Page:The history of Grand-Pre by Herbin, John Frederic.djvu/15



, Acadia, Minas, and Evangeline, are names which, in their broadest significance, represent many interesting facts in the history of Nova Scotia, yet the thought suggested is the banishment of a race of people from the country they had inhabited for nearly one hundred and fifty years. A poet, on the one hand, has woven into undying verse the story of that closing scene. A soldier, on the other hand, has put on record in a journal the facts and details that make up the last days of the Acadian occupation of Grand-Pré. One is a poetic creation based upon these facts of history. The other is the journal of a commander who had an unpleasant duty to perform. But it is left to the imagination to complete the picture, without the aid of poet or historian, of the grief and misery which became the lot of this banished and wandering people. In this volume are gathered together those facts and fragments of history which relate to the Acadian people of Grand-Pré.

Longfellow's beautiful poem, the story of Evangeline in the constancy of her love, created out of the