"Perhaps thy wife will not let me," she said, demurely.
"Then she may leave me; I detest women who will not obey."
For some time the cousins chattered on and endeavored to s.n.a.t.c.h a glimpse, in "time"s long and dark prospective gla.s.s," of Agapit"s future wife, while Vesper listened to them with as much indulgence as if they had been two children. He was just endeavoring to fathom the rationale of their curious interchange of _thou_ and _you_, when Agapit said, "If it is agreeable to you, we will drive back in the woods to the Concession. We have a cousin who is ill there,--see, here we pa.s.s the station," and he pointed his whip at the gabled roof near them.
The wheels of the dog-cart rolled smoothly over the iron rails, and they entered upon a road bordered by st.u.r.dy evergreens that emitted a deliciously resinous odor and occasioned Mrs. Rose to murmur, reverently, "It is like ma.s.s; for from trees like these the altar boys get the gum for incense."
Wild gooseberry and raspberry bushes lined the roadside, and under their fruit-laden branches grew many wild flowers. A man who stopped Agapit to address a few remarks to him gathered a handful of berries and a few sprays of wild roses and tossed them in Narcisse"s lap.
The child uttered a polite, "_Merci, monsieur_" (thank you, sir), then silently spread the flowers and berries on the lap rug and allowed tears from his beautiful eyes to drop on them.
Vesper took some of the berries in his hand, and carefully explained to the sorrowing Narcisse that the sensitive shrubs did not shiver when their clothes were stripped from them and their hats pulled off. They were rather shaking their sides in laughter that they could give pleasure to so good and gentle a boy. And the flowers that bowed so meekly when one wished to behead them, were trembling with delight to think that they should be carried, for even a short time, by one who loved them so well.
Narcisse at last was comforted, and, drying his tears, he soberly ate the berries, and presented the roses to his mother in a brilliant nosegay, keeping only one that he lovingly fastened in his neck, where it could brush against his cheek.
Soon they were among the clearings in the forest. Back of every farm stood grim trees in serried rows, like soldiers about to close in on the gaps made in their ranks by the diligent hands of the Acadien farmers.
The trees looked inexorable, but the farmers were more so. Here in the backwoods so quiet and still, so favorable for farming, the forest must go as it had gone near the sh.o.r.e.
About every farmhouse, men and women were engaged in driving in cows, tying up horses, shutting up poultry, feeding pigs, and performing the hundred and one duties that fall to the lot of a farmer"s family.
Everywhere were children. Each farmer seemed to have a quiver full of these quiet, well-behaved little creatures, who gazed shyly and curiously at the dog-cart as it went driving by.
When they came to a brawling, noisy river, having on its banks a saw-mill deserted for the night, Agapit exclaimed, "We are at last arrived!"
Close to the mill was a low, old-fashioned house, situated in the midst of an extensive apple orchard in which the fruit was already taking on size and color.
"They picked four hundred barrels from it last year," said Agapit, "our cousins, the Kessys, who live here. They are rich, but very simple," and springing out, he tied Toochune"s head to the gatepost. "Now let us enter," he said, and he ushered Vesper into a small, dull room where an old woman of gigantic stature sat smoking by an open fireplace.
Another tall woman, with soft black eyes, and wearing on her breast a medal of the congregation of St. Anne, took Rose away to the sick-room, while Agapit led Vesper and Narcisse to the fireplace. "Cousin grandmother, will you not tell this gentleman of the commencement of the Bay?"
The old woman, who was nearly sightless, took her pipe from her mouth, and turned her white head. "Does he speak French?"
"Yes, yes," said Agapit, joyfully.
A light came into her face,--a light that Vesper noticed always came into the faces of Acadiens, no matter how fluent their English, if he addressed them in their mother tongue.
"I was born _en haut de la Baie_" (up the Bay), she began, softly.
"Further than Sleeping Water,--towards Digby," said Agapit, in an undertone.
"Near Bleury," she continued, "where there were only eight families. In the morning my mother would look out at the neighbors" chimneys; where she saw smoke she would send me, saying, "Go, child, and borrow fire."
Ah! those were hard days. We had no roads. We walked over the beach fifteen miles to Pointe a l"Eglise to hear ma.s.s sung by the good Abbe.
"There were plenty of fish, plenty of moose, but not so many boats in those days. The hardships were great, so great that the weak died. Now when my daughter sits and plays on the organ, I think of it. David Kessy, my father, was very big. Once our wagon, loaded with twenty bushels of potatoes, stuck in the mud. He put his shoulder against it and lifted it. Nowadays we would rig a jack, but my father was strong, so strong that he took insults, though he trembled, for he knew a blow from his hand would kill a man."
The Acadienne paused, and fell into a gentle reverie, from which Agapit, who was stepping nimbly in and out of the room with jelly and other delicacies that he had brought for the invalid, soon roused her.
"Tell him about the derangement, cousin grandmother," he vociferated in her ear, "and the march from Annapolis."
CHAPTER XI
NEWS OF THE FIERY FRENCHMAN.
"Below me winds the river to the sea, On whose brown slope stood wailing, homeless maids; Stood exiled sons; unsheltered h.o.a.ry heads; And sires and mothers dumb in agony.
The awful glare of burning homes, where free And happy late they dwelt, breaks on the shades, Encompa.s.sing the sailing fleet; then fades, With tumbling roof, upon the night-bound sea.
How deep is hope in sorrow sunk! How harsh The stranger voice; and loud the hopeless wail!
Then silence came to dwell; the tide fell low; The embers died. On the deserted marsh, Where grain and gra.s.s stirred only to the gale, The moose unchased dare cross the Gaspereau."
J. F. HERBIN.
An extraordinary change came over the aged woman at Agapit"s words. Some color crept to her withered cheeks. She straightened herself, and, no longer leaning on her cane, said, in a loud, firm voice, to Vesper, "The Acadiens were not all stolen from Annapolis at the derangement. Did you think they were?"
"I don"t know that I ever thought about it, madame," he said, courteously; "but I should like to know."
"About fifty families ran to the wood," she said, with mournful vivacity; "they spent the winter there; I have heard the old people talk of it when I was young. They would sit by the fire and cry. I would try not to cry, but the tears would come. They said their good homes were burnt. Only at night could they revisit them, lest soldiers would catch them. They dug their vegetables from the ground. They also got one cow and carried her back. Ah, she was a treasure! There was one man among them who was only half French, and they feared him, so they watched. One day he went out of the woods,--the men took their guns and followed.
Soon he returned, fifty soldiers marching behind him. "Halt!" cried the Acadiens. They fired, they killed, and the rest of the soldiers ran.
"Discharge me! discharge me!" cried the man, whom they had caught. "Yes, we will discharge you," they said, and they put his back against a tree, and once more they fired, but very sadly. At the end of the winter some families went away in ships, but the Comeaus, Thibaudeaus, and Melancons said, "We cannot leave Acadie; we will find a quiet place." So they began a march, and one could trace them by the graves they dug. I will not tell you all, for why should you be sad? I will say that the Indians were good, but sometimes the food went, and they had to boil their moccasins. One woman, who had a young baby, got very weak. They lifted her up, they shook the pea-straw stuffing from the sack she lay on, and found her a handful of peas, which they boiled, and she got better.
"They went on and on, they crossed streams, and carried the little ones, until they came here to the Bay,--to Grosses Coques,--where they found big clams, and the tired women said, "Here is food; let us stay."
"The men cut a big pine and hollowed a boat, in which they went to the head of the Bay for the cow they had left there. They threw her down, tied her legs, and brought her to Grosses Coques. Little by little they carried also other things to the Bay, and made themselves homes.
"Then the families grew, and now they cover all the Bay. Do you understand now about the march from Annapolis?"
"Thank you, yes," said Vesper, much moved by the sight of tears trickling down her faded face.
"What reason did the old people give for this expulsion from their homes?"
"Always the same, always, always," said Madame Kessy, with energy. "They would not take the oath, because the English would not put in it that they need not fight against the French."
"But now you are happy under English rule?"
"Yes, now,--but the past? What can make up for the weeping of the old people?"
Nothing could, and Vesper hastened to introduce a new subject of conversation. "I have heard much about the good Abbe that you speak of.
Did you ever see him?"
"See him,--ah, sir, he was an angel of G.o.d, on this Bay, and he a gentleman out of France. We were all his children, even the poor Indians, whom he gathered around him and taught our holy religion, till their fine voices would ring over the Bay, in hymns to the ever blessed Virgin. He denied himself, he paid our doctors" bills, even to twenty pounds at a time,--ah, there was mourning when he died. When my bans were published in church the good Abbe rode no more on horseback along the Bay. He lay a corpse, and I could scarcely hold up my head to be married."
"In speaking of those old days," said Vesper, "can you call to mind ever hearing of a LeNoir of Grand Pre called the Fiery Frenchman?"
"Of Etex LeNoir," cried the old woman, in trumpet tones, "of the martyr who shamed an Englishman, and was murdered by him?"
"Yes, that is the man."