Sebastian Rale-A Maine Tragedy of the Eighteenth Century: EXTRACTS FROM RALE'S LETTER TO HIS BROTHER Page 104-116 John Francis Sprague Boston, Mass. Printed by the Heintzemann Press 1906 EXTRACTS FROM RALE's LETTER TO HIS BROTHER "At Nanrantsouak, this 12th day of October 1723. Monsieur and very dear brother: "The peace of our Lord: "I can no longer refuse the kind requests which you make me in all your letters, to inform you a little in detail of my occupations and of the character of the Savage nations, in the midst of which Providence has placed me for so many years. I do it the more willingly, because in conforming in this regard to wishes so urgent on your part 1 satisfy yet more your affection and curiosity. It was the 23 day of July of the year 1689 that I embarked at Rochelle ; and after three months of a pleasant enough voyage, I arrived at Quebec the 13th of October of the same year. I applied myself at first to learning the language of our Savages. This is difficult; because it is not sufficient to study the terms and their sig- nification and to make a collection of words and phrases, it is still necessary to know the turn and the arrangement which the savages give them, which one hardly acquires except by in- tercourse and association with these people. "I went then to dwell in a village with the Abnaki nation, situated in a forest, which is only three leagues from Quebec. This was inhabited by two hundred savages nearly all Christians. Their cabins were arranged a little like the houses in the towns ; an inclosure of stakes, thick and high, form a kind of wall which shel- ters them from the incursions of their enemies. "Their cabins are very soon set up ; they plant poles which they join at the top; and they cover them with great sheets of bark. The fire is made in the middle of the cabin; they spread all round rush mats, on which they sit during the day ; and take their repose during the night. "The clothing of the men consists of a cas- sock of skin, or else of a piece of red or blue stuff. That of the women is a blanket; which hangs from the neck quite to the middle of the legs and which they adjust quite properly. They put another blanket on the head, which descends even to the feet and which serves them for a cloak. Their stockings extend only from the knee to the ankle. Socks made of elk's hide and lined inside with hair or wool serve them in place of shoes. This sock is absolutely neces- sary to them in order to be adjusted to the snowshoes, by means of which they walk upon the snow. These snow-shoes are made lozenge shape, are more than two feet long and a foot and a half wide. I did not believe that I could ever walk with such machines; when I made a trial of them I soon found it so easy that the savages could not believe that it was the first time that I had made use of them. The inven- tion of these snow-shoes is of great use to these savages not only to travel on the snow, with which the ground is covered a great part of the year, but also to go in pursuit of beasts and above all of the moose; these animals, larger than the largest oxen of France, walk only with difficulty upon the snow; thus it is not difficult for the savages to overtake them, and they often kill them with a common knife attached to the end of a stick, they feed upon their flesh and after having well dressed their skins in which they are skillful they trade them with French and English who give them in exchange cas- socks, blankets, kettles, guns, hatchets and knives. "To give you an idea of a savage, picture to yourself a large man strong, agile, of a swarthy tint, without beard, with black hair, and whose teeth are whiter than ivory. If you wish to see him in his acoutrements you will only find for his whole adornment what is called beads; this is a kind of shell or stone which they fashion into the form of little grains, some white and others black, and which they string in such a manner, that they represent divers very regular figures which are agreeable to them. It is with this bead that our Savages knot and plait their hair above their ears and behind, make collars, garters, belts, five or six inches wide and with this sort of ornaments they estimate themselves a great deal more than a European does with all his gold and his jewels. " The occupation of the men is hunting or war, that of the women is to remain in the vil- lage and to make there out of bark baskets, bags, boxes, dishes, plates, etc. They sew the bark with roots and make of them various uten- sils very appropriately wrought, the canoes are likewise made solely of bark, but the largest can scarcely hold more than six or seven persons. " It is with these canoes made of a bark which has hardly the thickness of a crown, that they cross the arms of the sea, and that they navi- gate the most dangerous rivers and lakes of four or five hundred leagues around. I have thus made many voyages without having run any risk. Only once, that in crossing the river Saint Lawrence, I found myself suddenly sur- rounded with masses of ice of enormous size, and the canoe was wedged in them ; at once the two savages who conducted me cried out, 'We are dead men; it is done; we must perish,' in the meantime, making an effort, they leaped upon the floating ice. I did like them, and after having drawn up the canoe we carried it to the extremity of this ice. Then it was necessary for us to place ourselves again in the canoe to gain another ice cake; we arrived at last at the bank of the stream without other in- convenience than being very wet and numb with cold. Nothing equals the affection which the savages have for their children. As soon as they are born, they place them on a little piece of board covered with cloth and a little bearskin) in which they envelop them, and this is their cradle. The mothers carry them on their back in a manner convenient for the chil- dren and for them. Hardly do the children begin to walk when they are trained to draw the bow. They become so adroit in this, that at the age of ten or twelve years they do not fail to kill the bird that they shoot at. I have been surprised at it, and I should have hardly believed it if I had not been witness of it. That which I most revolted at when I be- gan to live with the savages was to find myself obliged to take my repast with them; nothing is more disgusting. After having filled their pot with meat they make it boil, at the most, three-quarters of an hour, after which they take it from the fire, serve it in bark porringers and divide it with all those who are in the cabin. Each one bites into his meat as he would into a piece of bread. This spectacle did not give me much appetite, and they very soon noticed my repugnance. I Why dost thou not eat? ' they asked. I replied to them that I was not accustomed to eat meat thus, without adding to it a piece of bread. ' It is necessary to conquer thyself,' they replied; 'is it so difficult as to be a patriarch who knows prayer perfectly ? We overcome a great deal to believe that which we cannot see.' After this there was no more to consider. It was best to bring one's self to their manners and customs in order to merit their confidence and gain them to Jesus Christ. "Their meals are not regular as in Europe. They live from hand to mouth; whilst they have somewhat from which to make good cheer, they profit by it, without troubling themselves about having anything to live on the following days. "They passionately love tobacco; men, wo- men, children smoke almost continually. To give them a piece of tobacco, is to give them more pleasure than to give them their weight in gold. "In the beginning of June, and when the snow is nearly all melted, they sow the scamgar. This is what we call Turkey or Indian wheat. Their style of sowing is to make with the fingers or with a little stick, different holes in the ground, and to throw in each eight or nine kernels, which they cover with the same earth which they have withdrawn to make the hole. Their harvest takes place at the end of August. " It is in the midst of these people, who pass for the least coarse of our savages, that I passed the apprenticeship of a missionary. My prin- cipal occupation was the study of their tongue; it is very difficult to learn, above all when one has no other master than savages. They have many sounds which they only utter from the throat, without making any movement of the lips; ou, for example, is of this number, and this is why in writing it, we make it by the figure 8, to distinguish it from other sounds. I passed a part of a year in their cabins and heard them talk. It was necessary for me to maintain extreme attention, to gather what they said, and to conjecture the signification of it. Sometimes I guessed right, more often I de- cieved myself, because not very able to man- age their guttural letters. I repeated only part of the word, and this made them laugh. At last, after five months of continual application, I reached the point of understanding all their terms, but that was not sufficient for me to ex- press myself according to their taste. I had still a good way to go to catch the scope and genius of their tongue, which is altogether dif- ferent from the genius and scope of our Euro- pean languages. To shorten the time and to put myself sooner in a state to exercise my functions, I made choice of some savages who had more wit and spoke better. I told them roughly some articles of the catechism, and they rendered them to me in all the delicacy of their language. I put them at once on paper, and by this means I made myself in a little while a dictionary and a catechism which con tained the principles and the mysteries of re- ligion. " One cannot deny that the language of the savages has true beauties, and I know not what of energy, in the turn and manner in which they express themselves. I am going to give you an example of it. If I should ask you, Why has God created you? You would re- ply to me, that it is to know him, to love him, and by this means to merit eternal glory. But should I put the same question to a savage, he would reply to me thus, in the terms of his lan- guage : The great Spirit has thought of us: Let them know me, let them love me, let them honor me, and let them obey me; for then I shall make them enter into my glorious felicity. If I should wish to tell you in their style that you would have much difficulty in learning the savage tongue, see how it would be necessary for me to express myself: I think of you my dear brother, that he will find difficulty in learn- ing the savage tongue. The language of the Hurons is the master language of the savages ; and when one possesses it, in less than three months one can make himself understood by the five Iroquois nations. It is the most ma- jestic and the most difficult of all the savage tongues. This difficulty does not come alone from their guttural character, but still more from the diversity of accents, because two words com- posed of the same characters have significations quite different. Father Chaumont, who has dwelt fifty years among the Hurons, has com- posed a grammar of it, which is very useful to those who newly arrive in that mission ; never- theless a missionary is most happy when, with those helps, after ten years' constant labor, he expresses himself elegantly in this language... " This mission is about eight leagues from Pentagouet, and they count it a hundred leagues from Pentagouet to Port Royal. The river of my mission is the greatest of all those which water the lands of the savages. It should be marked on the chart, under the name of Kini- beki ; which has brought the French to give to these savages the name of kanibals. This river empties into the sea at Sankderank, which is only five or six leagues from Pemquit. After having ascended forty leagues from Sankderank, one arrives at my village which is on the height of a point of land. We are only the distance of two days at the most from the English habi- tation ; it takes more than fifteen days for us to reach Quebec, and the journey is very painful and difficult. It would be natural that our sav- ages should do their trading with the English, and there are no advantages which the latter have not offered them to attract and to gain their friendship ; but all their efforts have been useless, and nothing has been able to detach them from alliance with the French. The only tie which has so closely united us with them is their firm attachment to the Catholic faith. They are convinced that if they gave them- selves up to the English, they would very soon find themselves without a missionary, without sacrifice, without a sacrament, and nearly with- out any exercise of religion, and that little by little they would be plunged into their first in- fidelity. This firmness of our savages has been put to all sorts of tests on the part of their powerful neighbors, without their ever having been able to gain anything. . . . " It is only in the spring that they sow their corn, and they only give it the last hoeing to- wards Corpus Christi Day. After which they deliberate as to what place on the sea they shall go to seek something to live upon till the har- vest, which is not ordinarily made until a little after the Assumption. After having deliberated they send to pray me to repair to their as- sembly. As soon as I have arrived there, one of them speaks to me thus in the name of all the others: ' Our Father, what I say to thee is what all of those whom thou seest here would say to thee. Thou knowest us, thou knowest that we want food; scarcely have we been able to give the last hoeing to our fields, and we have no other resource until the harvest, but to go and seek food on the shore of the sea. It will be hard for us to abandon our prayer; that is why we hope that thou wilt accompany us, so that in seeking something to live upon we shall not interrupt our prayer. Such and such persons will embark thee, and that which thou wilt have to carry will be dispersed among the other canoes. That is what I have to say to thee.' I have no sooner replied to them Kekik- berba (this is a savage term which means, I hear you, my children, I agree to what you demand), then all cry together ouriourie, which is an ex- pression of thanks. Immediately after they leave the village." - (c) 1998 Courtesy of the Androscoggin Historical Society & Somerset County Maine US Gen Web Project ************************************************* NOTICE: Printing the files within by noncommercial individuals and libraries is encouraged, as long as all notices and submitter information is included. 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