Read Ebook: The Raid from Beausejour; and How the Carter Boys Lifted the Mortgage Two Stories of Acadie by Roberts Charles G D Sir

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"BEAUBASSIN MUST GO!" The family were gathered in the kitchen.

THE RAID FROM BEAUS?JOUR. "They sped rapidly across the marsh."

MR. HAND. "When he reached the door he knocked imperiously."

THE RAID FROM BEAUS?JOUR.

"BEAUBASSIN MUST GO!"

On the hill of Beaus?jour, one April morning in the year 1750 A.D., a little group of French soldiers stood watching, with gestures of anger and alarm, the approach of several small ships across the yellow waters of Chignecto Bay. The ships were flying British colors. Presently they came to anchor near the mouth of the Missaguash, a narrow tidal river about two miles to the southeast of Beaus?jour. There the ships lay swinging at their cables, and all seemed quiet on board. The group on Beaus?jour knew that the British would attempt no landing for some hours, as the tide was scarce past the ebb, and half a mile of red mire lay between the water and the firm green edges of the marsh.

The French soldiers were talking in loud, excited tones. As they spoke a tallish lad drew near and listened eagerly. The boy, who was apparently about sixteen or seventeen years of age, was clad in the rough, yellow-gray homespun cloth of the Acadians. His name was Pierre Lecorbeau, and he had just come from the village of Beaubassin to carry eggs, milk, and cheeses to the camp on Beaus?jour. The words he now heard seemed to concern him deeply, for his dark face paled anxiously as he listened.

"Yes, I tell you," one of the soldiers was saying, "Beaubassin must go. Monsieur the abb? has said so. You know, he came into camp this morning about daybreak, and has been shut up with the colonel ever since. But he talks so loud when he's angry that Jacques has got hold of all his plans. His Reverence has brought two score of his Micmacs with him from Cobequid, and has left 'em over in the woods behind Beaubassin. He swears that sooner than let the English establish themselves in the village and make friends with those mutton-head Acadians, he will burn the whole place to the ground."

"And he'll do it, too, will the terrible father!" interjected another soldier.

"When will the fun begin?" asked a third.

"O!" responded the first speaker, "if the villagers make no fuss, and are ready to cross the river and come and settle over here with us, they shall have all the time they want for removing their stuff--all day, in fact. But if they are stubborn, and would like to stay where they are, and knuckle down to the English, they will see their roofs blazing over their heads just about the time the first English boat puts off for shore. If any one kicks, why, as like as not, one of His Reverence's red skins will lift his hair for him."

A chorus of exclamations, with much shrugging of shoulders, went round the group at this; and one said thoughtfully: "When my fighting days are over, and I get back to France, I shall pray all the saints to keep Father Le Loutre in Acadie. With such fierce priests in old France I should be afraid to go to mass!"

Pierre listened to all this with a sinking heart. Not waiting to hear more, he turned away, with the one thought of getting home as soon as possible to warn his father of the destruction hanging over their happy home. At this moment the soldier who had been doing most of the talking caught sight of him, and called out:

"Hullo, youngster, come here a minute!"

Pierre turned back with obvious reluctance, and the speaker continued:

"Your father, now, the good Antoine--whom may the saints preserve, for his butter and his cheeses are right excellent--does he greatly love this gentle abb? of yours?"

The boy looked about him apprehensively, and blurted out, "No, monsieur!" A flush mounted to his cheek, and he continued, in a voice of bitterness, "We hate him!" Then, as if terrified with having spoken his true thought, the lad darted away down the slope, and was soon seen speeding at a long trot across the young grass of the marsh to the ford of the Missaguash.

As the two nations were now at peace, any tampering with the allegiance of the Acadians could only be carried on in secret. In the hands of the French there remained just two forces to be employed--persuasion and intimidation; and their religion was the medium through which these forces were applied. The Acadians had their own priests. Such of these as would lend themselves to the schemes of the government were left in their respective parishes; others, more conscientious, were transferred to posts where their scruples would be less inconvenient. If any Acadian began to show signs of wishing to live his own life quietly, careless as to whether a Louis or a George reigned over him, he was promptly brought to terms by the threat that the Micmacs, who remained actively French, would be turned loose upon him. Under such a threat the unhappy Acadian made all haste to forget his partiality for the lenient British rule.

The right hand of French influence in Acadie at this time was the famous Abb? Le Loutre, missionary to the Micmac Indians at Cobequid. To this man's charge may well be laid the larger part of the misfortunes which befell the Acadian people. He was violent in his hatred of the English, unscrupulous in his methods, and utterly pitiless in the carrying out of his project. His energy and his vindictiveness were alike untiring; and his ascendency over his savage flock, who had been Christianized in name only, gave a terrible weapon into his hands. Liberal were the rewards this fierce priest drew from the coffers of Quebec and of Versailles.

In order to keep the symbol of French power and authority ever before Acadian eyes, and to hinder the spread of English influence, a force had been sent from Quebec, under the officers La Corne and Boish?bert, to hold the hill of Beaus?jour, which was practically the gate of Acadie. From Beaus?jour the flourishing settlement of Beaubassin, on the English side of the Missaguash, was overawed and kept to the French allegiance. The design of the French was to induce all those Acadians whom they could absolutely depend upon to remain in their homes within the English lines, as a means whereby to confound the English counsels. Those, however, who were suspected of leaning to the British, either from sloth or policy, were to be bullied, coaxed, frightened, or compelled by Le Loutre and his braves into forsaking their comfortable homes and moving into new settlements on the French side of the boundary.

But the English authorities at Halifax, after long and astonishing forbearance, had begun to develop a scheme of their own; and the fleet which, on this April morning, excited such consternation among the watchers on Beaus?jour, formed a part of it. Lord Cornwallis had decided that an English force established in Beaubassin would be the most effective check upon the influence of Beaus?jour; and the vessels now at anchor off the mouth of the red and winding Missaguash contained a little army of four hundred British troops, under command of Major Lawrence. This expedition had been sent out from Halifax with a commendable secrecy, but neither its approach nor its purpose could be kept hidden from the ever-alert Le Loutre. Since Beaubassin was on British soil, no armed opposition could be made to the landing of the British force; and the troops on Beaus?jour could only gnaw their mustaches and gaze in angry silence. But Le Loutre was resolved that on the arrival of the British there should be no more Beaubassin. The villagers were not to remain in such bad company!

Pierre Lecorbeau was swift of foot. As he sped across the gray-green levels, at this season of the year spongy with rains, he glanced over his shoulder and saw the abb?, with his companions, just quitting the log cabin which served as the quarters of Boish?bert. The boy's brow took on a yet darker shadow. When he reached the top of the dike that bordered the Missaguash, he paused an instant and gazed seaward. Pierre was eagerly French at heart, loving France, as he hated Le Loutre, with a fresh and young enthusiasm; and as his eyes rested on the crimson folds, the red, blue, and white crosses that streamed from the topmasts of the English ships, his eyes flashed with keen hostility. Then he vanished over the dike, and was soon splashing through the muddy shallows of the ford. The water was fast deepening, and he thought to himself, "If Monsieur the abb? doesn't hurry, he will have to swim where I am walking but knee-deep!"

There was another stretch of marsh for Pierre to cross ere reaching the gentle and fruitful slopes on which the village was outspread. On the very edge of the village, halfway up a low hill jutting out into the Missaguash marsh, stood the cabin of Pierre's father amid its orchards. There was little work to do on the farm at this season. The stock had all been tended, and the family were gathered in the kitchen when Pierre, breathless and gasping, burst in with his evil tidings.

Now in the household of Antoine Lecorbeau, and in Beaubassin generally, not less than among the garrison of Beaus?jour, the coming of the English fleet had produced a commotion. But in the heart of Lecorbeau there was less anxiety than curiosity. This temperate and sagacious farmer, had preserved an appearance of unimpeachable fidelity to the French, but in his inmost soul he appreciated the tolerance of the British rule, and longed to see it strengthened. If the visitors were coming to stay, as was rumored to be the case, then, to Antoine Lecorbeau's thinking, the day was a lucky one for Beaubassin. He thought how he would snap his fingers at Le Loutre and his Micmacs. But he was beginning to exult too soon.

When Pierre told his story, and the family realized that their kindly home was doomed, the little dark kitchen, with its wooden ceiling, was filled with lamentations. Such of the children as were big enough to understand the calamity wept aloud, and the littler ones cried from sympathy. Pierre's father for a moment appeared bowed down beneath the stroke, but the mother, a stout, dark, gentle-faced woman, suddenly stopped her sobs and cried out in a shrill voice, with her queer Breton accent:

"Antoine, Antoine, we will defy the wicked, cruel abb?, and pray the English to protect us from him. Did not Father Xavier, just before he was sent away, tell us that the English were just, and that it was our duty to be faithful to them? How can we go out into this rough spring weather with no longer a roof to cover us?"

This appeal roused the Acadian. His shrewd sense and knowledge of those with whom he had to deal came at once to his aid.

"Nay, nay, mother!" said he, rising and passing his gnarled hand over his forehead, "it is even as Pierre has said. We must be the first to do the bidding of the abb?, and must seem to do it of our own accord. It will be hours yet ere the English be among us, and long ere Le Loutre will have had time to work his will upon those who refuse to do his bidding. Do thou get the stuff together. This night we must sleep on the shore of the stream and find us a new home at Beaus?jour. To the sheds, Pierre, and yoke the cattle. Hurry, boy, hurry, for there is everything to do and small time for the doing of it."

From Lecorbeau's cottage the news of Le Loutre's decree spread like wildfire through the settlement. Some half dozen reckless characters declared at once in the abb?'s favor, and set out across the marsh to welcome him and offer their aid. A few more, a very few, set themselves reluctantly to follow the example of Antoine Lecorbeau, who bore a great name in the village for his wise counsels. But most of the villagers got stubborn, and vowed that they would stay by their homes, whether it was Indians or English bid them move. The resolution of these poor souls was perhaps a little shaken as a long line of painted and befeathered Micmacs, appearing from the direction of the wooded hills of Jolicoeur, drew stealthily near and squatted down in the outermost skirts of the village. But Beaubassin had not had the experience with Le Loutre that had fallen to the lot of other settlements, and the unwise ones hardened their hearts in their decision.

As Le Loutre, with his little party, entered the village, he met Antoine Lecorbeau setting out for Beaus?jour with a huge cartload of household goods, drawn by a yoke of oxen. The abb?'s fierce, close-set eyes gleamed with approval, and he accosted the old man in a cordial voice.

"This is indeed well done, Antoine. I love thy zeal for the grand cause. The saints will assuredly reward thee, and I will myself do for thee the little that lies in my poor power! But why so heavy of cheer, man?"

"Alas, father!" returned Lecorbeau, sadly, "this is a sorrowful day. It is a grievous hardship to forsake one's hearth, and these fruitful fields, and this well bearing orchard that I have planted with my own hands. But better this than to live in humiliation and in jeopardy every hour; for I learn that these English are coming to take possession and to dwell among us!"

The abb?, as Lecorbeau intended, quite failed to catch the double meaning in this speech, which he interpreted in accordance with his own feelings. Like many another unscrupulous deceiver, Le Loutre was himself not difficult to deceive.

"Well, cheer up, Antoine!" he replied, "for thou shalt have good lands on the other side of the hill; and thou wilt count thyself blest when thou seest what shall happen to some of these slow beasts here, who care neither for France nor the Church so long as they be let alone to sleep and fill their bellies."

As the great cart went creaking on, Lecorbeau looked over his shoulder, with an inscrutable gaze, and watched the retreating figure of the priest.

"Thou mayst be a good servant to France," he murmured, "but it is an ill service, a sorry service, thou dost the Church!"

Within the next few hours, while Antoine and his family had been getting nearly all their possessions across the Missaguash, first by the fords, and then by the aid of the great scow which served for a ferry at high tide, the tireless abb? had managed to coax or threaten nearly every inhabitant of the village. His Indians stalked after him, apparently heedless of everything. His few allies among the Acadians, who had assumed the Indian garb for the occasion, scattered themselves over the settlement repeating the abb?'s exhortations; but the villagers, though with anxious hearts, held to their cabins, refusing to stir, and watching for the English boats to come ashore. They did not realize how intensely in earnest and how merciless the abb? could be, for they had nothing but hearsay and his angry face to judge by. But their awakening was soon to come.

Early in the afternoon the tide was nigh the full. At a signal from the masthead of the largest ship there spread a sudden activity throughout the fleet, and immediately a number of boats were lowered. For this the abb? had been waiting. Snatching a blazing splinter of pine from the hearth of a cottage close to the church, he rushed up to the homely but sacred building about which clustered the warmest affections of the villagers. At the same moment several of his followers appeared with armfuls of straw from a neighboring barn. This inflammable stuff, with some dry brush, was piled into the porch and fired by the abb?'s own hand. The structure was dry as tinder, and almost instantly a volume of smoke rolled up, followed by long tongues of eager flame, which looked strangely pallid and cruel in the afternoon sunshine. A yell broke from the Indians, and then there fell a silence, broken only by the crackling of the flames. The English troops, realizing in a moment what was to occur, bent to their oars with redoubled vigor, thinking to put a stop to the shameless work. And the name of Le Loutre was straightway on their lips.

PIERRE VISITS THE ENGLISH LINES.

The ships were a mile from shore, and the shore nearly a league from the doomed village. When that column of smoke and flame rolled up over their beloved church the unhappy Acadian villagers knew, too late, the character of the man with whom they had to deal. It was no time for them to look to the ships for help. They began with trembling haste to pack their movables, while Le Loutre and a few of his supporters went from house to house with great coolness, deaf to all entreaties, and behind the feet of each sprang up a flame. A few of the more stolid or more courageous of the villagers still held out, refusing to move even at the threat of the firebrand; but these gave way when the Indians came up, yelling and brandishing their tomahawks. Le Loutre proclaimed that anyone refusing to cross the lines and take refuge at Beaus?jour should be scalped. The rest, he said, might retain possession of just so much of their stuff as they could rescue from the general conflagration. The English, he swore, should find nothing of Beaubassin except its ashes.

The English boats, driven furiously, dashed high up the slippery beach, and the troops swarmed over the brown and sticky dikes. Major Lawrence led the way at a run across the marshes; but the soft soil clogged their steps, and a wide bog forced them far to one side. When they reached the outskirts of the village the sorrowful dusk of the April evening was falling over the further plains and the full tide behind them, but the sky in front was ablaze. There was little wind, and the flames shot straight aloft, and the smoke hung on the scene in dense curtains, doubling the height of the hill behind the village, and reflecting back alike the fierce heat and the dreadful glare. At one side, skulking behind some outlying barns just bursting into flame, a few Indians were sighted and pursued. The savages fired once on their pursuers, and then, with a yell of derision and defiance, disappeared behind the smoke. The English force went into camp with the conflagration covering its rear, and philosophically built its camp fires and cooked its evening meal with the aid of the burning sheds and hayricks.

As Pierre Lecorbeau drove his ox cart up the slope of Beaus?jour toward the commandant's cabin, where his father was awaiting him, he halted and looked back while the blowing oxen took breath. His mother, who had stayed to the last, was sitting in the cart on a pile of her treasures. The children had been taken to a place of safety by their father, who had left the final stripping of the home to his wife and boy, while he went ahead to arrange for the night's shelter. Antoine Lecorbeau had lost his home, his farm, his barns, his orchards, and his easy satisfaction with life; but thanks to Pierre's promptitude and his own shrewdness he had saved all his household stuff, his cattle, his hay and grain, and the little store of gold coin which had been hidden under the great kitchen hearth. His house was the last to be fired, and even now, as Pierre and his mother stood watching, long red horns of flame were pushed forth, writhing, from the low gables. The two were silent, save for the woman's occasional heavy sobs. Presently the roof fell in, and then the boy's wet eyes flashed. A body of the English troops could be seen pitching tents in the orchard. "Mother!" said the boy, "what if we had stayed at home and waited for these English to protect us? They are our enemies, these English; and the abb? is our enemy; and the Indians are our enemies; and our only friends are--yonder!"

As Pierre spoke he turned his back on the lurid sky and pointed to the crest of Beaus?jour. There, in long, dark lines, stood nearly a thousand French troops, drawn up on parade. The light from the ruined village gleamed in blood-red flashes from their steel, and over them the banner of France flapped idly with its lilies.

That night, because Antoine Lecorbeau was a leader among the villagers of Beaubassin, he and his family had shelter in a small but warm stable where some of the officers' horses were quartered. Their goods were stacked and huddled together in the open air, and Pierre and his father cut boughs and spread blankets to cover them from the weather. In the warm straw of the stable, hungry and homesick, the children clung about their mother and wept themselves to sleep. But they were fortunate compared with many of their acquaintances, whom Pierre could see crowded roofless about their fires, in sheltered hollows and under the little hillside copses. The night was raw and showery, and there was not houseroom in Beaus?jour for a tenth part of the homeless Acadians.

As Pierre approached the smoldering ruins of his home, an English soldier, standing on guard before the tents in the orchard, ordered him to halt. Pierre didn't understand the word, but he comprehended the tone in which it was uttered. He saw his beloved oxen standing with bowed heads by the water trough, and he tried to make the soldier understand that he had come for those oxen, which belonged to him. On this point Pierre spoke very emphatically, as if to make his French more intelligible to the Englishman. But his struggles were all in vain. The soldier looked first puzzled, then vacuously wise; then he knit his brows and looked at the oxen. Finally he laughed, took Pierre by the elbow, and led him toward one of the tents. At this moment a pleasant-faced young officer came out of the tent, and, taking in the situation at a glance, addressed Pierre in French:

"Well, my boy," said he, kindly, "what are you doing here so early?"

Pierre became polite at once; so surely does courtesy find courtesy.

"Sir," said he, taking off his hat, "I have come after my father's oxen, those beasts yonder, which strayed back here in the night. This was our home yesterday."

Pierre's voice quivered as he spoke these last words.

The officer looked very much interested.

"Certainly," said he, "you shall have your oxen. We don't take anything that doesn't belong to us. But tell me, why is not this your home to-day? Why have you all burnt down your houses and run away? We are the true friends of all the Acadians. What had you to fear?"

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