no pity. The Governor of Canada and the colonial
minister in France were alike insistent that the English should be given
no peace and cared nothing for the sufferings of the unhappy Acadians
between the upper and the nether millstone.

At last, in 1755, the English accomplished something decisive. They sent
an army to Fort Lawrence, attacked Fort Beausejour, forced its timid
commander Vergor to surrender, mastered the whole surrounding country,
and obliged Le Loutre himself to fly to Quebec. There he embarked for
France. The English captured him on the sea, however, and the relentless
and cruel priest spent many years in an English prison. His later years,
when he reached France, do him some credit. By that time the Acadians
had been driven from their homes. There were nearly a thousand exiles in
England. Le Loutre tried to befriend these helpless people and obtained
homes for some of them in the parish of Belle-Isle-en-Mer in France.

In the meantime the price of Le Loutre's intrigues and of the outrages
of the French and their Indian allies was now to be paid by the unhappy
Acadians. During the spring and summer of 1755, the British decided
that the question of allegiance should be settled at once, and that the
Acadians must take the oath. There was need of urgency. The army at Fort
Lawrence which had captured Fort Beausejour was largely composed of men
from New England, and these would wish to return to their homes for
the winter. If the Acadians remained and were hostile, the country thus
occupied at laborious cost might quickly revert to the French. Already
many Acadians had fought on the side of the French and some of them,
disguised as Indians, had joined in savage outrage. A French fleet and
a French army were reported as likely to arrive before the winter.
In fact, France's naval power with its base at Louisbourg was still
stronger than that of Britain with its base at Halifax. When the
Acadians were told in plain terms that they must take the oath of
allegiance, they firmly declined to do so without certain limitations
involving guarantees that they should not be arrayed against France.
The Governor at Halifax, Major Charles Lawrence, was a stern, relentless
man, without pity, and his mind was made up. Shirley, Governor of
Massachusetts, was in touch with Lawrence. The Acadians should be
deported if they would not take the oath. This step, however, the
government at London never ordered. On the contrary, as