The Raid From Beausejour; And How The Carter Boys Lifted The Mortgage by Charles G. D. Roberts
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Charles G. D. Roberts >> The Raid From Beausejour; And How The Carter Boys Lifted The Mortgage
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THE RAID FROM BEAUSEJOUR
AND
HOW THE CARTER BOYS LIFTED THE MORTGAGE
TWO STORIES OF ACADIE
BY CHARLES G. D. ROBERTS
CONTENTS.
I. THE RAID FROM BEAUSEJOUR.
CHAPTER I.
"BEAUBASSIN MUST GO!"
CHAPTER II.
PIERRE VISITS THE ENGLISH LINES.
CHAPTER III.
FRENCH AND ENGLISH.
CHAPTER IV.
PREPARING FOR THE RAID.
CHAPTER V.
THE MIDNIGHT MARCH.
CHAPTER VI.
THE SURPRISE.
CHAPTER VII.
PIERRE'S LITTLE ONE.
CHAPTER VIII.
THE NEW ENGLANDERS.
* * * * *
II. HOW THE CARTER BOYS LIFTED THE MORTGAGE.
CHAPTER I.
CATCHING A TARTAR.
CHAPTER II.
THE HAND OF THE LAW.
CHAPTER III.
A PIECE OF ENGINEERING.
CHAPTER IV.
A RESCUE AND A BATTLE.
CHAPTER V.
THE TRANSFER OF THE MORTGAGE.
ILLUSTRATIONS.
"BEAUBASSIN MUST GO!"
The family were gathered in the kitchen.
THE RAID FROM BEAUSEJOUR.
"They sped rapidly across the marsh."
MR. HAND.
"When he reached the door he knocked imperiously."
* * * * *
THE RAID FROM BEAUSEJOUR.
CHAPTER I.
"BEAUBASSIN MUST GO!"
On the hill of Beausejour, 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 Beausejour.
There the ships lay swinging at their cables, and all seemed quiet
on board. The group on Beausejour 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 Beausejour. 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 abbe 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 abbe 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.
At the time when our story opens, events in Acadie were fast ripening
to that unhappy issue known as "the expulsion of the Acadians," which
furnished Longfellow with the theme of "Evangeline." The Acadian
peninsula, now Nova Scotia, had been ceded by France to England.
The dividing line between French and English territory was the
Missaguash stream, winding through the marshes of the isthmus of
Chignecto which connects Acadie with the mainland. The Acadians had
become British subjects in name, but all the secret efforts of France
were devoted to preventing them from becoming so in sentiment. What is
now New Brunswick was still French territory, as were also Prince Edward
Island and Cape Breton. It was the hope of the French king, Louis XV,
that if the Acadians could be kept thoroughly French at heart Acadie
might yet be won back to shine on the front of New France.
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 Abbe 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 Boishebert,
to hold the hill of Beausejour, which was practically the gate of Acadie.
From Beausejour 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 Beausejour, 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 Beausejour; 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 Beausejour 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 abbe, with his companions, just quitting the
log cabin which served as the quarters of Boishebert. 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 abbe 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 Beausejour, 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 abbe, 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 abbe, 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 Beausejour.
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 abbe'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 Beausejour with a huge cartload of household
goods, drawn by a yoke of oxen. The abbe'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 abbe, 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 abbe 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 abbe'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 abbe 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 abbe 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
abbe'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.
CHAPTER II.
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 Beausejour
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.
Presently the thin procession of teams, winding its gloomy way across
the plains of the Missaguash toward Beausejour, became a hurrying throng
of astonished and wailing villagers, each one carrying with him on his
back or in his rude ox cart the most precious of his movable possessions;
while the women, with loud sobbing, dragged along by their hands the
frightened and reluctant little ones. By another road, leading into
the wooded hills where the villagers were wont to cut their winter
firewood, a few of the more hardy and impetuous of the Acadians,
disdaining to bend to the authority of Le Loutre, fled away into the
wilds with their muskets and a little bread; and these the Indians
dared not try to stop.
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 Beausejour 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 abbe 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 Beausejour. 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 Beausejour for a tenth part of the homeless Acadians.
By dawn Pierre was astir. He rose from his cramped position under a
manger, stretched himself, shook the chaff and dust from his thick black
hair, and stepped out into the chilly morning. The cattle had been hobbled
and allowed to feed at large, but the boy's eye soon detected that his pet
yoke had disappeared. Nowhere on Beausejour could they be found, and he
concluded they must have freed themselves completely and wandered back
home. Pierre had no reason to fear the English, but he dreaded lest the
troops should take a fancy to make beef out of his fat oxen; so, after
a word to his father, he set out for the burned village. Early as it was,
however, Beausejour was all astir when he left, and he wondered what the
soldiers were so busy about.
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."
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