CHAPTER XIII

EVANGELINE, HIAWATHA, AND THE COURTSHIP OF MILES STANDISH

After his first marriage we have seen that Longfellow wrote his most famous short poems. After his second marriage he wrote his most famous long poems. The first was “Evangeline.” It was published in 1847, four years after his marriage; but he had been a long time writing it. He once wrote, “I had the fever burning a long time in my brain before I let my hero take it. ‘Evangeline’ is so easy for you to read, because it was so hard for me to write.”

The story of the Acadians is a familiar one. Acadia was the French name for Nova Scotia. But after the French had settled there the English claimed the land as having been discovered by John Cabot. There was much fighting between the French and English over the disputed ground, and finally the English made a settlement of their own at Halifax; but the country villages were made up mostly of the French. At last the rights of the English to the territory were acknowledged by the French government; but in the treaty that was made it was provided that the French settlers should not be obliged to pay taxes or take up arms against their fellow Frenchmen. Most of them also refused to take the customary oath of allegiance to the King of England.

To make up for the loss of this territory the French erected fortifications at Louisburg and Cape Breton, and they encouraged the Indians to keep up a raiding warfare on the English settlements. In this border warfare the English claimed that the French “neutrals” (as the Acadians were called) acted as spies and stirred up the Indians to revenge.

At last in 1755, a few years before the American Revolution, the colony of Massachusetts proposed an expedition against Acadia, and the British government fitted it out. They captured the neighboring French forts, and all the American people rejoiced at the easy victory. Then came the question, What should they do with those treacherous “neutrals,” who were British subjects though they would not swear allegiance to Great Britain, and in heart and act remained loyal to France after France had been beaten off the ground.

“Scatter them through all the British colonies!” ordered the governor.

Accordingly, eighteen thousand of them were shipped off wherever it happened to be convenient to send them, and in such haste that families were separated, mothers and children parted, lovers torn from each other, and all thrown into a new world without money or property of any kind; for their houses and barns were burned, their crops destroyed, their money and goods confiscated. It was a horrible retribution for a very natural and simple-minded loyalty to their own native land and government.

A friend of Hawthorne’s heard a story of a young couple who were about to be married on the day the proclamation was made; but as the young men were separated from their friends and families to prevent their taking up arms for their defense, the two were sent to different colonies, and spent the rest of their lives in a vain search for each other. At last they meet in a hospital, where the hero is dying. The story was offered to Hawthorne for a novel, but he did not care for it. One day when the friend, Hawthorne, and Longfellow were dining together, the story was told again to Longfellow and he was very much touched by it, especially by the constancy of the heroine.

“If you are not going to use it for a novel, give it to me for a poem,” said Longfellow; and Hawthorne gladly consented.

The heroine of the poem was at first called Gabrielle; and the poet located the scene of the climax at a poorhouse in Philadelphia, with the charming surroundings of which he had been fascinated years before. While waiting for the sailing of the packet for Europe at the time of his first voyage, he wandered up Spruce street, where his attention was attracted to a large building with trees about it, inside of a high enclosure. He walked along to the great gate and stepped inside. The charming picture of a lawn, flower beds, and shade which it presented made an impression which never left him. When twenty-four years afterward he came to write “Evangeline,” he located the final scene at this poorhouse, and the burial in an old Catholic graveyard not far away, which he had found by chance on another walk at the same period.

His next great poem was “Hiawatha.” For ten years Longfellow had been thinking about writing an Indian poem. At last a young man who had been a pupil in one of his classes came back from the West, where he had been living among the Indians. One day while he was dining with the poet, he told many of his experiences among the red men. Longfellow was very much impressed, and looked about for a book where he might read old Indian legends. He found that a Mr. Schoolcraft had published such a book, entitled “Algic Researches.” For three years, he says, he read and reread this volume. At last he began to write, and composed nearly five hundred lines, when he changed his mind and destroyed what he had written. He began again and continued writing to the end.

When “Hiawatha” was published, some critics claimed that it was stolen from a Finnish poem, and a great many people said unpleasant things about it. Already Poe had written very unkindly of “Evangeline,” as he seemed to be jealous of Longfellow’s success. But both “Evangeline” and “Hiawatha” soon became immensely popular, thousands of copies being sold and read.

Two years after “Hiawatha” appeared, the _Atlantic Monthly_ was started. Longfellow, Holmes, Whittier, Emerson, Prescott and others, were called together at a dinner, and Lowell was chosen editor of the magazine. After the periodical was started and became so famous, the men who wrote for it met regularly once a month at a dinner. Longfellow was a contributor and an attendant at the dinners for a long time.

The year after the _Atlantic Monthly_ was started, “The Courtship of Miles Standish” was published as a little volume. The poem professes to be a love poem, but the love is not so warm and sincere as that in the songs of Robert Burns.