FROM BOSTON TO ACADIE.
"For this is in the land of Acadie,
The fairest place of all the earth and sea."
J. F. H.
It is always amusing to be among a crowd of people on the Lewis Wharf,
in Boston, when a steamer is about to leave for the neighboring province
of Nova Scotia. The provincials are so slow, so deliberate, so
determined not to be hurried. The Americans are so brisk, so
expeditious, so bewildering in the multitude of things they will
accomplish in the briefest possible space of time. They surround the
provincials, they attempt to hurry them, to infuse a little more life
into their exercises of volition, to convince them that a busy wharf is
not the place to weigh arguments for or against a proposed course of
action, yet the provincials will not be hurried; they stop to plan,
consider, deliberate, and decide, and in the end they arrive at
satisfactory conclusions without one hundredth part of the worry and
vexation of soul which shortens the lives of their more nervous cousins,
the Americans.
At noon, on the Thursday following his decision to go to Nova Scotia,
Vesper Nimmo stood on the deck of the _Royal Edward_, a smile on his
handsome face,--a shrewd smile, that deepened and broadened whenever he
looked towards the place where stood his mother, with a fluffy white
shawl wrapped around her throat, and the faithful Henry for a bodyguard.
Express wagons, piled high with towers of Babel in the shape of trunks
that shook and quivered and threatened to fall on unsuspecting heads,
rattled down and discharged their contents on the already congested
wharf, where intending passengers, escorting friends, custom officials,
and wharf men were talking, gesticulating, admonishing, and escaping
death in varied forms, such as by crushing, falling, squeezing, deaths
by exhaustion, by kicks from nervous horse legs, or by fright from being
swept into the convenient black pool of the harbor.
However, scorning the danger, the crowd talked and jabbered on, until,
finally, the last bit of freight, the last bit of luggage, was on board.
A signal was given, the ambulance drew back,--the dark and mournful
wagon from which, alas, at nearly every steamer's trip, a long, light
box is taken, in which one Canadian is going home quite still and mute.
A swarm of stewards from the steamer descended upon their quarry, the
passengers, and a separation was made between the sheep and the foolish
goats, in the company's eyes, who would not be persuaded to seek the
fair Canadian pastures. Carefully the stewards herded and guarded their
giddy sheep to the steamer, often turning back to recover one skipping
behind for a last parley with the goats. At last they were all up the
gangway, the gorgeous ship swung her princely nose to the stream, and
Vesper Nimmo felt himself really off for Nova Scotia.
He waved an adieu to his mother, then drew back to avoid an onset of
stolid, red-cheeked Canadian sheep and lambs, who pressed towards the
railing, some with damp handkerchiefs at their eyes, others cheerfully
exhorting the goats to write soon.
His eye fell on a delicate slip of a girl, with consumption written all
over her shaking form; and, swinging on his heel, he went to stroll
about the decks, and watch, with proud and passionate concealed emotion,
the yellow receding dome of the State House. He had been brought up in
the shadow of that ægis. It was almost as sacred to him as the blue sky
above, and not until he could no longer see it did he allow his eyes to
wander over other points of interest of the historic harbor. How many
times his sturdy New England forefathers had dropped their hoes to man
the ships that sailed over these blue waters, to hew down the Agag of
Acadie! What a bloodthirsty set they were in those days! Indians,
English, French,--how they harried, and worried, and bit, and tore at
each other!
He thoughtfully smoothed the little silky mustache that adorned his
upper lip, and murmured, "Thank heaven, I go on a more peaceful errand."
Once out of the harbor, and feeling the white deck beneath his feet
gracefully dipping to meet the swell of the ocean, he found a seat and
drew a guide-book from his pocket. Of ancient Acadie he knew something,
but of this modern Acadie he had, strange to say, felt no curiosity,
although it lay at his very doors, until he had discovered the letter of
his great-grandfather.
The day was warm and sunshiny. It was the third of June, and for some
time he sat quietly reading and bathed in golden light. Then across his
calm, peaceful state of content, stole a feeling scarcely to be
described, and so faint that it was barely perceptible. He was not quite
happy. The balm had gone from the air; the spirit of the writer, who so
eloquently described the lure of the Acadien land, no longer communed
with his. He read on, knowing what was coming, yet resolved not to yield
until he was absolutely forced to do so.
In half an hour he had flung down his book, and was in his stateroom,
face downward, his window wide open, his body gently swaying to and fro
with the motion of the steamer, the salt air deliciously lapping his
ears, the back of his neck, and his hands, but unable to get at his
face, obstinately buried in the pillow.
"Sick, sir?" inquired a brisk voice, with a delicate note of suggestion.
Vesper uncovered one eye, and growled, "No,--shut that door."
The steward disappeared, and did not return for some hours, while
Vesper's whole sensitive system passed into a painless agony, the only
movement he made being to turn himself over on his back, where he lay,
apparently calm and happy, and serenely staring at the white ceiling of
his dainty cell.
"Can I do anything for you, sir?" asked the steward's voice once more.
Vesper, who would not have spoken if he had been offered the _Royal
Edward_ full of gold pieces, did not even roll an eyeball at him, but
kept on gravely staring upward.
"Your collar's choking you, sir," said the man, coming forward; and he
deftly slipped a stud from its place and laid it on the wash-stand.
"Shall I take off your boots?"
Vesper submitted to having his boots withdrawn, and his feet covered,
with as much indifference as if they belonged to some other man, and
continued to spend the rest of the day and the night in the same state
of passivity. Towards morning he had a vague wish to know the time, but
it did not occur to him, any more than it would have occurred to a stone
image, to put up his hand to the watch in his breast pocket.
Daylight came, then sunlight streaming into his room, and cheery sounds
of voices without, but he did not stir. Not until the thrill of contact
with the land went through the steamer did he spring to his feet, like a
man restored to consciousness by galvanic action. He was the first
passenger to reach the wharf, and the steward, who watched him going,
remarked sarcastically that he was glad to see "that 'ere dead man come
to life."
Vesper was himself again when his feet touched the shore. He looked
about him, saw the bright little town of Yarmouth, black rocks, a blue
harbor, and a glorious sky. His contemplation of the landscape over, he
reflected that he was faint from hunger. He turned his back on the
steamer, where his fellow passengers had recently breakfasted at fine
tables spread under a ceiling of milky white and gold, and hurried to a
modest eating-house near by from which a savory smell of broiled steak
and fried potatoes floated out on the morning air.
He entered it, and after a hasty wash and brush-up ate his breakfast
with frantic appetite. He now felt that he had received a new lease of
life, and buttoning his collar up around his neck, for the temperature
was some degrees lower than that of his native city, he hurried back to
the wharf, where the passengers and the customs men were quarrelling as
if they had been enemies for life.
With ingratiating and politic calmness he pointed out his trunk and
bicycle, assured the suspicious official that although he was an
American he was honest and had nothing to sell and nothing dutiable in
the former, and that he had not the slightest objection to paying the
thirty per cent deposit required on the latter; then, a prey to inward
laughter at the enlivening spectacle of open trunks and red faces, he
proceeded to the railway station, looking about him for other signs that
he was in a foreign country.
Nova Scotia was very like Maine so far. Here were the Maine houses, the
Maine trees and rocks, even the Maine wild flowers by the side of the
road. He thoughtfully boarded the train, scrutinized the comfortable
parlor-car, and, after the lapse of half an hour, decided that he was
not in Maine, for, if he had been, the train would certainly have
started.
As he was making this reflection, a dapper individual, in light
trousers, a shiny hat, and with the indescribable air of being a
travelling salesman, entered the car where Vesper sat in solitary
grandeur.
Vesper slightly inclined his head, and the stranger, dropping a neat
leather bag in the seat next him, observed, "We had a good passage."
"Very good," replied Vesper.
"Nobody sick," pursued the dapper individual, taking off his hat,
brushing it, and carefully replacing it on his head.
"I should think not," returned Vesper; then he consulted his watch. "We
are late in starting."
"We're always late," observed the newcomer, tartly. "This is your first
trip down here?"
Vesper, with the reluctance of his countrymen to admit that they have
done or are doing something for the first time, did not contradict his
statement.
"I've been coming to this province for ten years," said his companion.
"I represent Stone and Warrior."
Vesper knew Stone and Warrior's huge dry-goods establishment, and had
due respect for the opinion of one of their travellers.
"And when we start we don't go," said the dry-goods man. "This train
doesn't dare show its nose in Halifax before six o'clock, so she's just
got to put in the time somewhere. Later in the season they'll clap on
the Flying Bluenose, which makes them think they're flying through the
air, because she spurts and gets in two hours earlier. How far are you
going?"
"I don't know; possibly to Grand Pré."
"A pretty country there, but no big farms,--kitchen-gardening compared
with ours."
"That is where the French used to be."
"Yes, but there ain't one there now. The most of the French in the
province are down here."
Vesper let his surprised eyes wander out through the car window.
"Pretty soon we'll begin to run through the woods. There'll be a shanty
or two, a few decent houses and a station here and there, and you'd
think we were miles from nowhere, but at the same time we're running
abreast of a village thirty-five miles long."
"That is a good length."
"The houses are strung along the shores of this Bay," continued the
salesman, leaning over and tapping the map spread on Vesper's knee. "The
Bay is forty miles long."
"Why didn't they build the railway where the village is?"
"That's Nova Scotia," said the salesman, drily. "Because the people were
there, they put the railroad through the woods. They beat the Dutch."
"Can't they make money?"
"Like the mischief, if they want to," and the salesman settled back in
his seat and put his hands in his pockets. "It makes me smile to hear
people talking about these green Nova Scotians. They'll jump ahead of
you in a bargain as quick as a New Yorker when they give their minds to
it. But I'll add 'em up in one word,--they don't care."
Vesper did not reply, and, after a minute's pause his companion went on,
with waxing indignation. "They ought to have been born in the cannibal
isles, every man Jack of 'em, where they could sit outdoors all day and
pick up cocoanuts or eat each other. Upon my life, you can stand in the
middle of Halifax, which is their capital city, and shy a stone at half
a dozen banks and the post-office, and look down and see grass growing
between the bricks at your feet."
"Very unprogressive," murmured Vesper.
The salesman relented. "But I've got some good chums there, and I must
say they've got a lot of soft soap,--more than we have."
"That is, better manners?"
"Exactly; but"--and he once more hardened his heart against the Nova
Scotians,--"they've got more time than we have. There ain't so many of
'em. Look at our Boston women at a bargain-counter,--you've got a lot of
curtains at four dollars a pair. You can't sell 'em. You run 'em up to
six dollars and advertise, 'Great drop on ten-dollar curtains.' The
women rush to get 'em. How much time have they to be polite? About as
much as a pack of wolves."
"What is the population of Halifax?" asked Vesper.
"About forty thousand," said the salesman, lolling his head on the back
of the seat, and running his sentences as glibly from his lips as if he
were reciting a lesson, "and a sly, sleepy old place it is, with lots of
money in it, and people pretending they are poor. Suburbs fine, but the
city dirty from the soft coal they burn. A board fence around every lot
you could spread a handkerchief on,--so afraid neighbors will see into
their back yards. If they'd knock down their fences, pick up a little of
the trash in the streets, and limit the size of their hotel keys, they'd
get on."
"Are there any French people there?"
The salesman was not interested in the French. "No," he said, "not that
I ever heard of. They could make lots of money there," he went on, with
enthusiasm, "if they'd wake up. You know there's an English garrison,
and our girls like the military; but these blamed provincials, though
they've got a big pot of jam, won't do anything to draw our rich flies,
not even as much as to put up a bathing-house. They don't care a
continental.
"There's a hotel beyond Halifax where a big excursion from New York used
to go every year. Last year the manager said, 'If you don't clean up
your old hotel, and put a decent boat on the lake, you'll never see me
again.' The hotel proprietor said, 'I guess this house is clean enough
for us, and we haven't been spilt out of the boat yet, and you and your
excursion can go to Jericho.' So the excursion goes to Jericho now, and
the hotel man gets more time for sleep."
"Have you ever been in this French village?" asked Vesper.
"No," and the salesman stifled a yawn. "I only call at the principal
towns, where the big stores are. Good Lord! I wish those
stick-in-the-muds would come up from the wharf. If I knew how to run an
engine I'd be off without 'em," and he strolled to the car door. "It's
as quiet as death down there. The passengers must have chopped up the
train-hands and thrown 'em in the water. If my wife made up her mind to
move to this province, I'd die in ten days, for I'd have so much time to
think over my sins. Glory hallelujah, here they come!" and he returned
to his seat. "The whole tribe of 'em, edging along as if they were a
funeral procession and we were the corpses on ahead. We're off," he
said, jocularly, to Vesper, and he kicked out his little dapper legs,
stuck his ticket in the front of his shiny hat, and sank into a seat,
where he was soon asleep.
Vesper was rather out of his reckoning. It had not occurred to him, in
spite of Longfellow's assurance about naught but tradition remaining of
the beautiful village of Grand Pré, that no French were really to be
found there. Now, according to the salesman, he should look for the
Acadiens in this part of the province. However, if the French village
was thirty-five miles long there was no hurry about leaving the train,
and he settled back and watched his fellow passengers leisurely climbing
the steps. Among those who entered the parlor-car was a stout,
gentlemanly man, gesticulating earnestly, although his hands were full
of parcels, and turning every instant to look with a quick, bright eye
into the face of his companion, who was a priest.
The priest left him shortly after they entered the car, and the stout
man sat down and unfolded a newspaper on which the name and place of
publication--_L'Évangéline, Journal Hebdomadaire, Weymouth_--met
Vesper's eye with grateful familiarity. The title was, of course, a
pathetic reminder of the poem. Weymouth, and he glanced at his map, was
in the line of villages along the bay.
The gentleman for a time read the paper intently. Then his nervous hands
flung it down, and Vesper, leaning over, politely asked if he would lend
it to him.
It was handed to him with a bow, and the young American was soon deep in
its contents. It had been founded in the interests of the Acadiens of
the Maritime Provinces, he read in fluent modern French, which greatly
surprised him, as he had expected to be confronted by some curious
_patois_ concocted by this remnant of a foreign race isolated so long
among the English. He read every word of the paper,--the cards of
professional men, the advertisements of shopkeepers, the remarks on
agriculture, the editorials on Canadian politics, the local news, and
the story by a Parisian novelist. Finally he returned _L'Évangéline_ to
its owner, whose quick eyes were looking him all over in mingled
curiosity and gratification, which at last culminated in the remark that
it was a fine morning.
Vesper, with slow, quiet emphasis, which always imparted weight and
importance to his words, assented to this, with the qualification that
it was chilly.
"It is never very warm here until the end of June," said the stout
gentleman, with a courteous gesture, "but I find this weather most
agreeable for wheeling. I am shortly to leave the train and take to my
bicycle for the remainder of my journey."
Vesper asked him whether there was a good road along the shores of the
Bay.
"The best in the province, but I regret to say that the roads to it from
the stations are cut up by heavy teaming."
"And the hotels,--are they good?"
"According to the guide-books there are none in Frenchtown," said the
gentleman, with lively sarcasm. "I know of one or two where one can be
comfortable. Here, for instance," and one of his facile hands indicated
a modest advertisement in _L'Évangéline_.
Sleeping Water Inn. This inn, well patronized in the past, is still
the rendezvous for tourists, bicyclists, etc. The house is airy,
and the table is good. A trustworthy teamster is always at the
train to carry trunks and valises to the inn. Rose de Forêt,
Proprietress.
Vesper looked up, to find his neighbor smiling involuntarily. "Pardon
me," he said, with contrition, "I am thinking that you would find the
house satisfactory."
"It is kept by a woman?"
"Yes," said the stranger, with preternatural gravity; "Rose à
Charlitte."
Vesper said nothing, and his face was rarely an index of his thoughts,
yet the stranger, knowing in some indefinable way that he wished for
further information, continued. "On the Bay, the friendly fashion
prevails of using only the first name. Rose à Charlitte is rarely called
Madame de Forêt."
Vesper saw that some special interest attached to the proprietress of
the Acadien inn, yet did not see his way clear to find out what it was.
His new acquaintance, however, had a relish for his subject of
conversation, and pursued it with satisfaction. "She is very
remarkable, and makes money, yet I hope that fate will intervene to
preserve her from a life which is, perhaps, too public for a woman of
her stamp. A rich uncle, one Auguste Le Noir, whose beautiful home among
orange and fig trees on the Bayou Vermillon in Louisiana I visited last
year, may perhaps rescue her. Not that she does anything at all out of
the way," he added, hastily, "but she is beautiful and young."
Vesper repressed a slight start at the mention of the name Le Noir, then
asked calmly if it was a common one among the Acadiens.
The Le Noirs and Le Blancs, the gentleman assured him, were as
plentiful as blackberries, while as to Melançons, there were eighty
families of them on the Bay. "This has given rise to the curious
house-that-Jack-built system of naming," he said. "There is Jean à
Jacques Melançon, which is Jean, the son of Jacques,--Jean à Basile,
Jean à David, and sometimes Jean à Martin à Conrade à Benoit Melançon,
but"--and he checked himself quickly--"I am, perhaps, wearying you with
all this?" He was as a man anxious, yet hesitating, to impart
information, and Vesper hastened to assure him that he was deeply
interested in the Acadiens.
The cloud swept from the face of the vivacious gentleman. "You gratify
me. The old prejudice against my countrymen still lingers in this
province in the shape of indifference. I rarely discuss them unless I
know my listener."
"Have I the pleasure of addressing an Acadien?" asked Vesper.
"I have the honor to be one," said the stout gentleman, and his face
flushed like that of a girl.
Vesper gave him a quick glance. This was the first Acadien that he had
ever seen, and he was about as far removed from the typical Acadien that
he had pictured to himself as a man could be. This man was a gentleman.
He had expected to find the Acadiens, after all the trials they had gone
through in their dispossession of property and wanderings by sea and
land, degenerated into a despoiled and poverty-stricken remnant of
peasantry. Curiously gratified by the discovery that here was one who
had not gone under in the stress of war and persecution, he remarked
that his companion was probably well-informed on the subject of the
expulsion of his countrymen from this province.
"The expulsion,--ah!" said the gentleman, in a repressed voice. Then,
unable to proceed, he made a helpless gesture and turned his face
towards the window.
The younger man thought that there were tears in his eyes, and forbore
to speak.
"One mentions it so calmly nowadays," said the Acadien, presently,
looking at him. "There is no passion, no resentment, yet it is a living
flame in the breast of every true Acadien, and this is the reason,--it
is a tragedy that is yet championed. It is commonly believed that the
deportation of the Acadiens was a necessity brought about by their
stubbornness."
"That is the view I have always taken of it," said Vesper, mildly. "I
have never looked into the subject exhaustively, but my conclusion from
desultory reading has been that the Acadiens were an obstinate set of
people who dictated terms to the English, which, as a conquered race,
they should not have done, and they got transported for it."
"Then let me beg you, my dear sir, to search into the matter. If you
happen to visit the Sleeping Water Inn, ask for Agapit Le Noir. He is an
enthusiast on the subject, and will inform you; and if at any time you
find yourself in our beautiful city of Halifax, may I not beg the
pleasure of a call? I shall be happy to lay before you some historical
records of our race," and he offered Vesper a card on which was
engraved, Dr. Bernardin Arseneau, Barrington Street, Halifax.
Vesper took the card, thanked him, and said, "Shall I find any of the
descendants of the settlers of Grand Pré among the Acadiens on this
Bay?"
"Many, many of them. When the French first came to Nova Scotia, they
naturally selected the richest portions of the province. At the
expulsion these farms were seized. When, through incredible hardships,
they came struggling back to this country that they so much loved, they
could not believe that their lands would not be restored to them. Many
of them trudged on foot to fertile Grand Pré, to Port Royal, and other
places. They looked in amazement at the settlers who had taken their
homes. You know who they were?"
"No, I do not," said Vesper.
"They were your own countrymen, my dear sir, if, as I rightly judge, you
come from the United States. They came to this country, and found
waiting for them the fertile fields whose owners had been seized,
imprisoned, tortured, and carried to foreign countries, some years
before. Such is the justice of the world. For their portion the returned
Acadiens received this strip of forest on the Bay Saint-Mary. You will
see what they have made of it," and, with a smile at once friendly and
sad, the stout gentleman left the train and descended to a little
station at which they had just pulled up.