EVANGELINE

PRELUDE

This is the forest primeval. The murmuring pines

and hemlocks,

Bearded with moss, and in garments green, indistinct

in the twilight,

Stand like Druids of eld, with voices sad and pro-

phetic,

Stand like harpers hoar, with beards that rest on their

bosoms.

Loud from its rocky caverns, the deep-voiced neigh-

boring ocean

Speaks, and in accents disconsolate answers the wail

of the forest.

This is the forest primeval; but where are the hearts

that beneath it

Leaped like the roe, when he hears in the woodland

the voice of the huntsman?

Where is the thatch-roofed village, the home of Aca-

dian farmers,

Men whose lives glided on like rivers that water the

woodlands,

Darkened by shadows of earth, but reflecting an image

of heaven?

Waste are those pleasant farms, and the farmers for-

ever departed!

Scattered like dust and leaves, when the mighty blasts

of October

Seize them, and whirl them aloft, and sprinkle them

far o’er the ocean.

Naught but tradition remains of the beautiful village

of Grand-Pré

Ye who believe in affection that hopes, and endures

and is patient,

Ye who believe in the beauty and strength of woman’s

devotion,

List to the mournful tradition still sung by the pines

of the forest;

List to a Tale of Love in Acadie, home of the happy.

PART II

Then it came to pass that a pestilence fell on the

city,

Presaged by wondrous signs, and mostly by flocks of

wild pigeons,

Darkening the sun in their flight, with naught in their

craws but an acorn

And, as the tides of the sea arise in the month of Sep-

tember,

Flooding some silver stream, till it spreads to a lake

in the meadow,

So death flooded life, and, o’erflowing its natural mar-

gin,

Spread to a brackish lake the silver stream of existence.

Wealth had no power to bribe, nor beauty to charm

the oppressor;

But all perished alike beneath the scourge of his

anger;

Only, alas! The poor, who had neither friends nor at-

tendants,

Crept away to die in the almshouse, home of the

homeless.

Then in the suburbs it stood, in the midst of meadows

and woodlands:

SECTION V

Now the city surrounds it; but still, with its gateway

and wicket

Meek, in the midst of splendor, its humble walls seem

to echo

Softly the words of the Lord: – “The poor ye always

have with you.”

Thither, by night and by day, came the Sister of

Mercy. The dying

Looked up into her face, and thought, indeed, to be-

hold there

Gleams of celestial light encircle her forehead with

splendor,

Such as the artist paints o’er the brows of saints and

apostles,

Or such as hangs by night o’er a city seen at a dis-

tance.

Unto their eyes it seemed the lamps of the city celestial,

Into whose shining gates erelong their spirits would

enter.

Thus, on a Sabbath morn, through the streets, de-

serted and silent,

Wending her quiet way, she entered the door of the

almshouse.

Sweet on the summer air was the odor of flowers in

the garden,

And she paused on her way to gather the fairest among

them,

That the dying once more might rejoice in their fra-

grance and beauty.

Then, as she mounted the stairs to the corridors,

cooled by the east-wind,

Distant and soft on her ear fell the chimes from the

belfry of Christ Church,

While, intermingled with these, across the meadows

were wafted

Sounds of psalms, that were sung by the Swedes in

their church at Wicaco.

Soft as descending wings fell the calm of the hour on

her spirit;

Something within her said, “At length thy trials are

ended;”

And, with light in her looks, she entered the chambers

of sickness.

Noiselessly moved about the assiduous, careful attend-

ants,

Moistening the feverish lip, and the aching brow, and

in silence

Closing the sightless eyes of the dead, and concealing

their faces,

Where on their pallets they lay, like drifts of snow

by the roadside.

Many a lanquid head, upraised as Evangeline en-

tered,

Turned o its pillow of pain to gaze while she passed,

for her presence

Fell on the hearts like a ray of sun on the walls

of a prison

And, as she looked around, she saw how Death, the

consoler,

Laying his hand upon many a heart, had healed it

forever.

Many familiar forms had disappeared in the night

time;

Vacant their places were, or filled already by strangers.

Suddenly, as if arrested by fear or a feeling of

wonder,

Still she stood, with her colorless lips apart, while a

shudder

Ran through her frame, and, forgotten, the flowerets

dropped from her fingers,

And from her eyes and cheeks the light and bloom of

the morning.

Then there escaped from her lips a cry of such terri-

ble anguish

That the dying heard it, and started up from their

pillows.

On the pallet before her was stretched the form of an

old man.

Long, and thin, and gray were the locks that shaded

his temples;

But, as he lay in the morning light, his face for a

moment

Seemed to assume once more the forms of its earlier

manhood;

So are wont to be changed the faces of those who are

dying.

Hot and red on his lips still burned the flush of the

fever,

As if life, like the Hebrew, with blood had besprinkled

its portals,

That the Angel of Death might see the sign, and pass

over.

Motionless, senseless, dying , he lay, and his spirit ex-

hausted

Seemed to be sinking down through infinite depths

in the darkness,

Darkness of slumber and death, forever sinking and

sinking.

Then through those realms of shade, in multiplied

reverberations,

Heard he that cry of pain, and through the hush that

succeeded

Whispered a gentle voice in accents tender and saint-

like,

“Gabriel! O my beloved!” and died away into si-

lence.

Then he behe3ld, in a dream, once more the home of

his childhood;

Green Acadian meadows, with sylvan rivers among

them

Village, and mountain, and woodlands; and, walking

under their shadow,

As in the days of her youth, Evangeline rose in his

vision.

Tears came into his eyes; and as slowly he lifted his

eyelids,

Vanished the vision away, but Evangeline knelt by

his bedside.

Vainly he strove to whisper her name, for the accents

unuttered

Died on his lips, and their motion revealed what his

tongue would have spoken.

Vainly he strove to rise; and Evangeline, kneeling

beside him,

Kissed his dying lips, and laid his head on her bosom.

Sweet was the light of his eyes; but it suddenly sank

into darkness,

As when a lamp is blown out by a gust of wind at a

casement.

All was ended now, the hope, and the fear, and the

sorrow,

All the aching of heart, the restless, unsatisfied longing,

All the dull, deep pain, and constant anguish of

patience!

And, as she pressed once more the lifeless head to her

bosom,

Meekly she bowed her own, and murmured, “Father,

I thank thee!”

Still stands the forest primeval; but far away from

its shadow,

Side by side, in their nameless graves, the lovers are

sleeping.

Under the humble walls of the little Catholic church-

yard.

In the heart of the city, they lie, unknown and un-

noticed.

Daily the tides of life go ebbing and flowing beside

them,

Thousands of throbbing hearts, where theirs are at

rest and forever,

Thousands of aching brains,where theirs no longer

are busy.

Thousands of toiling hands, where theirs have ceased

from their labors,

Thousands of weary feet, where theirs have com-

pleted their journey!

Still stands the forest primeval; but under the

shade of its branches

Dwells another race, with other customs and language

Only along the shore of the mournful and misty

Atlantic

Linger a few Acadian peasants, whose fathers from

exile

Wandered back to their native land to die in its

bosom.

In the fisherman’s cot the wheel and the loom are still

busy;

Maidens still wear their Norman caps and their kirtles

of homespun,

And by the evening fire repeat Evangeline’s story,

While from its rocky caverns the deep-voiced, neigh-

boring ocean

Speaks, and in accents disconsolate answers the wail

of the forest.