It sounds to him like her mother's voice Singing in Paradise!He needs must think of her once more, How in the grave she lies;And with his hard, rough hand he wipes A tear out of his eyes.
Thus, at peace with God and the world, the farmer of Grand-PréLived on his sunny farm, and Evangeline governed his household.Many a youth, as he knelt in the church and opened his missal,Fixed his eyes upon her as the saint of his deepest devotion;Happy was he who might touch her hand or the hem of her garment!Many a suitor came to her door, by the darkness befriended,And, as he knocked and waited to hear the sound of her footsteps,Knew not which beat the louder, his heart or the knocker of iron;Or at the joyous feast of the Patron Saint of the village,Bolder grew, and pressed her hand in the dance as he whisperedHurried words of love, that seemed a part of the music.But, among all who came, young Gabriel only was welcome;Gabriel Lajeunesse, the son of Basil the blacksmith,Who was a mighty man in the village, and honored of all men;For, since the birth of time, throughout all ages and nations,Has the craft of the smith been held in repute by the people.Basil was Benedict's friend. Their children from earliest childhoodGrew up together as brother and sister; and Father Felician,Priest and pedagogue both in the village, had taught them their lettersOut of the selfsame book, with the hymns of the church and the plain-song.But when the hymn was sung, and the daily lesson completed,Swiftly they hurried away to the forge of Basil the blacksmith.There at the door they stood, with wondering eyes to behold himTake in his leathern lap the hoof of the horse as a plaything,Nailing the shoe in its place; while near him the tire of the cart-wheelLay like a fiery snake, coiled round in a circle of cinders.Oft on autumnal eves, when without in the gathering darknessBursting with light seemed the smithy, through every cranny and crevice,Warm by the forge within they watched the laboring bellows,And as its panting ceased, and the sparks expired in the ashes,Merrily laughed, and said they were nuns going into the chapel.Oft on sledges in winter, as swift as the swoop of the eagle,Down the hillside hounding, they glided away o'er the meadow.Oft in the barns they climbed to the populous nests on the rafters,Seeking with eager eyes that wondrous stone, which the swallowBrings from the shore of the sea to restore the sight of its fledglings;Lucky was he who found that stone in the nest of the swallow!Thus passed a few swift years, and they no longer were children.He was a valiant youth, and his face, like the face of the morning,Gladdened the earth with its light, and ripened thought into action.She was a woman now, with the heart and hopes of a woman."Sunshine of Saint Eulalie" was she called; for that was the sunshineWhich, as the farmers believed, would load their orchards with applesShe, too, would bring to her husband's house delight and abundance,Filling it full of love and the ruddy faces of children.
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Now had the season returned, when the nights grow colder and longer,And the retreating sun the sign of the Scorpion enters.Birds of passage sailed through the leaden air, from the ice-bound,Desolate northern bays to the shores of tropical islands,Harvests were gathered in; and wild with the winds of SeptemberWrestled the trees of the forest, as Jacob of old with the angel.All the signs foretold a winter long and inclement.Bees, with prophetic instinct of want, had hoarded their honeyTill the hives overflowed; and the Indian hunters assertedCold would the winter be, for thick was the fur of the foxes.Such was the advent of autumn. Then followed that beautiful season,Called by the pious Acadian peasants the Summer of All-Saints!Filled was the air with a dreamy and magical light; and the landscapeLay as if new-created in all the freshness of childhood.Peace seemed to reign upon earth, and the restless heart of the oceanWas for a moment consoled. All sounds were in harmony blended.Voices of children at play, the crowing of cocks in the farm-yards,Whir of wings in the drowsy air, and the cooing of pigeons,All were subdued and low as the murmurs of love, and the great sunLooked with the eye of love through the golden vapors around him;While arrayed in its robes of russet and scarlet and yellow,Bright with the sheen of the dew, each glittering tree of the forestFlashed like the plane-tree the Persian adorned with mantles and jewels.
In-doors, warm by the wide-mouthed fireplace, idly the farmerSat in his elbow-chair, and watched how the flames and the smoke-wreathsStruggled together like foes in a burning city. Behind him,Nodding and mocking along the wall, with gestures fantastic,Darted his own huge shadow, and vanished away into darkness.Faces, clumsily carved in oak, on the back of his arm-chairLaughed in the flickering light, and the pewter plates on the dresserCaught and reflected the flame, as shields of armies the sunshine.Fragments of song the old man sang, and carols of Christmas,Such as at home, in the olden time, his fathers before himSang in their Norman orchards and bright Burgundian vineyards.Close at her father's side was the gentle Evangeline seated,Spinning flax for the loom, that stood in the corner behind her.Silent awhile were its treadles, at rest was its diligent shuttle,While the monotonous drone of the wheel, like the drone of a bagpipe,Followed the old man's songs and united the fragments together.As in a church, when the chant of the choir at intervals ceases,Footfalls are heard in the aisles, or words of the priest at the altar,So, in each pause of the song, with measured motion the clock clicked.
Pleasantly rose next morn the sun on the village of Grand-Pré.Pleasantly gleamed in the soft, sweet air the Basin of Minas,the ships, with their wavering shadows, were riding at anchor.Life had long been astir in the village, and clamorous laborKnocked 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 folkMade 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-doorsSat in the cheerful sun, and rejoiced and gossiped together.Every house was an inn, where all were welcomed and feasted;For with this simple people, who lived like brothers together,All things were held in common, and what one had was another's.Yet under Benedict's roof hospitality seemed more abundant:For Evangeline stood among the guests of her father;Bright was her face with smiles, and words of welcome and gladnessFell from her beautiful lips, and blessed the cup as she gave it.
In that delightful land which is washed by the Delaware's waters,Guarding in sylvan shades the name of Penn the apostle,Stands on the banks of its beautiful stream the city he founded.There all the air is balm, and the peach is the emblem of beauty,And the streets still re-echo the names of the trees of the forest,As if they fain would appease the Dryads whose haunts they molested.There from the troubled sea had Evangeline landed, an exile,Finding among the children of Penn a home and a country.There old Rene Leblanc had died; and when he departed,Saw at his side only one of all his hundred descendants.Something at least there was in the friendly streets of the city,Something that spake to her heart, and made her no longer a stranger;And her ear was pleased with the Thee and Thou of the Quakers,For it recalled the past, the old Acadian country,Where all men were equal, and all were brothers and sisters.So, when the fruitless search, the disappointed endeavor,Ended, to recommence no more upon earth, uncomplaining,Thither, as leaves to the light, were turned her thoughts and her footsteps.As from a mountain's top the rainy mists of the morningRoll away, and afar we behold the landscape below us,Sun-illumined, with shining rivers and cities and hamlets,So fell the mists from her mind, and she saw the world far below her,Dark no longer, but all illumined with love; and the pathwayWhich she had climbed so far, lying smooth and fair in the distance.Gabriel was not forgotten. Within her heart was his image,Clothed in the beauty of love and youth, as last she beheld him,Only more beautiful made by his deathlike silence and absence.Into her thoughts of him time entered not, for it was not.Over him years had no power; he was not changed, but transfigured;He had become to her heart as one who is dead, and not absent;Patience and abnegation of self, and devotion to others,This was the lesson a life of trial and sorrow had taught her.So was her love diffused, but, like to some odorous spices,Suffered no waste nor loss, though filling the air with aroma.Other hope had she none, nor wish in life, but to followMeekly, with reverent steps, the sacred feet of her Saviour.Thus many years she lived as a Sister of Mercy; frequentingLonely and wretched roofs in the crowded lanes of the city,Where distress and want concealed themselves from the sunlight,Where disease and sorrow in garrets languished neglected.Night after night, when the world was asleep, as the watchman repeatedLoud, through the gusty streets, that all was well in the city,High at some lonely window he saw the light of her taper.Day after day, in the gray of the dawn, as slow through the suburbsPlodded the German farmer, with flowers and fruits for the market,Met he that meek, pale face, returning home from its watchings. 2ff7e9595c
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