"Yes, if one is born to it," said Rose, quietly.
"But one gets born to it, dear madame. In a short time, I assure you, I put on airs. I straightened my back, I no longer joked with the servants. I said, quietly, 'Give me this. Give me that,'—and I disliked to walk. I wished always to step in a carriage. Then Mr. Nimmo talked to me."
"What did he say?" asked Agapit, jealously and unexpectedly.
"My dear sir," said Bidiane, drawing herself up, and speaking in her grandest manner, "I beg permission to withhold from you that information. You, I see, do not worship my hero as wildly as I do. I address my remarks to your cousin," and she turned her head towards Rose.
They both laughed, and she herself laughed merrily and excitedly. Then she hurried on: "I had a governess for a time, then afterwards I was sent every day to a boarding-school near by the hotel where we lived. I was taught many things about this glorious country of France, this land from which my forefathers had gone to Acadie. Soon I began to be less ashamed of my nation. Later on I began to be proud. Very often I would be sent for to go to the salon (drawing-room). There would be strangers,—gentlemen and ladies to whom Mrs. Nimmo would introduce me, and her son would say, 'This is a little girl from Acadie.' Immediately I would be smiled on, and made much of, and the fine people would say, 'Ah, the Acadiens were courageous,—they were a brave race,' and they would address me in French, and I could only hang my head and listen to Mr. Nimmo, who would remark, quietly, 'Bidiane has lived among the English,—she is just learning her own language.'
"Ah, then I would study. I took my French grammar to bed, and one day came the grand revelation. I of course had always attended school here on the Bay, but you know, dear Madame de Forêt, how little Acadien history is taught us. Mr. Nimmo had given me a history of our own people to read. Some histories are dull, but this one I liked. It was late one afternoon; I sat by my window and read, and I came to a story. You, I daresay, know it," and she turned eagerly to Agapit.
"I daresay, mademoiselle, if I were to hear it—"
"It is of those three hundred Acadiens, who were taken from Prince Edward Island by Captain Nichols. I read of what he said to the government, 'My ship is leaking, I cannot get it to England.' Yet he was forced to go, you know,—yet let me have the sad pleasure of telling you that I read of their arrival to within a hundred leagues of the coast of England. The ship had given out, it was going down, and the captain sent for the priest on board,—at this point I ran to the fire, for daylight faded. With eyes blinded by tears I finished the story,—the priest addressed his people. He said that the captain had told him that all could not be saved, that if the Acadiens would consent to remain quiet, he and his sailors would seize the boats, and have a chance for their lives. 'You will be quiet, my dear people,' said the priest. 'You have suffered much,—you will suffer more,' and he gave them absolution. I shrieked with pain when I read that they were quiet, very quiet,—that one Acadien, who ventured in a boat, was rebuked by his wife so that he stepped contentedly back to her side. Then the captain and sailors embarked, they set out for the shore, and finally reached it; and the Acadiens remained calmly on board. They went calmly to the bottom of the sea, and I flung the book far from me, and rushed down-stairs,—I must see Mr. Nimmo. He was in the salon with a gentleman who was to dine with him, but I saw only my friend. I precipitated myself on a chair beside him. 'Ah, tell me, tell me!' I entreated, 'is it all true? Were they martyrs,—these countrymen of mine? Were they patient and afflicted? Is it their children that I have despised,—their religion that I have mocked?'
"'Yes, yes,' he said, gently, 'but you did not understand.'
"'I understand,' I cried, 'and I hate the English. I will no longer be a Protestant. They murdered my forefathers and mothers.'