Page:Tourist's Maritime Provinces.djvu/162

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THE TOURIST'S MARITIME PROVINCES

ment of his unaffected hospitality. No one knows better than he how to plan the innumerable walks and drives that reveal the beauties of the Minas country with Wolfville as a base; and no one has laboured more efficiently than he to keep intact the meagre relics of French Grand Pré.

Mr. Herbin, whose store is on the corner below the Villa, is another fine-spirited citizen who for distinguished reasons has taken the Neutrals' story to heart. He is the only one of his race now dwelling above the dykes of Acadie. His adequate History of Grand Pré is dedicated to his mother's people. He has also written many verses that reflect in poetic strain the melancholy of the marshlands. Mr. Herbin's windows are a museum of Acadian relics taken from old cellars and disused wells. Here are night-cap frillers and warming-pans, loaf sugar cutters, and strange implements for crimping the hair. Ah, vain Evangeline! For one's admiration there is also displayed a lovely collection of jasper, agate and amethyst, the jewels of Blomidon. Besides, there are absorbing specimens of crystals less familiar,—heulandite, stilbite, cairngorm, orange-shaded acadialite,—which come from bluffs on the Cumberland shore of the Basin, and from Partridge Island. All the Minas cliffs are of volcanic origin. The cooling of the molten rock developed fissures which presently were bridged with crystalline deposits of many hues, with facets like cut gems.