Text of a
short story from Cape Breton Tales
Page prepared by Col. John Brooks Devoe for his website Acadian Grandfathers
There are a total of 16 pages
which will be followed by the pencil sketch (from the book) of the Calvaire……
Below the text and sketch find a few comments on the author of the book as provided by Gordon Benoit. According to notes in the book the story was written in 1908, the date on the sketch is August 1907.
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The End
The pencil sketch is by Oliver M. Wiard, drawn in 1907
THE AUTHOR HARRY JAMES SMITH
Author of Amedee’s Son, Enchanted Ground, Mrs. Bumpstead
Leigh, Tailor Made Man, etc.
According
to Gordon Benoit the book of short stories and sketches was written by the
author based on his travels to Arichat not long after the turn of the 19th
century; the story told here was first published in The Atlantic Monthly
(Boston). Gordon states that Smith was born in New Britain, Connecticut in 1880
and was a novelist and playwright. He was also an expert on sphagnum moss that
was somehow used as a surgical dressing during WWI. He died in an accident in
Canada while collecting moss for shipment to the Red Cross in March of 1918.
His novel Amedee’s Son is also set in the Isle Madame area, and its
characters are Acadians and he writes of the feu follet, the mysterious
lights at Cape Auguet…when chased by the lights if one ran to the Calvaire they
would be safe. A volume of Smith’s letters was published in 1919; Cape
Breton Tales was published by his sister, Edith Smith, in 1920. My data
(above) on some of his other work is found in the book.
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