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Condition of the inhabitants of Canada part 1 · Canadian Scenery

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Section sixteen of Canadian Scenery, Volume one. This is a LibriVox recording.
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All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer,
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please visit LibriVox dot org. Canadian Scenery, Volume one by Nathaniel Parker
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willis Condition of the Inhabitants of Canada, Part one. We have now brought
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the historical part of our labors to a close and proceed to what is more
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interesting to the general reader, the social and moral condition of this interesting people.
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The inhabitants of Canada are divided into three classes, among which no complete
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amalgamation has yet been formed. These are the original French colonists commonly called Abitin,
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the British settlers, and the Indian tribes. The Abitin, at the
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time of the conquest formed almost the whole of the European population. They had
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occupied the best lands along the banks of the Saint Lawrence between Quebec and Montreal,
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a considerable extent of those upon the Richelieu, and a small space on
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the chadierg, the Yamasca, the Saint Maurice and other tributaries of the Great
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River, as well as a detached settlement on the fertile shores of the Detroit.
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These tracts had been granted to persons of distinction and to favorites, usually
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in large blocks, which has already stated, they held under the title of
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seigneur, but it accorded not with their habits to clear and cultivate for themselves
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ground covered with an unbroken forest, nor would the task be undertaken by farmers
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on the terms of an ordinary lease. The proprietors were therefore obliged to make
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them over in small lots under the feudal title of feasts to hard working men,
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who, on receiving this permanent interest, were willing to encounter the toil.
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The annual payment or quit rent is in general exceedingly small, amounting on
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some properties only to ten shillings a year. With the bushel of wheat and
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two fowls. The seigneur has, besides certain feudal claims, a tithe on
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fish mill dews, and more especially payments on sale or transference, which in
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some cases amount to a fifth of the purchase money. The occupants of these
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fiefs or farms under the burdens now specified are virtual proprietors of the soil which
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they cultivate with their own hands, aided by their families. They are described
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as a particularly contented, industrious, and amiable race of people, and the
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lots, though much subdivided in the course of succession, are still sufficient to
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maintain them in simple plenty. They till their land with diligence, though without
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skill, having scarcely adopted any of the modern improvements. Their study is to
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produce from the farm everything they need, not only the whole of their food,
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but their candles, soap, and even sugar from flacks of their own
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raising, too, and the wool of their own sheep. They are unable
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to manufacture almost every article of clothing. Their houses, though generally built of
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wood and only one story high, are whitewashed and tolerably commodious. A partition
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in the middle separates the kitchen from the principal apartment, at one end of
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which are the bedrooms. There is a garden, which, though in somewhat
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rude and straggling state and cultivated by the females, only yields a comfortable supply
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of the more common fruits and vegetables. The personal appearance of the abitum is
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peculiar. They are tall, thin and from exposure to the climate. Almost
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as dark as the Indians. They have thin lips and often aquiline noses,
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with small, dark and lively eyes. Many of the girls are pretty,
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oval faced brunettes, with fine eyes, good teeth and glossy locks. The
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dress is nearly after the old fashion of the French peasantry. The men wear
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the capau, a large gray coat or surtout covering nearly the whole body and
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tied with a girdle of brilliant colors. On the legs. They have moccasins
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and on the head a straw hat in summer and a red bonnet in winter.
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The hair is still tied in a long queue behind. The women wear
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short jackets, are bed gowns, mantelets with petticoats distinct and sometimes of a
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different color, and caps instead of bonnets, a mode of dress formerly common
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in Scotland and not yet wholly disused. They have long waists and sometimes the
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hair tied behind. In a large club at church or other occasions of full
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dress, they adopt the English fashion, but display a much greater variety of
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showy colors. Hair powder is sometimes worn, and beetroot employed as rouge,
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but both in their dress and houses. They are perfectly clean. The Abitat
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are frugal and moderate in their ordinary diet, which mostly consists of different kinds
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of soup. They have, however, their jous gras, or great feast
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days, particularly before and after Lent, when large companies assemble and the board
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is spread with every delicacy which their larder can afford. The table groans beneath
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immense turkey pies, huge joints of beef, mutton and pork, followed by
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a profusion of fruit puddings. Extraordinary justice is said to be done to these
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vians, as well as to the rum which follows. But the younger members
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of the company are soon roused by the sound of the violin, and the
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dancing of which they are passionately fond, engages them till a late hour.
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Weddings, above all, are celebrated by a mighty concourse of friends and acquaintances,
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twenty or thirty of the country characters bringing parties to witness the ceremony,
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which is followed by feasts and dances, not unfrequently prolonged for several days.
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The young people, however, have a somewhat rude method of expressing their opinion
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of an unequal union, especially if arising from the relative age of the parties.
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They assemble at night in large bodies, sounding various discordant instruments horns,
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drums, bells, kettles, accompanied by loud shouts, and a contribution to
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the church or some charitable purpose is indispensable to obtain a respite from this jocular
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persecution. The short summer is necessarily spent in almost unred emitting labor, but
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when ice and snow have covered the ground, the gay season begins, and
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in their carryoles are little chaise on steel runners which pass swiftly over the frozen
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surface. They visit their neighbors and spend much time in social intercourse. The
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Canadian French, like their forefathers, profess the Roman Catholic religion with much zeal
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and in a manner which occasionally approaches superstition. The roads are marked by crosses
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erected at the side. Their houses are filled with little pictures of the Madonna
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and child, waxen images of saints and of the Crucifixion, and there is
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a profuse expenditure of holy water and candles. They reluctantly establish their dwelling beyond
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hearing of the church bells, and on Sundays the attendants is crowded. They
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have, however, those inadequate notions as to the sanctity of that day,
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which are general in Catholic countries. When worship is over, the remainder is
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devoted without reserve to amusements. Sunday, it is said, is to them
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their day of gaiety. There is then an assemblage of friends and relations.
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The parish church collects together all whom they know and with whom they have relations
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of business or pleasure. The young and old men and women, clad in
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their best garments, riding their best horses, driving in their gayest callege,
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meet there for purposes of business, love, and pleasure. The young abitante,
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decked out in his most splendid finery, makes his court to the maiden,
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whom he singled out as the object of his affections. The maiden,
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exhibiting in her adornment every color of the rainbow, there hopes to meet her.
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Chevalier. The bold rider descants upon and gives evidence of the merits of
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his unrivaled pacer. And in winter the powers of the various horses are tried
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in sleigh or carry all racing in short, Sunday is the ground fete.
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Even the violin and the dance in the evening are not considered unsuitable. Notwithstanding
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these customs, the religious spirit of the Canadians appears sincere and is attended with
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great benefits. Their general conduct is inoffensive and praiseworthy. Crimes of an atrocious
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description as murder and violent assaults upon the person scarcely ever occur. Property is
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perfectly safe, both from the thief and the robber. The doors of the
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houses stand open, and all sorts of goods are exposed without any precaution.
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They scarcely ever engage in those furious personal conflicts which among the Americans of English
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descent are often carried on with such violence. They know neither dueling, boxing,
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or gouging. On the contrary, they mutually treat each other with all
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the ceremonious politeness of the French school. One of the first things taught to
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a child is to speak decorously, to bow or courtesy to its elders or
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to strangers. This politeness is not accompanied with any degree of insincerity or servility,
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above which last they are completely raised by their independent situation. They are
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said to be generous in relieving those in distress, liberal and courteous to all
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who have any claim on their hospitality. The custom of parants and children living
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together, often to the third generation in the same house, marks a mild
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and friendly temper. The only form under which hostile passions are vented is that
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of litigation, to which they are immoderately addicted, being favored by the comparative
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cheapness of law. Monsieur Bouchette defends this as securing them from violent and turbulent
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modes of terminating their differences. They abitat are not a stirring, enterprising,
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or improving race. They tread in the steps of their forefathers, following the
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same routine, and with difficulty adopting the most obvious improvements of modern husbandry.
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Although extensive tracts lie in their immediate neighborhood, unoccupied, they resign them to
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the English and Americans, and have scarcely at all extended the range of their
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original settlement. Even their amiable qualities tend to retain them in this stationary condition,
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to which we may add their social disposition, their attachment to their kindred,
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their church, and the rights of their religion. They feel as if
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in leaving these things they would leave all. Their range of information has hitherto
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been very limited, and their priests, it has been alleged, by no
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means, favored, the diffusion among them even of the first elements of education,
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so that the majority of the adults cannot even read or write. But
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the legislature have lately made great exertions to improve them in this respect, and
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it is hoped that the rising generation will be more enlightened. The society in
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Upper Canada, with the exception of the small French settlement at Detroit, presents
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a very different aspect. A great majority of the inhabitants consists of emigrants recently
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arrived from Ireland, Scotland and England, who have not yet made much change
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in their original ideas and habits. Those established at successive periods during the previous
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half century are not represented by mister Howis and mister Talbot and other writers.
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Under a very favorable light, the tone, especially in the western districts,
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appears to have been in a great measure given by such Americans as came from
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the civilized portions of the Union, but from the backwood tracts breathing rather the
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spirit of Kentucky than of New England. Disbanded soldiers and sailors were not well
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calculated to improve the breed, and even the voluntary emigrants were not always composed
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of the respectable classes, who, under the pressure of the times, have
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lately embraced this resource. The removal of the ordinary restraints of society and the
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absence of religious coordinances and ministration concurred in giving to them a reckless and unprincipled
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character. Intoxication, encouraged by the cheapness of spirits, is indulged to a
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lamentable degree, and is often productive of general ill conduct and ruin. Little
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regard is paid to the sabbath and other sacred institutions, and the ear of
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the stranger is wounded not only by abuse of language, but by swearing to
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an odious and disgusting degree. Pugilistic contests are carried on with a violence rivaling
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those of Kentucky, and have not always been unaccompanied by the savage practice of
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gouging. Mister Talbot, though he admits that he met with many respectable females,
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charges a large proportion of the sex with a disregard and even insensibility to
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their first duties. Although a spry lass, as she is termed, is
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certain of repeated offers and is sure of being early united in the bonds of
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matrimony, she may frequently, before that event, have given birth to one
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or two children. Our author was in company with a lady who volunteered to
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the company the information that her betty had been two years old at her marriage.
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The correcter feelings on this subject of females from the old country are condemned
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as ridiculous. Nay, where so little delicacy prevails, and the children are
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so valuable a possession that bringing two or three into the world in this irregular
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manner, instead of being a bar to marriage, proves, it is said,
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an additional attraction by making the young lady a species of heiress. After
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marriage, she makes an active and industrious wife, but expect from her husband
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much difference, and even that he should wink at occasional frailties. These faults
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are described by mister Goolay as rapidly disappearing, though mister Talbot and even mister
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Chirriff found them still too prevalent. But the increased means of instruction and the
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example of respectable emigrants, will, it may be hoped, gradually effect a
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thorough reform. No people in the world live better than the inhabitants of Upper
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Canada. The abundance of produce and the low price at which it can be
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sold naturally inclines them to take the full use of it. Three copious meals,
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often of twelve or fourteen dishes each, are daily served up, called
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breakfast, dinner, and supper, but consisting generally of the same component parts,
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among which are specially enumerated green tea, fried pork, honeycomb, salted
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salmon, pound cake, pickled cucumbers, stewed chickens, apple tarts, maple
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molasses, peas pudding, gingerbread, and sauer kraut. They are not very
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social in their daily habits, to which indeed the almost impassable state of the
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roads opposes great obstacles. But they are fond of large parties, and in
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a favorable season, five or six families often unite and without any notice drive
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to visit another at the distance of ten or twelve miles. Such an arrival
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would not always be very opportune in an English household, but in this land
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of plenty, the flower barrel, the pork tub, and the fowl house
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afford at all times materials for meeting such an emergency, and the board is
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soon spread with a plentiful meal. The dance is an amusement of which they
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are passionately fond. No inn is considered worthy of the name unless it be
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provided with a spacious ball room, which is called into requisition as often as
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convenience will permit. Intellectual recreations have not hitherto attracted all the attention which they
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merit. Mister Talbot, during a residence of five years, never saw above
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two individuals with books in their hands, and in one case it was a
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medical time treatise consulted for health. The sources of improvement already enumerated, however,
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have already made a great impression, and will we doubt not ere long
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wipe off this reproach from the Canadian people. There remains, yet undescribed,
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a small but interesting portion the remnant of the Indian nations. It has appeared
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mysterious how tribes, once so powerful without war or bloodshed, should have silently
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disappeared, and only a handful survive the occupation of their hunting grounds by European
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settlers. The introduction of destructive diseases, particularly smallpox, and the free use
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of intoxicating liquors, have no doubt materially thinned their numbers. Our researches,
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however, have led us to suspect that the diminution has not been nearly so
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great as is supposed, In other words, that the original numbers were much
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exaggerated. We have had occasion to observe that the Iroquois, the most powerful
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people in America and occupying a territory extending several hundred miles in every direction,
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were not estimated by the French to include more than three thousand warriors. Yet
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they enjoyed a better climate and were not so entirely ignorant of cultivation as the
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tribes northward of the Saint Lawrence. The Indians under British protection are dispersed in
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small villages and settlements in different parts of Upper and Lower Canada. The charge
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made by mister MacGregor that they have not been kindly treated by our government seems
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scarcely well founded, for not only do they remain peaceably under her sway,
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but they have repeatedly taken up arms in her cause against the Big knives,
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as they termed the Americans, in consideration of their services and in compensation for
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the encroachments made on their domain. Each individual, on repairing to a fixed
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station, receives a certain amount of goods as an annual present, and this
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grant affords the means of estimating the number residing within the provinces. In Lower
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Canada in eighteen twenty eight it amounted to two thousand, nine hundred and twenty
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two, exclusive of about four hundred fifty micmah or one tribes from Nova Scotia
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and New Brunswick. The number in Upper Canada, to whom about the same
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time donations were made was twelve thousand, nine hundred and nineteen, making in
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the two provinces fifteen thousand, eight hundred and forty one. The estimate thus
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obtained, however, is not quite so accurate as could be wished. Several
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thousands came from beyond the Western frontier, a distance in some cases of four
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or five hundred miles, and even from the territory of the United States.
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But in consequence of the signal services rendered by them during the last War,
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pledges had been given which Britain must now fulfill. On the other hand,
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in the immense forest territory which the hand of cultivation has not yet approached,
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there are doubtless very considerable numbers who retain their wild independence and hold no relation
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whatever with Europeans. We may notice, in particular the vast tracts to the
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east and north of Quebec, whence no mention is made of any resort to
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the stations of distribution. The Indians of Lower Canada to have been converted to
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the Catholic religion, and their spiritual concerns are superintendent by five missionaries, who
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receive salaries from forty pounds to seventy pounds per annum. They appear much attached
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to these instructors, and show a deep sense of their religious duties. Yet
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they have admitted scarcely any change in their original habits or made any progress in
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industry. Their husbandry, as formerly, is on a small scale of the
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rudest description, and carried on entirely by women and old men. The Indian
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tribes, said the late Lord Dalhousie, continue to be warlike in their ideas
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and recollections, insignificant, as are some of the tribes now in Lower Canada,
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civilized and accustomed to social life. There is not one of them that
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does not boast of the warlike days of their chiefs and warriors. Even now,
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the word warrior is assumed by every young man. He's trained up to
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it, and has a higher idea of the approbation of his chief or the
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consideration of white men in that character of an active hunter or warrior, than
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he has of any other object or use of his existence. The missionaries,
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though they execute their spiritual functions with zeal and diligence, not only take no
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pains to instruct them in reading or writing, but effectually oppose any efforts for
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that purpose, at least when made by Protestant teachers. We even suspect that
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they indulge, rather than check, the warlike spirit of their flocks, since
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it appears that on the annual religious festival called the cont Feed de Dieu,
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the Indians are in the habit of marching to church in military order, headed
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by their chiefs, bearing arms, and amid the music of drums and fifes.
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A few miles northward from Quebec is the Huron settlement of Loreto, consisting
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of sixty seven men, sixty five women, and forty seven children. This
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poor remnant of a race once so powerful, holding only forty acres of land,
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derive a precarious subsistence from hunting, fishing, and some trifling articles made
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by their females. They recently preferred a claim to the fief of Sillery,
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a fine tract extending a league along the Saint Lawrence near Quebec, in virtue
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of a grant made to their ancestors in sixteen fifty one, the case being
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brought before the courts, it was argued by the Crown lawyers that the grant
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had been made to the Jesuits in general terms, for the purpose of assembling
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the wandering nations of New France and instructing them in the Christian religion. That
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in sixteen ninety nine these missionaries, representing that the Indians had quitted the spot
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on account of the soil being exhausted, requested and obtained a grant of it
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for themselves, and that it remained in their possession till the extinction of their
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order. In eighteen hundred, when it devolved on the British government. On
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these grounds, the judges decided against the Hurons. We cannot help referring,
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however, to certain facts in our historical narrative founded on authorities which we inclined
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to believe were unknown to either party in this contest. It there appears that
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the grant immediately followed the destruction of the Huron nation by the Iroquois, when
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the Jesuits, as the only means of saving the remnant of the tribe,
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removed to Quebec. The date and the name of the principal settlement seemed to
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show that, however general the terms may have been, the grant was made
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virtually for the benefit of these unfortunate fugitives, and to the Jesuits only as
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their trustees. If this be admitted, we know not how far their quitting
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it at one time for another spot without any formal relinquishment could be considered as
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vacating their title. On the loss of their cause, they sent two deputies
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to London, who very earnestly solicited an interview with their great father. Sir
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George Murray evaded this demand but received them kindly, and though he could not
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reopen a legal decision, offered them grants of crown lands in other quarters.
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But they replied that an arrangement which would separate them and require a complete change
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in their mode of life could not be felt by them as any real advantage.
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In the vicinity of three rivers are eighty two Olgonkins, and near Saint
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Francis and Bissauco. On the opposite side three hundred and fifty nine Abenaki.
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These tribes inhabit rude villages composed of very poor bark huts, though somewhat better
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than the ordinary wigwams. They once possessed a considerable extent of land, the
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greater part of which has been wrested from them under various pretenses by designing individuals.
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And to prevent such frauds, it is proposed that no alienation of property
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by these untaught tribes shall be held valid until it has been sanctioned by government.
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Farther down the river are three settlements of Iroquois, one at Sioux,
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Saint Louis and Cognawaka, amounting to nine hundred and sixty seven, another at
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Saint Regis of three hundred and forty eight, and a third of two hundred
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and eighty two at the Lake of the two Mountains. This tribe, once
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powerful and even intelligent, are now indolent, wretched, and despised by their
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own countrymen. Those of Sioux Saint Louis possess some land, though from mismanagement
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it produces little, and a late claim for an addition, founded on minute
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boundary questions was fruitless, though they also sent two deputies to London to enforce
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it. At the Lake of the Two Mountains are likewise three hundred and fifty
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five Algonkins and two hundred and fifty Nipissings. These have no land to cultivate,
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but by their activity in hunting and supplying Europeans with furs, they have
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placed themselves in a more comfortable condition than any other Indians in Lower Canada.
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They complain, much, however, of the extended colonization on the Ottawa,
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by which their hunting grounds are greatly narrowed. End of Section sixteen, read
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by Sandra near Montreal, twenty twenty three.