_The Old French Orchard.--The French Acadians.--The ruined
Houses.--Captain Corbet in the Cellar.--Mysterious Movements.--The
Mineral Bod--Where is the Pot of Cold?--Excitement.--Plans, Projects,
and Proposals._
THE hill on which Grand Pré Academy was built sloped upwards behind it,
in a gentle ascent, for about a mile, when it descended abruptly into
the valley of the Gaspereaux. For about a quarter of a mile back of
the Academy there were smooth, cultivated meadows, which were finally
bounded by a deep gully. At the bottom of this there ran a brawling
brook, and on the other side was that dense forest in which the boys
built their camps. Here, on the cleared lands just by the gully, was the
favorite play-ground of the school. Happy were the boys who had such
a play-ground. High up on the slope of that hill, it commanded a
magnificent prospect. Behind, and on either side, were dense, dark
woods; but in front there stood revealed a boundless scene. Beneath was
the Academy. Far down to the right spread away the dike lands of Grand
Pré, bounded by two long, low islands, which acted as a natural barrier
against the turbulent waters; and farther away rose the dark outline of
Horton Bluff, a wild, precipitous cliff, at the mouth of the Gaspereaux
River, marking the place where the hills advanced into the sea, and
the marsh lands ended. Beyond this, again, there spread away the wide
expanse of Minas Bay, full now with the flood tide--a vast sheet of blue
water, dotted with the white sails of passing vessels, and terminated in
the dim and hazy distance by those opposite shores, which had been the
scene of their late adventures--Parrsboro’, Pratt’s Cove, and the Five
Islands. Far away towards the left appeared fields arrayed in the living
green of opening spring; the wide plains of Cornwallis, with its long
reaches of dike lands, separated by ridges of wood land, and bounded by
the dark form of the North Mountain. Through all this, from afar, flowed
the Cornwallis River, with many a winding, rolling now with a full,
strong flood before them and beyond them, till, with a majestic sweep,
it poured its waters into that sea from which it had received them.
Finally, full before them, dark, gloomy, frowning, with its crest
covered with rolling fog-clouds, and the white sea-foam gleaming at its
base, rose the central object of this magnificent scene,--the towering
cliff--Blomidon.
Such was the scene which burst upon the eyes of the boys as they crossed
the brook, and ascended the other side of the gully. Familiar that
scene was, and yet, in spite of its familiarity, it had never lost its
attractions to them; and for a moment they paused involuntarily, and
looked out before them. For there is this peculiarity about the scenery
of Grand Pré, that it is not possible for it to become familiar, in
the common sense of the word. That scene is forever varying, and the
variations are so great, that every day has some new prospect to offer.
Land, sea, and sky, all undergo incessant changes. There is the Basin
of Minas, which is ever changing from red to blue, from a broad sea to
a contracted strait, hemmed in by mud flats. There is the sky, with its
changes from deepest azure to dreamy haze, or impenetrable mist. There
are rivers which change from fulness to emptiness, majestic at the flow
of tide, indistinguishable at the ebb. There is Blomidon, which every
day is arrayed in some new robe; sometimes pale-green, at other times
deep purple; now light-gray, again dark-blue; and thus it goes through
innumerable changes, from the pale neutral tints which it catches
from the overhanging fogs, down through all possible gradations, to
a darkness and a gloom, and a savage grandeur, which throw around it
something almost of terror. Then come the seasons, which change the
wide plains from brown to green, and from green to yellow, till winter
appears, and robes all in white, and piles up for many a mile over
the shallow shores, and in the deep channels of the rivers, the ever
accumulating masses of heaped-up ice.
Yet all the time, through all the seasons, while field and flood, river
and mountain, sea and forest, are thus changing their aspect, there
hangs over all an atmosphere which brings changes more wonderful than
these. The fog is forever struggling for an entrance here. The air in an
instant may bring forth its hidden watery vapors. High over Blomidon the
mist banks are piled, and roll and writhe at the blast of the winds from
the sea. Here the mirage comes, and the eye sees the solid land uplifted
into the air; here is the haze, soft and mysterious as that of Southern
Italy, which diffuses through all the scene an unutterable sweetness
and tenderness. Here, in an instant, a change of wind may whirl all
the accumulated mists down from the crest of Blomidon into the vale of
Cornwallis, and force vast masses of fog-banks far up into the Basin of
Minas, till mountain and valley, and river and plain, and sea and sky,
are all alike snatched from view, and lost in the indistinguishable gray
of one general fog.
The boys then had not grown wearied of the scene. Every day they were
prepared for some fresh surprise, and they found in this incessant
display of the glory of nature, with its never-ending variety and its
boundless scope, something which so filled their souls and enlarged
their minds, that the perpetual contemplation of this was of itself an
education. And so strong was this feeling in all of them, that for
a moment all else was forgotten, and it was with an effort that they
recollected the captain and his mineral rod.
Upon this they turned to carry out their purpose.
In this, place, and close by where they were standing, were several
hollows in the ground, which were well known to be the cellars of houses
once occupied by French Acadians. At a little distance were a number of
apple trees, still growing, and now putting forth leaf, yet so old that
their trunks and branches were all covered with moss, and the fruit
itself, on ripening, was worthless. These trees also belonged to the
former owners of the houses--the fallen--the vanished race.
And at the bottom of one of these holes Captain Corbet was standing,
solemnly balancing the mineral rod on one finger, and calling to the
boys to come and watch how it “pinted” to the buried pot of gold.
These cellars were but a few out of hundreds which exist over the
country, as sad memorials of those poor Acadians who were once so
ruthlessly driven into exile. The beautiful story of Evangeline has made
the sorrows of the Acadians familiar to all, and transformed Grand Pré
into a place of pilgrimage, where the traveller may find on every side
these sad vestiges of the former occupants. Into this beautiful land the
French had come first; they had felled the forests, drained the marshes,
and reared the dikes against the waters of the sea. Here they had
increased and multiplied, and long after Acadie had been ceded to the
British they lived here unmolested. They still cherished that patriotic
love for France which was natural, and in the wars did not wish to fight
against their own countrymen; but, on the other hand, they resisted the
French agents who were sent among them to excite insurrection. A few
acted against the British, but the majority were neutral. At length
the British enlarged their operations in Acadie, sent out thousands of
emigrants, and began to settle the province. Then came a life and
death struggle between Englishmen and Frenchmen, which spread over all
America, far along the Canadian frontier, and along the Ohio Valley, and
southward to the Gulf of Mexico. The Frenchmen of Acadie were looked
on with suspicion. An effort was soon to be made against Louisbourg and
Quebec, by which it was hoped that the French power would be crushed
into the dust. But the Acadians stood in the way. They were feared as
being in league with the French and the Indians. Their pleasant lands,
also, were eagerly desired for an English population. And so it was
determined to banish them all, and in the most cruel way conceivable.
Ordinary banishment would not do; for then they might wander to Canada,
and add their help to their brethren: so it was determined to send
them away, and scatter them over the coast of America. This plan
was thoroughly carried out. From Grand Pré two thousand were taken
away--men, women, and children; families were divided forever, the
dearest friends were parted never to meet again. Their fields were laid
waste; their houses, and barns, and churches, were given to the flames;
and now the indelible traces of this great tragedy may be seen in the
ruined cellars which far and wide mark the surface of the country. Far
and wide also may be seen their trees,--the apple trees,--moss-grown,
and worn out, and gnarled, and decaying; the broad-spreading willow,
giving a grateful shade by the side of brooks; and the tall poplar, dear
to the old Acadian, whose long rows may be seen from afar, rising like
so many monuments over the graves of an extinct race.
Where is the thatch-roofed village, the home of Acadian farmers,
Men whose lives glided on like rivers that water the wood lands,
Darkened by shadows of earth, but reflecting an image of heaven?