In a history, where so much is spoken of the regions, from whence the miraculous Image of Our Lady of Good Counsel came, it will be of great use to take a brief glance at the once entirely Catholic nation in which it so long remained, and at the great client of its Sanctuary in Scutari, King George Castriota, or, as he is better known by his Turkish appellation, Scanderbeg, (from the words Iskander and beg or bey, which mean Alexander, the prince), the hero of Christendom….
The miraculous Image of Our Lady of Good Counsel of Genazzano.
Amurath II ascended the throne of his grandfather Bajazet in 1422. He speedily spread his power over the remnant of territory left to Constantinople. He added Greece, and finally Albania, to his dominions; and gave a death blow to all opposition to his power, by a victory over the Christian crusade, which the zeal of the Pope had gathered to resist him at Varna, in 1444.
The reign of this Mussulman conqueror brings us to the mighty chief, whom Mary, Mother of Good Counsel, had raised up to save Albania and Europe from him, and from the still more terrible power of his son and successor Mahomet II, the captor of Constantinople. This was George, the youngest of four sons of King John Castriota….
