An Account of the Customs and Manners of the Micmakis and Maricheets Savage Nations Part 3

These and other European families then soon became united with the French Acadians, and were no longer distinguished from them. Most of these last were originally from _Roch.e.l.le_, _Xaintonge_, and _Poitou_; but all went under the common name of Acadians; and were once very numerous. The Parish of _Annapolis-Royal_ alone in 1754, according to the account of father _Daudin_, contained three hundred habitations, or about two thousand communicants. The _Mines_, which are about five-and-thirty leagues from Port-Royal, and the best corn country in Acadia, were also very populous; nor were there wanting inhabitants in many commodious parts of this peninsula.

The character of the French Acadians was good at the bottom: their morals far from vitious; their const.i.tution hardy, and yet strongly turned to indolence and inaction, not caring for work, unless a point of present necessity pressed them; much attached to the customs of the country, which have not a little of the savage in them, and to the opinions of their fore-fathers, which they cherished as a kind of patrimony; it was hard to inculcate any novelty to them. They had many parts of character in common with the Canada French. A little matter surprises, and sets them a staring, without stirring their curiosity to examine, or exciting their inclination to adopt or embrace it. They are remarkably fond of rosaries, crucifixes, agnus deis, and all the little trinkets consecrated by religion, with which they love to adorn their persons, and of which the priests make no little advantage in disposing of amongst them: and in truth, it is almost incredible what a power and influence these have over them, and with which they despotically govern them. One instance I am sure cannot but make you laugh. In September, 1754, the priest at _Pigigeesh_, had appointed his paris.h.i.+oners to perform the religious ceremony of a _Recess_, and to make them expiate some disgust they had given him, obliged them, men, women, and children, to attend the adoration of the holy-sacrament with a rope about their necks; and what is more, he not only made them all buy the rope of him, in which you may be sure he took care to find his account, but exacted their coming to fetch it bare-footed, from his parsonage house; and this they quietly submitted to. In short, considering the sweets of power on whomsoever exercised, our good fathers the missionaries are not so much to be pitied, as they would have us believe, for their great apostolical labors, and exposure to fatigue; since it is certain, they live like little kings in their respective parishes, and enjoy in all senses the best the land affords; and even our government itself, for its own ends, is obliged to pay a sort of court to them, and to keep them in good humour.

The Acadian men were commonly drest in a sort of coa.r.s.e black stuff made in the country; and many of the poorer sort go bare-footed in all weathers. The women are covered with a cloak, and all their head-dress is generally a handkerchief, which would serve for a veil too, in the manner they tied it, if it descended low enough.

Their dwellings were almost all built in an uniform manner; the inhabitants themselves it was who built them, each for himself, there being but few or no mechanics in the country. The hatchet was their capital and universal instrument. They had saw-mills for their timber, and with a plane and a knife, an Acadian would build his house and his barn, and even make all his wooden domestic furniture. Happy nation!

that could thus be sufficient to itself, which would always be the case, were the luxury and the vanity of other nations to remain unenvied.

Such in short were the French Acadians, who fell under the dominion of the king of Great Britain, when the English experienced, from both the Acadians and savages, a most thorough reluctance to the recognition of their new sovereign, which has continued to this day.

As to the savages it is certain, that the governors for the English acted entirely against the interest of their nation, in their procedure with them. They had been long under the French government, so far as their nature allows them to be under any government at all; and besides almost all the Micmakis, and great numbers of the Maricheets, or Abenaquis, were converted to our faith, and were consequently under the influence of the priests. It could not then be expected, naturally speaking, that these people could all of a sudden shake off their attachment to, and connexions with our nation; so that, even after the cession of Acadia, they continued, with a savage sulleness, to give marks of their preference of our government. This could not fail of giving the English umbrage; and their impatience not brooking either delays, or soothing them into a temper and opinion more favorable to them: they let it very early be seen, and penetrated by the savages, that they intended to clear the country of them. Nor would this exterminating plan, however not over-humane, have been perhaps wholly an impolitical one, if they had not had the French for neighbors, who, ever watchful and alert in concerning themselves with what past in those parts, took care underhand, by their priests and emissaries, to inflame them, and to offer them not only the kindest refuge, but to provide them with all necessaries of life, sure of being doubly repaid by the service they would do them, if but in the mischief they would do the English, to whom it was a great point with our government to make Acadia as uncomfortable, and as untenable as possible. It was no wonder then, that the savages, ill-used by the English, and still dreading worse from them, being constantly plied by our caresses, presents, and promises, should prefer our nation to that. I have before said, that religion has no great hold of these savages, but it could not be but of some weight in the scale, where their minds were already so exulcerated against those of a different one, whom they now considered as their capital enemies. You may be sure like-wise, our priests did not neglect making the most of this advantage, which the English themselves furnished them by their indiscreet management: for certain it is, that a few presents well placed, proper methods of conciliation, and a very little time, would have entirely detached the savages from our interest, and have turned the system of annoyance of the English against the French themselves. Some English governors indeed grew sensible of this, and applied themselves to retrieve matters by a gentler treatment, but the mischief was already done and irretrieveable; and our missionaries took care to widen the breach, and to keep up their spirit of hatred and revenge, by instilling into them the notions of jealousy, that such overtures of friends.h.i.+p, on the part of the English, were no better than so many snares laid to make them perish, by a false security, since they could not hope to do it by open violence. One instance may serve to show you the temper of these people: Some years ago the English officers being a.s.sembled at the _Mines_, in order to take a solemn recognition from them of the king of Great Britain, when a savage, a new convert, called _Simon_, in spite of all dissuasion, went himself alone to the English commander, and told him, that all his endeavours to get the king of England acknowledged, would be to no purpose; that, for his part, he should never pay any allegiance but to the king of France, and drawing a knife, said, "This indeed is all the arms I have, and with this weapon alone, I will stand by the king of France till death."

Yet, with all this obstinacy of sentiments, once more I dare aver, the savages would have been easily won over and attached to the English party, had these gone the right way about it: and I well know that the French, who knew best the nature of the savages, much dreaded it; and were not a little pleased to see the English take measures so contrary to their own interest, and play the game so effectually into our hands.

In short, we took, as was natural, all the advantage of their indiscretion and over-sight.

I come now to the Acadians, or what may more properly be called the French Acadians. These would undoubtedly have proved very valuable subjects to the English, and extreamly useful to them in improving a dominion so susceptible of all manner of improvement as _Acadia_, (Nova-Scotia) if they could have been, prevailed on to break their former ties of allegiance to the king of France, and to have remained quietly under the new government to which they were now transferred. But from this they were constantly dissuaded, and withheld by the influence of our French priests, cantoned, amongst them [The letter-writer might have here added the infamous arts and falsities by which these emissaries of the French imposed on those bigotted deluded people, and to that end made religion a vile tool of state. They represented to these Acadians, that it was an inexpiable crime against their faith, to hold any commerce with heretics, and much more so to enter into their interests;--that there would be no pardon for them, either in the other world, or even in this, when the French should regain, as they certainly would, possession of a country ceded so much against the grain. In short, they succeeded but too well in keeping up the spirit of rebellion amongst those infatuated devotees of theirs, who remained sullen and refractory to all the advances the English made to gain them.], who kept them steady to our party. You may be sure our government did not fail of constantly inculcating the expediency of this conduct to our priests; who not only very punctually and successfully conformed to their instructions on this head, but very often in the heat of their zeal so much exceeded them, as to draw on themselves the animadversion of the English government. This answered a double end, of hindering that nation from finding those advantages in this country, by the prospect of which it had been tempted to settle in it, and of engaging it to consider Acadia itself, as something not material enough to think worth its keeping, at the expence which it must occasion, and consequently induce the English to be the readier to part with it again, on any future treaty of peace. This too is certain, that the French themselves knew neither the extent, nor the value of this country, till they were sensible of the improvements the English were projecting; and the use now so easy to discover might be made of so fine an establishment. But to return to the Acadians: It must be confest the English had, with respect to them, a difficult game to play. To force such a number of families, of which too such great use might have been made, to evacuate the country, seems at first both impolitic and inhuman. But then it must be considered, that these people were absolutely untractable as to the English, and thoroughly under the direction of priests in an interest quite opposite to theirs. To have taken those priests entirely from them, would have exasperated them yet more, and was, in fact, a measure repugnant to that spirit of toleration in religious matters, of which they boast, and to which it must be owned they constantly adhered, as to these people, both in speculation and practice.

[Might not this dilemma have been removed, by procuring for them priests, since priests they must have, from neutral nations, such as the Flemings, the Roman Swiss Cantons, &c. whom a very small matter of reward and encouragement would, it is probable, have fixed in the English interest? At least, they could not have the same motives for fomenting rebellious principles, as the French priests, who were set on by that government.]

None of the Acadians were ever molested purely for their religion; and even the priests of our nation were always civilly treated by them, whenever they had not reason to think they meddled in temporal matters, or stirred up their paris.h.i.+oners to rebellion. I have seen many of their own letters that acknowledge as much; so that upon the whole, I do not see that the English could do otherwise than they did, in expelling their bounds a people, who were const.i.tutionally, and invincibly, a perpetual thorn in their side, whom they could at best look on as secret domestic enemies, who wanted nothing but an occasion to do them all the mischief in their power, and of whom, consequently, there could not, for their interest and safety, remain too few in the land.

In the mean time the French took special care to appear at least to receive with open arms those _refugees_, whom their fear or hatred of the English drove out of that country; they gave them temporary places of habitation, both for them and their cattle, besides provisions, arms, tools, &c. till they should fix a settlement in some part of the French dominions here, which they recommended especially in the island of, or on the banks of the river of St. John; but they were at first very loth to come to a determination. And surely, these unfortunate victims of their attachment to the French government deserved all the reparation in its power to give them, for what they had quitted for the sake of preserving allegiance to it, even after their country had been transferred to another sovereign. I cannot, however, consistently with truth say, they were received as kindly as they deserved, which probably bred that undetermination of their's to fix a new settlement, as they were pressed to do by the French government. They retained still a hankering after their old habitations: the temporary new ones were far from being equally agreeable or convenient; and even the ancient settlers in those places where these refugees were provisionally cantoned, began to make complaints of their encroaching upon them, and to represent their apprehensions of their becoming burthensome to them.

Some of our people in power, more sollicitous for their own private interest, than for the public good, were but too remiss in relieving and comforting these poor people. This, at length, indisposed them so, that after very pathetic remonstrances on the hards.h.i.+p of their case, and the motives upon which they thus suffered, great numbers of them began to listen seriously to the proposals made them by the English, to return upon very inviting terms to the settlements they had quitted. In short, it required the utmost art of the missionaries, and even a kind of coercion from the military power, to keep them from accepting the English offers. For when they presented a pet.i.tion to Mons. _de Vergor_, for leave to return to the English district, this commander, after having remonstrated to them that he could not grant their request, nor decide any thing of himself in a matter of that importance, was forced, at length, to declare to them, that he would _shoot_ any man who should attempt to go over to the English. [It should here be remarked, that these very people had taken the oath of allegiance to the crown of England, agreeable to the tenor of the treaty of Utrecht. But the French, not content with harbouring these causeless malecontents, that were actually deserters over to them, kept continually, by means of the priests, plying such as staid behind with exhortations, promises, menaces, in short, with every art of seduction, to engage them to withdraw their sworn allegiance to their now lawful sovereign. In short, if all the transactions of the French in those parts were thrown into a history, it would lay open to the world such a scene of complicated villainy, rebellion, perjury, subornation of perjury, perfidiousness, and cruelty, as would for ever take from that nation the power of pluming itself, as it now so impudently does, on its sincerity, fairness, and moderation. The English, on the other hand, too conscious of the justice of their cause at bottom, have been too remiss in their confutation of the French falsities: content with being in the right, they cared too little for having the appearance of being so, as if the world was not governed by appearances.] Thus these poor people remained under this deplorable dilemma. Some of them too, had not even habitations to go back if they would: they had been forced into the measure of deserting their country, and pa.s.sing over to the French side, by the violence of the Abbot de Loutre, who had not only preached them into this spirit, but ordered the savages, whom he had at his disposal, to set fire to their habitations, barns, &c. particularly at _Mirtigueesh_. [The reader is desired to observe, that in the memorials delivered into the English court by the French ministers, this burning of villages was specifically made an article of complaint, at the same time that it was their own incendiary agent, at their own instigation, who had actually caused fire to be set to them by his savages. Could then impudence be pushed farther than it was on this occasion?]

In the mean time the French did not spare, at least, the consolation of words and promises to these distrest Refugee-acadians. They were a.s.sured, that they would infallibly be relieved on the regulation of the limits taking place, which was then on the point of being settled, by commissaries, between the two crowns. [The truth is, that in these a.s.surances the French government, which never intended a conclusion, but only an amus.e.m.e.nt, did not scruple equally deceiving the English, and these infatuated Acadian subjects of ours, who, to the French interest had sacrificed their own, their possessions in their country, their sworn faith, in short, their ALL. Whoever has the patience to go through the French memorials, in their procedure with our commissaries, may see such instances of their pitiful prevarications, petty-fogging chicanery, quirks, and evasions, as would nauseate one. The whole stress of their argument, in short, turns merely upon names, where the things themselves were absolutely out of the question, from the manifest notoriety of them.] This hope, in some sort, pacified them; and they lived as well as they could in the expectation of a final decision, which was not so soon to come.

Yet even this example of the sufferings of these people, purely on account of their attachment to the French government, could not out balance with the French Acadians, who remained in the English district, the a.s.siduous applications of our priests to keep them firm in the French interest. They never ceased giving every mark in their power of their preference of our government to that, under which the treaty of Utrecht had put them. The English, however, at length finding that, neither by fair nor foul means, could they reclaim or win them over to their purpose, so as that they might in future depend upon them, came at once to a violent resolution. They surprized and seized every French Acadian-man they could lay their hands on, (the women they knew would follow of course) and, to clear the country effectually of them, dispersed them into the remotest parts of their other settlements in North-America, where they thought they could do the least mischief to them. Some were s.h.i.+pped off for England: the priests shared the same fate, and were conveyed to Europe. With this evacuation, the very existence of the French Acadians may be said to have ended; for in Acadia there are scarce any traces of them left, few or none having escaped this general seizure and transportation, for the necessity of which, the English were perhaps more to be pitied than blamed.

In the mean time our government had so far succeeded, as to force the English, thus to deprive themselves of such a number of subjects, who, but for the reasons above deduced, might have been very valuable ones, and a great strengthening of their new colony. Hitherto then our neighborhood has made it almost as irksome, and uncomfortable to them, as we could wish; and this fine spot of dominion does not nigh produce to them the advantages that might otherwise naturally be expected from it. Numbers of themselves begin to exclaim against it, as if its value and importance had been overrated; not considering, that it is on the circ.u.mstances of their possession, and not on the nature of the possession itself, that their complaints and murmurings should fall. It is very likely, that whenever we get it back again, we shall know very well what to do with it. They have begun to teach us the value of what we thus inadvertently parted with to them; and it will be hard, indeed, on recovering it, if we do not improve upon their lessons.

In the mean time you in Europe are cruelly mistaken, if you do not annex an idea of the highest consequence and value, to the matters of dominion now in dispute, between the crowns of France and Great Britain, between whom the war is in a manner begun, by the capture of the Alcides and Lys, and which, even without that circ.u.mstance, was inevitable. I know that our (French) government, is indeed fully sensible of the capital importance to it of its interest in these parts, and has proceeded in consequence. But it is not so, I find by your letters, and the reports of others, with numbers in Europe, who do not conceive, that the present object of the war is so considerable as it really is.

To say nothing of the vast extent of country that falls under the claim of the English to Acadia (Nova-Scotia) which alone would form an immence ma.s.s of dominion, greatly improveable in a number of points, its situation is yet of greater weight. By the English possessing it, Canada itself would be so streightened, so liable to harra.s.sment, and especially to the comptrol of its navigation, that it would scarce be tenable, and surely not worth the expence of keeping. The country pretended to have been ceded is far preferable to it; and the masters of it would be equally masters of the sea all over North-America. Hallifax, for example, according to which of the nation's hand it should be in, may be equally an effectual check on Quebec, or Boston.

You will then allow, that was there even nothing more in dispute than the limits of the cession of Acadia, or Nova-Scotia, together with its necessary dependence, that alone would form such a considerable object, as not easily to be given up on either side. The commissaries appointed by both crowns, then failing of coming to any agreement or regulation, it is no wonder to see the appeal lodged with the sword; especially when there is another point yet remains, of perhaps equal, if not superior, importance, depending on the issue of the war: and that is, the western inland frontiers of the English colonies. Should we ever command the navigation of the lakes and rivers, behind their settlements, you can easily figure to yourself, not only the vast advantages of preserving that communication of Canada, with New Orleans and the Mississippi, so absolutely essential to both these our colonies, but the facility it will give us on all occasions of distressing the English, where neither their marine-force can succor them, nor can they be able to resist the attack, since we may make it wherever ever we please, and effectually dodge any land-force they might a.s.semble in any one or two parts to oppose us. We may then carry the war into the quarter most convenient; and most safe for us, if we should ever have the whole navigation of the lakes so far at our disposal, as to prevent their constructing any material number vessels to dispute it with us. Thus we can penetrate into the heart of any of their colonies, that may best suit us, especially with the concurrent aid of the savages, whom we have found means to attach so strongly to us, and on whom we can greatly depend for the effectual harra.s.sment of, especially, the back-plantations of the English.

You see then, Sir, by this summary sketch of the points in contest, that the war being once engaged, it will not be so easy a matter as many in Europe imagine, to adjust the pretensions, so various and so important, of the respective nations, so as to be able to procure a peace. Some, of the points appear to me absolutely _untreatable_. You may observe too, that I do not so much as touch upon the dispute about Tabago, Santa-Lucia, or any of the Leeward islands, which are not, however, of small consequence. In short, the war must, in all human probability, be a much longer one, than is commonly believed. Neither nation can materially relax of its claims, without such a thorough sacrifice of its interest in America, as nothing but the last extremities of weakness can compel.

Long as this letter is, I cannot yet close it without mentioning to you a singular phenomenon of nature, in the island of St. John. You know it is a flat, level island, chiefly formed out of the congestion of sand and soil from the sea. Tradition, experience, and authentic public acts (_Proces verbaux_) concur to attest that every seven years, it is visited by swarms either of locusts, or of field-mice, alternately, never together; without its being possible to discover hitherto either the reason, or the origin of these two species, which thus in their turns, at the end of every seventh year, pour out all of a sudden in amazing numbers, and having committed their ravages on all the fruits of the earth, precipitate themselves into the sea. Neither has any preventive remedy for this evil been yet discovered. It is well known how they perish, but, once more, how they are produced no one, that I could learn, has as yet been able to trace. The field-mice are undoubtedly something in the nature of those swarms of the sable-mice, that sometimes over-run Lapland and Norway, though I do not know that these return so regularly, and at such stated periods, as those of this island.

I am, Sir,

Your most obedient,

Humble servant.

CHARACTER

OF THE

SAVAGES of NORTH-AMERICA,

EXTRACTED FROM

A LETTER of the Father CHARLEVOIX,

TO

A LADY of Distinction,

To give you, Madam, a summary sketch of the character of the savages in this country, I am to observe to you, that under a savage appearance, with manners and customs, that favor entirely of barbarism, may be found a society exempt from almost all the faults that so often vitiate the happiness of ours.

They appear to be without pa.s.sion, but they are in cold blood, and sometimes even from principle, all that the most violent and most unbridled pa.s.sion can inspire into those, who no longer listen to reason.

They seem to lead the most miserable of lives, and they are, perhaps, the only happy of the earth. At least those of them are still so, amongst whom the knowledge of those objects that disturb and seduce us, has not yet penetrated, or awakened in them, those pernicious desires which their ignorance kept happily dormant: it has not, however, hitherto made great ravages amongst them.

There may be perceived a mixture in them of the most ferocious and the most gentle manners; of the faults reproachable to the carnivorous beasts, with those virtues and qualities of the head and heart, that do the most honor to human-kind.

One would, at first, imagine, that they had no sort of form of government, that they knew no laws nor subordination, and that living in an entire independence, they suffered themselves to be entirely guided by chance, or by the most wild, untamed caprice: yet they enjoy almost all the advantages, which a well-regulated authority can procure to the most civilized nations. Born free and independent, they hold in horror the very shadow of despotic power; but they rarely swerve from certain principles and customs, founded upon good-sense, which stand them in the stead of laws, and supplement in some sort to their want of legal authority. All constraint mocks them; but reason alone hold them in a kind of subordination, which, for its being voluntary, does not the less answer the proposed end.

A man, whom they should greatly esteem, would find them tractable and ductile enough, and might very nearly make them do any thing he had a mind they should; but it is not easy to gain their esteem to such a point. They grant it only to merit, and that merit a very superior one, of which they are as good judges as those, who, amongst us, value themselves the most upon being so. They are, especially, apt to be taken with physiognomy; and there are not in the world, perhaps, men who are greater _connoisseurs_ in it: and that is, because they have for no man whatever, any of those respects that prejudice or impose on us, and that studying only nature, they understand it well. As they are not slaves to ambition or interest, those two pa.s.sions that have chiefly cancelled in us that sentiment of humanity, which the author of nature had engraved in our hearts; the inequality of conditions is not necessary to them, for the support of society.

There are not therefore, Madam, to be seen amongst them, or at least, are rarely to be met with, those arrogant haughty characters, who, full of themselves of their greatness, or their merit, look on themselves almost as a species a-part, and disdain the rest of mankind, of whom consequently they can never have the confidence or love. Their equals these rarely know any thing of, because the jealousy that reigns amongst the great, hinders them from being intimate enough with one another.

Neither do they know themselves, from their never studying themselves, and from their constant self-flattery. They never reflect, that to gain admission into the hearts of men, they must make themselves their equals; so that with this pretended superiority of enlightened understanding, which they look on as an essential property of the rank they hold, the most part of them live groveling in a proud and incurable ignorance of all that it would be the most important for them to know, and never enjoy the true sweets of life.

In all this how wretchedly different from the savages! In this country, all the men esteem themselves equally men; and in man, what they most esteem is, the man. No distinction of birth; no prerogative attributed to rank, to the prejudice of the other free members of society; no pre-eminence annexed to merit that can inspire pride, or make others feel too much their inferiority. There is, perhaps, less delicacy in their sentiments than amongst us, but surely more uprightness; less ceremony; less of all that can form a dubious character; less of the temptations or illusions or self-love.

Religion only can perfect these people in what is good in them, and correct what bad. This indeed is not peculiar to them, but what is so, is, that they bring with them fewer obstacles to religious devotion when once they have begun to believe, which can only be the effect of a special grace. It is also true, that to establish firmly the empire of religion over them, it would be necessary that they should see it practised in all its purity by those who profess it. They are extremely susceptible of the scandal given by bad Christians, as are all those who are, for the first time, instructed in the principles of the Gospel-morality.

You will perhaps ask me, Madam, if they have a religion? To this I answer, that it cannot be said they have not one, though it is difficult to give a definition of what it is. I shall sometime or other, take occasion to enter into more particulars on this head. This letter, like most of the others that have preceded it, prove sufficiently that I do not pretend to write to you methodically.

I shall then now only content myself with adding, by way of finis.h.i.+ng, to this picture of the savages, that even in their most indifferent actions, may be perceived the traces of the primitive natural religion, but which escape those who do not study them enough, because they are yet more defaced by the want of instruction, [This want of instruction is wretchedly supplemented amongst the savage-converts to the Popish religion, by that superst.i.tious wors.h.i.+p, and those fabulous traditions, its missionaries have introduced amongst them, and which must be only the more execrable, for their being a superstructure on so fair a foundation as that of the truths of the Gospel. At least, the savages, in their genuine unsophisticated state, have no such base, absurd, derogatory ideas of the Deity, as are implied by the doctrines of transubstantiation, purgatory, absolution, and the like fictions in the Romish church, which have been the more than mines of Mexico and Peru, of its clergy.] than adulterated by the mixture of a superst.i.tious wors.h.i.+p, and by fabulous traditions.

_FINIS._