Acadia by Frederic S. Cozzens

Page 1 of 112

[Illustration: _"This, with the antique kirtle and picturesque petticoat is an Acadian portrait." PAGE 56._]

[Illustration: _"There is nothing modern in the face or drapery of this figure. She might have stepped out of Normandy a century ago." PAGE 40._]

ACADIA;

OR,

A MONTH WITH THE BLUE NOSES.

FREDERIC S. COZZENS,

AUTHOR OF "SPARROWGRASS PAPERS."

This is Acadia--this is the land That weary souls have sighed for; This is Acadia--this is the land Heroic hearts have died for: Yet, strange to tell, this promised land Has never been applied for!

PORTER.

NEW YORK:

DERBY & JACKSON, 119 NASSAU STREET.

1859.

Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1859, by

FREDERIC S. COZZENS,

In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States for the Southern District of New York.

W.H. TINSON, Stereotyper.

GEO. RUSSELL & Co., Printers.

PREFACE.

As I have a sort of religion in literature, believing that no author can justly intrude upon the public without feeling that his writings may be of some benefit to mankind, I beg leave to apologize for this little book. I know, no critic can tell me better than I know myself, how much it falls short of what might have been done by an abler pen. Yet it is something--an index, I should say, to something better. The French in America may sometime find a champion. For my own part, I would that the gentler principles which governed them, and the English under William Penn, and the Dutch under the enlightened rule of the States General, had obtained here, instead of the narrower, the more penurious, and most prescriptive policy of their neighbors.

I am indebted to Judge Haliburton's "History of Nova Scotia" for the main body of historical facts in this volume. Let me acknowledge my obligations. His researches and impartiality are most creditable, and worthy of respect and attention. I have also drawn as liberally as time and space would permit from chronicles contemporary with the events of those early days, as well as from a curious collection of items relating to the subject, cut from the London newspapers a hundred years ago, and kindly furnished me by Geo. P. Putnam, Esq. These are always the surest guides. To Mrs. Kate Williams, of Providence, R. I., I am indebted also. Her story of the "Neutral French," no doubt, inspired the author of the most beautiful pastoral in the language. The "Evangeline" of Longfellow, and the "Pauline" of this lady's legend, are pictures of the same individual, only drawn by different hands.

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