Amy in Acadia Part 26

"Oh, yes, fairly true, and there's always a chance of finding something by digging long enough. But I would never waste my time digging, except with hoe and spade, for fruit and vegetables. There's good money," he concluded, "in strawberries here in Nova Scotia. In Annapolis I know a man who has several acres, and in good seasons he gets two thousand boxes a day."

"Strawberries! Aren't apples the prize crop here?"

"Yes, and more certain than anything else. A man can get $300 an acre from a good orchard. If money were the only thing I'd rather be a farmer than a lawyer down here."

"That's better than some gold mines," said Amy, as they turned and walked down the hill to the carriage.

"When I was a small shaver," continued Balfour, "and had plenty of time to spare, I used to walk there along the top of the d.y.k.es of Annapolis.

From the base of seven or eight feet it narrows to hardly a foot at the top, and I can tell you that it was ticklish work keeping a footing."

"Why didn't I know of that before?" cried Martine. "I certainly should have tried it. I love to walk on railroad tracks, and d.y.k.e-walking must be almost the same."

"You can't try anything of that kind while you are in my care,"

interposed Amy. "The river is probably deeper than it looks, and if you should go too near the edge--"

"Oh, I can swim, my dear Miss Amy Redmond, though, to put your careful soul at ease, I'll promise not to go near the water. All the same, I wish that I were an Indian, at this very moment gliding down from Minas to Digby. Didn't you tell me that this was one of their favorite routes?" and she turned to Balfour for a reply.

"Why, yes," he replied, "from any point outside Minas they used to glide over to French Cross, then by a portage of four miles to Aylesford, and they would be borne on by the current down the Annapolis River, sometimes as far even as Digby."

"French Cross?" asked Amy. "What have I heard of French Cross?"

"Perhaps of the awful winter there that some of the Acadians pa.s.sed through, just after the deportation."

"Tell me about it," cried Martine, eagerly. "I never heard of it."

"Well, after the Acadians had been put aboard the s.h.i.+ps at Grand Pre, some friendly Micmacs hurried down secretly to warn the French at the eastern end of Annapolis. When they heard the news, about sixty Acadians decided on flight, and with a Micmac guide began to make their way north. They hoped to reach a point on the sh.o.r.e where the English would not see them, from which they could cross over to New Brunswick, and then get the protection of the French at Quebec. But when they reached Aylesford they did not dare try to cross. Their food was poor, sickness broke out among them, many died, and were buried in the soft Aylesford sand. The others went on to French Cross, but still did not dare cross the Bay. During the bitter cold of December, while they were suffering everything, they saw the last of the transports pa.s.s down the Bay, carrying their countrymen to the southern colonies. Many died during the winter, and when spring came the friendly Indians made birch-bark canoes for the remainder, who then crossed in safety to the New Brunswick sh.o.r.e."

"Man's inhumanity to man," sighed Amy, sentimentally.

"What wretches the English were!" exclaimed Martine, more energetically.

"Remember, please, that I am English;" and Balfour raised his hand in remonstrance. "Besides, the persecutors of the Acadians were not English, but your fellow New Englanders, who took the whole matter on themselves, without asking leave of any one else."

"But I am no New Englander," objected Martine.

"Oh, it's all the same. Some of your ancestors were from New England undoubtedly, unless you are different from most Chicagoans. But if you repudiate New England, you cannot object to my arousing your sympathies for some of those exiled Loyalists who suffered quite as much as the over-pitied Acadians."

"It's a shame Priscilla is not here," murmured Martine.

Now Balfour was not likely to speak idly, and in a moment he had begun his recital.

"The old lady who told this story to my mother was visiting Annapolis from Fredericton, and her mother, the daughter of an officer in a New Jersey regiment, experienced all the hards.h.i.+ps that she described. The vessels with these New Jersey officers and soldiers and their families went up the St. John River in early October, and landed at a place called St. Ann's, that later became Fredericton, the capital of the Province. It was a wet, cold season, and the people had no shelter but tents, that they tried to cover with spruce boughs. Their floor was the ground, and when snow fell in early November the old lady's mother said that her family tried to shut it out by putting their one rug against the opening. Often a part of the family had to sit up all night to keep the others from freezing. When everything else failed they would heat boards at the fire, and hold them over the children to give them needed warmth."

"A likely story!" and Martine smiled.

"Indeed, it is perfectly true," rejoined Balfour, gravely. "Many men and women died of exposure and lack of food that terrible winter. Their graves were dug with pickaxe and shovel, in the hard ground not far from the tents. Like the Acadians at French Cross, they had no clergyman to pay the last rites. They had been used to comfortable and pleasant homes, and many of them had had wealth; so it was doubly hard to have to live in Indian fas.h.i.+on on fish, and moose, and berries. In the spring they made maple sugar, and killed pigeons. There was great rejoicing when the first vessels came with corn and rye. They were in constant fear of the Indians, and it was long before they could live even half decently."

"I have always sympathized with the Loyalists," said Amy, quietly.

"Oh, well, it's all over now," returned Balfour, bitterly. "But it must have been hard for many of them to remember that their houses and lands, and even their personal property, had been pa.s.sed over to people who to them seemed to have no shadow of right to it."

"Do you care now?" asked Martine, gently.

"Oh, no;" but Balfour's tone belied his words. "My family did not suffer so much as some, though we had to start here in Annapolis with little besides the land that the King granted."

"Back to the soil is a good thing sometimes."

"Oh, yes, and Nova Scotia was very hospitable to the poor Loyalists; but still--to tell the truth, sometimes I wish that I had grown up on the other side of the line. There seems to be more chance in many ways;" and Balfour sighed.

Amy looked at Balfour in surprise. He was evidently considerably her junior, yet he talked like one much older.

"I should like to see him and Fritz together," she thought. "I believe that Fritz would appear five years younger, for he always persists in talking like an overgrown boy."

"There," concluded Balfour, "I have said too much. On the whole, I am contented, and the Province offers more than many corners of the world to an ambitious young man, so enough said. Now, just see, I was so absorbed in harrowing your feelings over the Loyalists that I have taken a wrong turn, and we are now so far from the battleground that we'll have to give it up this afternoon."

"'All roads are alike to me,'" hummed Amy, while Martine added, "But the scenery here is lovely. Just see how the North Mountain stands out, with that little fringe of mist hanging about the top, and I've never seen so many fine orchards. Oh, I wouldn't have missed this particular drive for anything;" and her flushed cheeks and beaming eyes showed that she had meant what she said.

"The drive has been full of pictures, too," added Martine. "I've seen a great many things even that you have not spoken of, and whenever I look over there toward the woods I fancy I see an Indian creeping along; not an unfriendly savage, but one with a smile on his face, hoping perhaps to be asked by Lescarbot to stay to dinner at the Fort."

"Yes," rejoined Balfour, "one of those jolly fellows who objected to the wording of the Lord's Prayer in asking for bread, saying that bread alone wouldn't do for him, as he needed moose, and fish besides."

"Yes, and some of the French dishes that they favored him with occasionally."

"Well, I have heard many things that make me believe that the Indians of Acadia were jokers. Some of the stories would shock you, I am afraid;"

and Balfour hesitated.

"Oh, we are not so easily shocked. Tell us, do."

"Very likely you've heard this particular thing. But it is said that one of the men in that first expedition of the French undertook to make a dictionary, and when he tried to get some of the natives to give him the Micmac for various sacred names, the Indian gave him words that were just the contrary,--almost profane, in fact,--so that the Frenchman made himself very ridiculous when he tried to make use of his new vocabulary."

"Which shows," said Martine, "that the Micmac Indian was not such a serious and solemn creature as those that used to appear in our school histories bewailing the advance of the white man. I always thought I'd like to meet one of them."

"Why, Martine?"

"Yes, just for the pleasure of sticking a pin in him. He would never have had spirit enough to turn his tomahawk against me. But these Micmacs knew how to enjoy life. The dictionary maker was probably a prim, conceited fellow, who deserved to be laughed at. Of course, in a general way," she concluded hastily, "I am always on the side of the French, and I love to remember that the old Fort once belonged to them."

"'When from Port Royal's rude-built walls Gleamed o'er the hills afar, The golden lilies on the s.h.i.+eld Of Henry of Navarre.

"'A gay and gallant company, Those voyagers of old, Whose life in the Acadian Fort Lescarbot's verse has told,'"

recited Balfour, as they turned into St. George's Street, "and here we are in sight of Fort Anne, and it pleases my soul that the flag floating above is the flag of Great Britain."

"We won't quarrel about that now," said Martine, "for you have given us the very pleasantest afternoon we've had."

"Yes," added Amy, "it has certainly been delightful, and so it is all the harder to remember that this is probably our last excursion around Annapolis,--at least, for the present."

"You are very good to appreciate our old town so, and I hope that you will find Wolfville almost as attractive. I am sorry enough, however, that you are going away. We shall miss you all;" and though emphasizing "all," Balfour looked directly at Martine as he spoke. "My sister has grown so fond of Miss Priscilla that she has forgotten her inborn hatred for New Englanders, and I hope you'll understand that we all appreciate your interest in Acadian history. I only trust I haven't bored you and Miss Martine by my facts and reminiscences. I fear that I've been almost garrulous."