Truth made transparent in a life, tried gold of character, Were Mistress Hale's, and this is all that history says of her; Their simple force, like sunlight, broke the hideous midnight spell, And sight restored again to eyes obscured by films of hell.
The minister's long fields are still with dews of summer wet; The roof that sheltered Mistress Hale tradition points to yet. Green be her memory ever kept all over Cape-Ann-Side, Whose unobtrusive excellence awed back delusion's tide!
While England was colonizing the Atlantic seaboard, France was firmly establishing herself to the north along the St. Lawrence. It was inevitable that war should follow; and as early as 1613 the English had destroyed the French settlements in Nova Scotia. The country had scarcely rallied from the blow, when it was torn asunder by the contest between Charles la Tour and the Chevalier D'Aulnay--a contest which, after twelve years, resulted in victory for the latter.
"To the winds give our banner! Bear homeward again!" Cried the Lord of Acadia, Cried Charles of Estienne! From the prow of his shallop He gazed, as the sun From its bed in the ocean, Streamed up the St. John.
O'er the blue western waters That shallop had passed, Where the mists of Penobscot Clung damp on her mast. St. Saviour had looked On the heretic sail, As the songs of the Huguenot Rose on the gale.
The pale, ghostly fathers Remembered her well, And had cursed her while passing, With taper and bell; But the men of Monhegan, Of Papists abhorred, Had welcomed and feasted The heretic Lord.
They had loaded his shallop With dun-fish and ball, With stores for his larder, And steel for his wall. Pemaquid, from her bastions And turrets of stone, Had welcomed his coming With banner and gun.
And the prayers of the elders Had followed his way, As homeward he glided, Down Pentecost Bay. Oh, well sped La Tour! For, in peril and pain, His lady kept watch, For his coming again.
O'er the Isle of the Pheasant The morning sun shone, On the plane-trees which shaded The shores of St. John. "Now, why from yon battlements Speaks not my love! Why waves there no banner My fortress above?"
Dark and wild, from his deck St. Estienne gazed about, On fire-wasted dwellings, And silent redoubt; From the low, shattered walls Which the flame had o'errun, There floated no banner, There thundered no gun!