At last I paused and looked at her, waiting for a word of praise or blame. “And your poetry, monsieur?” she said gently. “Surely that was not all the time forgotten. This Acadian land, with its wonder and its beauty, has found no interpreter but you, and your brave work in the field would be a misfortune, not a benefit, if it cost us your song.” “The loss of my verses were no great loss,” said I. “Indeed, monsieur,” she said earnestly, “I do not think you can be as modest as you pretend. But I am sincere. Since we have known your song of them, I think that mamma and I have watched only through your eyes the great sweep of the Minas tides. And only the other day I heard papa, who cares for no poetry but his old ‘_Chansons de Gestes_,’ quoting you to Father Fafard with evident enthusiasm.” She paused—but I said nothing. I had talked long; and I wished her to continue. What she was saying, the manner of her saying it, were such as I could long listen to. “As for me,” she went on, “I never walk down the orchard in summer time without saying over to myself your song of the apple-leaves.” “You do, really, remember my verses?” said I, flushing with surprise and joy. I was not used to commendation for such things, my verses being wont to win no more approval than they merited, which I felt to be very little. She laughed softly, and began to quote: “O apple leaves, so cool and green Against the summer sky, You stir, although the wind is still And not a bird goes by! You start, And softly move apart In hushed expectancy. Who is the gracious visitor Whose form I cannot see? “O apple leaves, the mystic light All down your dim arcade! Why do your shadows tremble so, Half glad and half afraid? The air Is an unspoken prayer; Your eyes look all one way. Who is the secret visitor Your tremors would betray?” It was a slight thing, which I had never thought particularly well of; but on her lips it achieved a music unimagined before. “Your voice,” said I, “makes it beautiful, as it makes all words beautiful. Yes, I have written some small bits of verse during my exile, but they have been different from those of mine which you honour with your praise. They have had another, a more wonderful, theme—a theme all too high for them, which nevertheless spurred them to their best. They have at least one merit—they speak the truth from my heart.” As I spoke I felt myself leaning forward, though not of set purpose, and my voice sank almost to a whisper. “One of them,” I continued, begins in this way: