Vanished the vision away, but Evangeline knelt by his bedside. Vainly he strove to whisper her name, for the accents unuttered Died on his lips, and their motion revealed what his tongue would have spoken.

Vainly he strove to rise; and Evangeline, kneeling beside him, Kissed his dying lips, and laid his head on her bosom.

Sweet was the light of his eyes; but it suddenly sank into dark

ness,

As when a lamp is blown out by a gust of wind at a casement.

All was ended now, the hope, and the fear, and the sorrow, All the aching of heart, the restless, unsatisfied longing, All the dull, deep pain, and constant anguish of patience! And, as she pressed once more the lifeless head to her bosom, Meekly she bowed her own, and murmured, 'Father, I thank thee !'

Still stands the forest primeval; but far away from its shadow,
Side by side, in their nameless graves, the lovers are sleeping.
Under the humble walls of the little Catholic churchyard,
In the heart of the city, they lie, unknown and unnoticed.
Daily the tides of life go ebbing and flowing beside them,
Thousands of throbbing hearts, where theirs are at rest and for

ever,

Thousands of aching brains, where theirs are no longer busy, Thousands of toiling hands, where theirs have ceased from their labours,

Thousands of weary feet, where theirs have completed their journey!

Still stands the forest primeval; but under the shade of its branches

Dwells another race, with other customs and language.
Only along the shore of the mournful and misty Atlantic
Linger a few Acadian peasants, whose fathers from exile
Wandered back to their native land to die in its bosom.
In the fisherman's cot the wheel and the loom are still busy ;

Maidens still wear their Norman caps and their kirtles of home

spun,

And by the evening fire repeat Evangeline's story,

While from its rocky caverns the deep-voiced neighbouring ocean Speaks, and in accents disconsolate answers the wail of the forest."

Mark the beautiful transition from one picture to another that begins with "Then he beheld.”

So ends "Evangeline '—a poem which should confer on Longfellow the title of "Golden-mouthed," that was given once to Bishop Jeremy Taylor. Hawthorne never tired of it, and had it read to him shortly before he died. Thus he came to admire the theme after all. The success of the poem was so immediate and prodigious that thirty-seven thousand copies were sold in ten years. The French Canadians reverence Longfellow for "Evangeline" beyond all their national poets. Every family among them has it by heart in Le May's translation, and scores of them have learned English expressly to enjoy the tale more fully in the original.

T

CHAPTER IX.

Pittsfield, Massachusetts, Longfellow and his

family went to spend the summer of 1848. Their abode in Pittsfield was an old mansion named Melville House, near Oliver Wendell Holmes's house, and here Longfellow quietly sketched out and completed "Kavanagh," a story that was published in 1849. It fell rather flat, and has never been talked of in America with any enthusiasm. As the Americans found less to move them in the poet's studies of slavery than we find, so it seems to be the case that the pictures he draws in "Kavanagh" of every-day life in the rural parts of Massachusetts as it was about half a century ago, appeal to us here with more freshness and beauty than they do to those who are more or less familiar with the scenes and incidents he described. Of plot "Kavanagh" can hardly boast; it consists of a series of impressions drawn from the humdrum life of country folk, among whom the only learned and only completely discontented person is a village schoolmaster, Mr. Churchill. Mr. Churchill felt that he had been created to be a poet, and the smallness of his means and leisure and opportunity for the study of life chafed him daily. This was a nature of some

complexity, then, set in an environment the very simplicity of which at once afforded a contrast to it, and sharpened, or should have sharpened, its longing for stimulus. The schoolmaster was exactly the kind of subject Hawthorne might have dropped upon; and in Hawthorne's hands his life would have become thoroughly dramatic with quiet intensity. Probably we should be right in thinking that Hawthorne's methods in fiction had a good deal of influence in making Longfellow conceive Kavanagh.” But another influence seems to be still more evident, and that is Jean Paul Richter's. Again and again the short story told by the American poet reminds us of the German author who drew the poor student, Quintus Fixlein; and oftener still the schoolmaster exhibits the moods of Siebenkaes, while his poor little commonplace wife recalls to our minds the pigheaded Lenette, who had a good heart, but not the least capacity for understanding her eccentric spouse. Look at this brief scene :—

"Good-night, Alfred!'

"His father looked fondly after him as he went upstairs holding Lucy by one hand, and with the other rubbing the sleep out of his eyes.

"Ah! these children, these children!' said Mr. Churchill, as he sat down at the tea-table; 'we ought to love them very much now, for we shall not have them long with us!'

"Good heavens!' exclaimed his mean? Does anything ail them? die ?'

wife, 'what do you

Are they going to

"I hope not. But they are going to grow up, and be no longer children.'

“O, you foolish man! You gave me such a fright!' "And yet it seems impossible that they should ever grow to be men, and drag the heavy artillery along the dusty roads of life.'

"And I hope they never will. That is the last thing I want either of them to do.'

"O, I do not mean literally, only figuratively. By the way, speaking of growing up and growing old, I saw Mr. Pendexter this evening, as I came home.'

“He told me he should preach his farewell sermor. to-morrow.'

"Poor old man! I really pity him.'

"So do I. But it must be confessed he is a dull preacher; and I dare say it is as dull work for him as for his hearers.'

"Why are they going to send him away?'

666

"O, there are a great many reasons.

He does not

give time and attention enough to his sermons and to his parish. He is always at work on his farm; always wants his salary raised; and insists upon his right to pasture his horse in the parish fields.'

"Hark!' cried his wife, lifting up her face in a listening attitude.

"What is the matter?'

"I thought I heard the baby!'

"There was a short silence. Then Mr. Churchill said

"It was only the cat in the cellar.'"