Pleasantly
rose next morn the sun on the village of Grand-Pré.
Pleasantly gleamed in the soft, sweet air the Basin of
Minas,
Where the ships, with their wavering shadows, were riding
at anchor.
Life had long been astir in the village, and clamorous
labor
Knocked with its hundred hands at the golden gates of the
morning.
Now from the country around, from the farms and
neighboring hamlets,
Came in their holiday dresses the blithe Acadian peasants.
Many a glad good morrow and jocund laugh from the young
folk
Made the bright air brighter, as up from the numerous
meadows,
Where no path could be seen but the track of wheels in the
greensward,
Group after group appeared, and joined, or passed on the
highway.
Long ere noon, in the village all sounds of labor were
silenced.
Thronged were the streets with people; and noisy groups at
the house-doors
Sat in the cheerful sun, and rejoiced and gossiped
together.
So passed the morning away. And lo! with a summons sonorous
Sounded the bell from its tower, and over the meadows a
drum beat.
Thronged erelong was the church with men. Without, in the
churchyard,
Waited the women. They stood by the graves, and hung on
the headstones
Garlands of autumn-leaves and evergreens fresh from the
forest.
Then came the guard from the ships, and marching proudly
among them
Entered the sacred portal. With loud and dissonant clangor
Echoed the sound of their brazen drums from ceiling and
casement,
Echoed a moment only, and slowly the ponderous portal
Closed, and in silence the crowd awaited the will of the
soldiers.
Then uprose their commander, and spake from the steps of
the altar,
Holding aloft in his hands, with its seals, the royal
commission.
"You are convened this day," he said, "by his Majesty's
orders.
Clement and kind has he been; but how you have answered
his kindness,
Let your own hearts reply! To my natural make and my
temper
Painful the task is I do, which to you I know must be
grievous.
Yet must I bow and obey, and deliver the will of our
monarch;
Namely, that all your lands, and dwellings, and cattle of
all kinds
Forfeited be to the crown; and that you yourselves from
this province
Be transported to other lands. God grant you may dwell
there
Ever as faithful subjects, a happy and peaceable people!
Prisoners now I declare you; for such is his Majesty's
pleasure!"
As, when the air is serene in the sultry solstice of
summer,
Suddenly gathers a storm, and the deadly sling of the
hailstones
Beats down the farmer's corn in the field and shatters his
windows,
Hiding the sun, and strewing the ground with thatch from
the house-roofs,
Bellowing fly the herds, and seek to break their
enclosures;
So on the hearts of the people descended the words of the
speaker.
Silent a moment they stood in speechless wonder, and then
rose
Louder and ever louder a wail of sorrow and anger,
And, by one impulse moved, they madly rushed to the
door-way.
Vain was the hope of escape; and cries and fierce
imprecations
Rang through the house of prayer;
Meanwhile had spread in the village the tidings of ill,
and on all sides
Wandered, wailing, from house to house the women and
children.
Four times the sun had risen and set; and now on the fifth
day
Cheerily called the cock to the sleeping maids of the
farm-house.
Soon o'er the yellow fields, in silent and mournful
procession,
Came from the neighboring hamlets and farms the Acadian
women,
Driving in ponderous wains their household goods to the
sea-shore,
Pausing and looking back to gaze once more on their
dwellings,
Ere they were shut from sight by the winding road and the
woodland.
Close at their sides their children ran, and urged on the
oxen,
While in their little hands they clasped some fragments
of playthings.
Thus to the Gaspereau's mouth they hurried; and there on
the sea-beach
Piled in confusion lay the household goods of the
peasants.
All day long between the shore and the ships did the boats
ply;
All day long the wains came laboring down from the
village.
Late in the afternoon, when the sun was near to his
setting,
Echoed far o'er the fields came the roll of drums from the
churchyard.
Thither the women and children thronged. On a sudden the
church-doors
Opened, and forth came the guard, and marching in gloomy
procession
Followed the long-imprisoned, but patient, Acadian
farmers.
Even as pilgrims, who journey afar from their homes and
their country,
Sing as they go, and in singing forget they are weary and
wayworn,
So with songs on their lips the Acadian peasants descended
Down from the church to the shore, amid their wives and
their daughters.
Foremost the young men came; and, raising together their
voices,
Sang they with tremulous lips a chant of the Catholic
Missions:--
"Sacred heart of the Saviour! O inexhaustible fountain!
Fill our hearts this day with strength and submission and
patience!"
Then the old men, as they marched, and the women that
stood by the wayside
Joined in the sacred psalm, and the birds in the sunshine
above them
Mingled their notes therewith, like voices of spirits
departed.
Thus to the Gaspereau's mouth moved on that mournful
procession.
There disorder prevailed, and the tumult and stir of embarking.
Busily plied the freighted boats; and in the confusion
Wives were torn from their husbands, and mothers, too
late, saw their children
Left on the land, extending their arms, with wildest
entreaties.
Suddenly rose from the south a light, as in autumn the
blood-red
Moon climbs the crystal walls of heaven, and o'er the
horizon
Titan-like stretches its hundred hands upon mountain and
meadow,
Seizing the rocks and the rivers, and piling huge shadows
together.
Broader and ever broader it gleamed on the roofs of the
village,
Gleamed on the sky and the sea, and the ships that lay in
the roadstead.
Columns of shining smoke uprose, and flashes of flame were
Thrust through their folds and withdrawn, like the
quivering hands of a martyr.
Then as the wind seized the gleeds and the burning thatch,
and, uplifting,
Whirled them aloft through the air, at once from a hundred
house-tops
Started the sheeted smoke with flashes of flame
intermingled.
These things beheld in dismay the crowd on the shore and
on shipboard.
Speechless at first they stood, then cried aloud in their
anguish,
"We shall behold no more our homes in the village of
Grand-Pré!"
Loud on a sudden the cocks began to crow in the
farm-yards,
Thinking the day had dawned; and anon the lowing of cattle
Came on the evening breeze, by the barking of dogs
interrupted.
Solemnly answered the sea, and mingled its roar with the
dirges.
'Twas the returning tide, that afar from the waste of the
ocean,
With the first dawn of the day, came heaving and hurrying
landward.
Then recommenced once more the stir and noise of
embarking;
And with the ebb of the tide the ships sailed out of the
harbor,
