# 36:Heartsick Hermit: PEI Legends and Lore series Traditional Cache
# 36:Heartsick Hermit: PEI Legends and Lore series
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camoed pill bottle
"They have tales ." Oh yes they do ! P.E. Islanders love to share tales and there is no shortage of yarns both short and tall to tell. The history of this tiny island is replete with strange occurrences and each seems to spawn one or more explanations to account for them. Ghosts and goblins and things that go bump in the night are commonplace in this lore. The stranger the actual events the more detailed the often supernatural story around it. Some of these tales go back centuries. Loss and gain, treasure, triumph, disaster, birth, life and death all feature prominently. Not many who live here doubt the existence of spirits and ' haunts' , nor the places they can be found. Forerunners, omens of all kinds, even Satan himself often show up in these accounts.
I have lived here too long to dismiss all these tales as fiction, nor the beliefs that they encompass. I know too many perfectly sober honest people who have had ' strange ' experiences to doubt the veracity of what they say happened.
This series contains a variety of such tales I gleaned from several Island folklore books, old newspaper articles, a few first-person accounts and even an on-line site or two. None are original to me and I certainly wish to thank all those who gathered the stories. I have tried to place the caches in the communities and, if possible, on or close to the exact sites of the described events. For some of these stories you would NOT find me at the exact site late at night. Not a chance. I hope you enjoy both the story and the going to where it happened !
# 36 : Heartsick Hermit:
Perry Gaudet, the son of wealthy parents, seemed to have everything one could want. he was a successful law student and for a time had a good law practice in Halifax. Then quite suddenly he left it all and moved back to PEI a sullen silent man , who shunned all human company. His parents tried but failed to discover the cause of his distress but his silence was impenetrable. The local priest and even the doctor met with similar results.
Perry only said " I am through serving humanity in any capacity. I intend to retire from society and live away from people ". Soon he packed his belongings, including a few favorite books and moved into a shack near St. Peters.
The years passed and the recluse that he was became almost famous in Kings County. When his parents died, he did not attend their funerals. Once in a great while he could be seen out in the country at night but not often and almost never by day.. The years continued to pass. One winter, after a particularly nasty blizzard , when no one could remember seeing him for weeks, a group of men decided to visit his shack to check on him. When they opened the door they were greeted with the sight of the hermits frozen remains lying in the corner..there was no telling how long he had been dead nor what exactly had caused it.
Among the dead mans meager possessions were found some gold, a silver watch, a serpent ring, a photograph of a strikingly beautiful young woman and a dairy , with a letter which read in part:
" Dear Perry :
Where I am you cannot follow. Please do not grieve too much at my passing. The whole affair has been a terrible tragedy; but such is life and someday when the veil is lifted you will understand why this terrible thing had to be. So until then adieu my lover.
Yours forever - Pauline.
With Gaudet died this mystery of a broken heart now lying in a lonely unmarked grave in St Peters' Bay.
Additional Hints
(Decrypt)
Va fznyy gerrf.