The Man of Douay

Nota Bene: This is a small snippet from my up-coming novel set in the days of 1765-1776 in British North America. This writing is a selection of historical fiction representing viewpoints that the author does not necessarily share or condone, but that reflects the viewpoints of the characters within the work. I plan on posting more snippets of the work in the days to come. Currently the page count is around 300 pages finished, and is a labor of love, hoping to share an impression of the 18th century in all its terror and magnificence.

⁂ Pardon me once again, my dearest reader, for here I must interrupt my paltry narrative with some exposition upon an old soul lingering, nigh hidden, amidst the pews of that church. His name was Nathaniel, and he was a supercentenarian marvel of the congregation. He sat there sunk deep into the bench, his back curved by years of wear, and sitting with his eyes closed, and one would be forgiven for believing that this elder was asleep in the sanctuary of God! Such was not the case, however, for he was engaging in his daily holy hour before the blessed Sacrament, a firm habit built by the toil of half a century, and who was at that very moment pondering the faint delineation of the face of a man crucified some seventeen centuries earlier, supernaturally impressed upon a span of linen, which he had had the fortune to behold and venerate as a youth in the Italian city of Turin. That haunting image had never left him, nor had the man whose image it was.

I find it worth taking a moment to meditate upon this ancient soul, though his history for the most part was quite unsurprising and unusual, save one special detail, that he was a recusant living in England in the first quarter of the century. He, not unlike many Catholic children who lingered in the British dominion after the Reformation, was sent abroad to the English College at Douay in France to learn his Latin and grammar. His tenure, however, was quite different than the many English children who came before him to study at the English colleges on the continent, for in his 3^rd year, the same year that Bishop Challoner too studied at Douay, the ancient city was besieged by the army of the Allies, led by the famous John Churchill, the 1^st Duke of Marlborough.

Can you imagine, friends, the torment in those English hearts, who sat terrified within the walls of their English college, perhaps sat praying in their chapel dedicated to St. Thomas of Becket, whilst their Protestant countrymen were busy engaging in their destruction! They sat listening to the whistle of cannon, the pop of gunfire, and the screams of the fearful French. One can only wonder as to the tension within their souls, between their dedication to the ancient religion and to the King of Kings, and to their fellow countryman, to dame Britannia!

The city held strong for some time, yet eventually the valiant Francis D’Albergotti, in whose trust the city of Douay was given by King Louis XIV, capitulated to the allied forces, for the sake of the citizenry…

⸺ Nathaniel, once returned to England, could never again look upon his country or his fellow Britons with sympathy. A vast ocean of difference stood between them, though they worshiped the same God, the same Messiah, and shared the same ancient tongue. Hence he fled Britain to the colonies, making true the distance that he felt, seeking eternal refuge in Christ the King, and not in the earthly polities of men. He would have fled to Turin, if but he could, to forever meditate upon the holy shroud, yet such is Divine Providence, inscrutable in all its ways, to sometimes drive us far from the course which most resonates with the deepest wishes of our hearts, yet for the sake of a deeper, hidden, and greater good.

Thus of Nathaniel, the supercentenarian of that Philadelphian Catholic congregation. May you excuse my errant attention upon such a one as him. ⁂

The English College at Douay in France, 1590-1611 AD

Context of the except: The protagonist of the novel (let's call him G for now) is visiting the small Roman Catholic congregation in colonial Philadelphia in the 1770s, where he witnesses an elderly man sitting in the pews. At this moment in the text, the garrulous narrator pauses to briefly tell the backstory of this old man, for no sake whatsoever save that he is incredibly prolix and entirely moralizing, as 18th century narrators can often be. Caveat lector vel lectrix.