We will first give a few lines partially indicating some of the characters. Benedict, Evangeline’s father, is thus described:
“Stalworth and stately in form was the man of seventy winters;
Hearty and hale was he, an oak that is covered with snow-flakes;
White as the snow were his locks, and his cheeks as brown as the oak-leaves.”
• • • • • • • •
“In-door, warm by the wide-mouth fire-place, idly the farmer
Sat in his elbow-chair, and watched how the flames and the smoke-wreaths
Struggled together like foes in a burning city.
Faces clumsily carved in oak on the back of his arm-chair
Laughed in the flickering light, and the pewter plates on the dresser