inspired by her example and comforted by her merciful help. Amen.

Accession of Baudouin I

On this day in 1951, Crown Prince Baudouin of Belgium swore his constitutional oath, becoming the fifth King of the Belgians. He was not yet 21 years old.