Hopson, the next governor, described by the French themselves as a "mild and peaceable officer," was no less considerate in his treatment of the Acadians; and at the end of 1752 he issued the following order to his military subordinates: "You are to look on the French inhabitants in the same light as the rest of His Majesty's subjects, as to the protection of the laws and government; for which reason nothing is to be taken from them by force, or any price set upon their goods but what they themselves agree to. And if at any time the inhabitants should obstinately refuse to comply with what His Majesty's service may require of them, you are not to redress yourself by military force or in any unlawful manner, but to lay the case before the Governor and wait his orders thereon." [105] Unfortunately, the mild rule of Cornwallis and Hopson was not always maintained under their successor, Lawrence.
[105] Public Documents of Nova Scotia, 197.
Louis Joseph Le Loutre, vicar-general of Acadia and missionary to the Micmacs, was the most conspicuous person in the province, and more than any other man was answerable for the miseries that overwhelmed it. The sheep of which he was the shepherd dwelt, at a day's journey from Halifax, by the banks of the River Shubenacadie, in small cabins of logs, mixed with wigwams of birch-bark. They were not a docile flock; and to manage them needed address, energy, and money,—with all of which the missionary was provided. He fed their traditional dislike of the English, and fanned their fanaticism, born of the villanous counterfeit of Christianity which he and his predecessors had imposed on them. Thus he contrived to use them on the one hand to murder the English, and on the other to terrify the Acadians; yet not without cost to the French Government; for they had learned the value of money, and, except when their blood was up, were slow to take scalps without pay. Le Loutre was a man of boundless egotism, a violent spirit of domination, an intense hatred of the English, and a fanaticism that stopped at nothing. Towards the Acadians he was a despot; and this simple and superstitious people, extremely susceptible to the influence of their priests, trembled before him. He was scarcely less masterful in his dealings with the Acadian clergy; and, aided by his quality of the Bishop's vicar-general, he dragooned even the unwilling into aiding his schemes. Three successive governors of New France thought him invaluable, yet feared the impetuosity of his zeal, and vainly tried to restrain it within safe bounds. The Bishop, while approving his objects, thought his medicines too violent, and asked in a tone of reproof: "Is it right for you to refuse the Acadians the sacraments, to threaten that they shall be deprived of the services of a priest, and that the savages shall treat them as enemies?" [106] "Nobody," says a French Catholic contemporary, "was more fit than he to carry discord and desolation into a country." [107] Cornwallis called him "a good-for-nothing scoundrel," and offered a hundred pounds for his head. [108]
[106] L'Évêque de Québec à Le Loutre; translation in Public Documents of Nova Scotia, 240.
[107] Mémoires sur le Canada, 1749-1760.
[108] On Le Loutre, compare Public Documents of Nova Scotia, 178-180, note, with authorities there cited; N. Y. Col. Docs., X. 11; Mémoires sur le Canada, 1749-1760 (Quebec, 1838).
The authorities at Halifax, while exasperated by the perfidy practised on them, were themselves not always models of international virtue. They seized a French vessel in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, on the charge—probably true—that she was carrying arms and ammunition to the Acadians and Indians. A less defensible act was the capture of the armed brig "St. François," laden with supplies for a fort lately re-established by the French, at the mouth of the River St. John, on ground claimed by both nations. Captain Rous, a New England officer commanding a frigate in the Royal Navy, opened fire on the "St. François," took her after a short cannonade, and carried her into Halifax, where she was condemned by the court. Several captures of small craft, accused of illegal acts, were also made by the English. These proceedings, being all of an overt nature, gave the officers of Louis XV. precisely what they wanted,—an occasion for uttering loud complaints, and denouncing the English as breakers of the peace.
But the movement most alarming to the French was the English occupation of Beaubassin,—an act perfectly lawful in itself, since, without reasonable doubt, the place was within the limits of Acadia, and therefore on English ground.[109] Beaubassin was a considerable settlement on the isthmus that joins the Acadian peninsula to the mainland. Northwest of the settlement lay a wide marsh, through which ran a stream called the Missaguash, some two miles beyond which rose a hill called Beauséjour. On and near this hill were stationed the troops and Canadians sent under Boishébert and La Corne to watch the English frontier. This French force excited disaffection among the Acadians through all the neighboring districts, and constantly helped them to emigrate. Cornwallis therefore resolved to send an English force to the spot; and accordingly, towards the end of April, 1750, Major Lawrence landed at Beaubassin with four hundred men. News of their approach had come before them, and Le Loutre was here with his Micmacs, mixed with some Acadians whom he had persuaded or bullied to join him. Resolved that the people of Beaubassin should not live under English influence, he now with his own hand set fire to the parish church, while his white and red adherents burned the houses of the inhabitants, and thus compelled them to cross to the French side of the river. [110] This was the first forcible removal of the Acadians. It was as premature as it was violent; since Lawrence, being threatened by La Corne, whose force was several times greater than his own, presently reimbarked. In the following September he returned with seventeen small vessels and about seven hundred men, and again attempted to land on the strand of Beaubassin. La Jonquière says that he could only be resisted indirectly, because he was on the English side of the river. This indirect resistance was undertaken by Le Loutre, who had thrown up a breastwork along the shore and manned it with his Indians and his painted and be-feathered Acadians. Nevertheless the English landed, and, with some loss, drove out the defenders. Le Loutre himself seems not to have been among them; but they kept up for a time a helter-skelter fight, encouraged by two other missionaries, Germain and Lalerne, who were near being caught by the English. [111] Lawrence quickly routed them, took possession of the cemetery, and prepared to fortify himself. The village of Beaubassin, consisting, it is said, of a hundred and forty houses, had been burned in the spring; but there were still in the neighborhood, on the English side, many hamlets and farms, with barns full of grain and hay. Le Loutre's Indians now threatened to plunder and kill the inhabitants if they did not take arms against the English. Few complied, and the greater part fled to the woods. [112] On this the Indians and their Acadian allies set the houses and barns on fire, and laid waste the whole district, leaving the inhabitants no choice but to seek food and shelter with the French. [113]
[109] La Jonquière himself admits that he thought so. "Cette partie là étant, à ce que je crois, dépendante de l'Acadie." La Jonquière au Ministre, 3 Oct. 1750.
[110] It has been erroneously stated that Beaubassin was burned by its own inhabitants. "Laloutre, ayant vu que les Acadiens ne paroissoient pas fort pressés d'abandonner leurs biens, avoit lui-même mis le feu à l'Église, et l'avoit fait mettre aux maisons des habitants par quelques-uns de ceux qu'il avoit gagnés," etc. Mémoires sur le Canada, 1749-1760. "Les sauvages y mirent le feu." Précis des Faits, 85. "Les sauvages mirent le feu aux maisons." Prévost au Ministre, 22 Juillet, 1750.