There
is no section of Canada so rich in romance and folk-lore,
so crowded with memories, as the region around Grand
Pré, in the Land of Evangeline.
And
here, most moving story of all, the French and English
waged a century-long struggle, alternately captured,
razed and recaptured - the continual clamor of war.
Here
Col. Arthur Noble was killed on February 11th 1747,
with one hundred of his New England men.
Here
was St. Charles' Church where the Acadian men were assembled
at the command of Governor Lawrence, of Halifax and
told that they were prisoners.
Here
Longfellow properly placed the home of Evangeline and
her lover, Gabriel - and the start of the pathetic pilgrimage
so thrillingly related in the poem.
Grand
Pré was the theatre of the Evangeline story, so graphically
told in Longfellow's epic poem. "Evangeline's"
real name was Emmeline, the daughter of Benedict Bellefontaine,
surnamed the "Sunshine of St. Eulalie".
Gabriel Lajeunesse, the son of Basil the blacksmith,
and Rene LeBlanc, the heros of the Evangeline poem,
are not fictitious but real characters, according to
Acadian tradition. The poem itself , beautiful
and poignant, is a classic. |