Cameron of Lochiel
"It happened one day that my late father, who is now dead, had left the
city for home somewhat late. He had even diverted himself a little, so
to speak, with his acquaintances in Point Lévis. Like an honest man, he
loved his drop; and on his journeys he always carried a flask of brandy
in his dogfish-skin satchel. They say the liquor is the milk for old
men."
"_Lac dulce_," interjected Archie, sententiously.
"Begging your pardon, Mr. Archie," answered José, with some warmth, "it
was neither _sweet water_ (_de l'eau_ _douce_) nor _lake-water_ (_eau
de lac_), but very good, unadulterated brandy which my late father, now
dead, was carrying in his satchel."
"Capital, upon my word!" cried Jules. "It serves you right for your
perpetual Latin quotations!"
"I beg your pardon, José," said Lochiel, very seriously. "I intended
not the shadow of disrespect to your late father."
"You are excused, sir," said José, entirely mollified. "It happened
that it was quite dark when my father at last got under way. His
friends did their best to keep him all night, telling him that he would
have to pass, all by himself, the iron cage wherein _La Corriveau_ did
penance for having killed her husband.
"You saw it yourselves, gentlemen, when leaving Point Lévis at one
o'clock. She was quiet then in her cage, the wicked creature, with her
eyeless skull. But never you trust to her being blind. She is a cunning
one, you had better believe! If she can't see in the daytime, she knows
well enough how to find her way to torment poor folks at night. Well,
as for my late father, who was as brave as his captain's sword, he told
his friends that he didn't care--that he didn't owe _La Corriveau_ a
farthing--with a heap more reasons which I can not remember now. He put
the whip to his horse, a fine brute that could travel like the wind,
and was gone in a second.
"As he was passing the skeleton, he thought he heard a noise, a sort
of wailing; but, as a heavy southwest wind was blowing, he made up his
mind it was only the gale whistling through the bones of the corpse. It
gave him a kind of a start, nevertheless, and he took a good pull at
the flask to brace himself up. All things considered, however, as he
said to himself, Christians should be ready to help each other; perhaps
the poor creature was wanting his prayers. He took off his cap and
devoutly recited a _de profundis_ for her benefit, thinking that, if it
didn't do her any good, it could at least do her no harm, and that he
himself would be the better for it. Well, then he kept on as fast as he
could; but, for all that, he heard a queer sound behind him--tic-tac,
tic-tac, like a piece of iron striking on the stones. He thought it
was the tire of his wheel, or some piece of the wagon, that had come
unfastened. He got out to see, but found everything snug. He touched
the horse to make up for lost time, but after a little he heard again
that tic-tac, tic-tac, on the stones. Being brave, he didn't pay much
attention.
"When he got to the high ground of St. Michel, which we passed a little
way back, he grew very drowsy. 'After all,' said my late father, 'a
man is not a dog! let us take a little nap; we'll both be the better
for it, my horse and I.' Well, he unharnessed his horse, tied his legs
so he would not wander too far, and said: 'There, my pet, there's good
grass, and you can hear the brook yonder. Good-night.'
"As my late father crawled himself into the wagon to keep out of the
dew, it struck him to wonder what time it was. After studying the
'Three Kings' to the south'ard and the 'Wagon' to the north'ard, he
made up his mind it must be midnight. 'It is time,' said he, 'for
honest men to be in bed.'
"Suddenly, however, it seemed to him as if Isle d'Orléans was on fire.
He sprang over the ditch, leaned on the fence, opened his eyes wide,
and stared with all his might. He saw at last that the flames were
dancing up and down the shore, as if all the will-o'-the-wisps, all
the damned souls of Canada, were gathered there to hold the witches'
sabbath. He stared so hard that his eyes which had grown a little dim
grew very clear again, and he saw a curious sight; you would have said
they were a kind of men, a queer breed altogether. They had a head big
as a peck measure, topped off with a pointed cap a yard long; then they
had arms, legs, feet, and hands armed with long claws, but no body
to speak of. Their crotch, begging your pardon, gentlemen, was split
right up to their ears. They had scarcely anything in the way of flesh;
they were kind of all bone, like skeletons. Every one of these pretty
fellows had his upper lip split like a rabbit's, and through the split
stuck out a rhinoceros tusk a foot long, like you see, Mr. Archie, in
your book of unnatural history. As for the nose, it was nothing more
nor less, begging your pardon, than a long pig's snout, which they
would rub first on one side and then on the other of their great tusk,
perhaps to sharpen it. I almost forgot to say that they had a long
tail, twice as long as a cow's, which they used, I suppose, to keep off
the flies.
"The funniest thing of all was that there were but three eyes to every
couple of imps. Those that had but one eye, in the middle of the
forehead, like those Cyclopes that your uncle, who is a learned man,
Mr. Jules, used to read to us about out of that big book of his, all
Latin, like the priest's prayer-book, which he called his Virgil--those
that had but one eye held each by the claw two novices with the proper
number of eyes. Out of all these eyes spurted the flames which lit up
Isle d'Orléans like broad day. The novices seemed very respectful to
their companions, who were, as one might say, half blind; they bowed
down to them, they fawned upon them, they fluttered their arms and
legs, just like good Christians dancing the minuet.
"The eyes of my late father were fairly starting out of his head. It
was worse and worse when they began to jump and dance without moving
from their places, and to chant in a voice as hoarse as that of a
choking cow, this song:
"Hoary Frisker, Goblin gay,
Long-nosed Neighbor, come away!
Come my Grumbler in the mud,
Brother Frog of tainted blood!
Come, and on this juicy Christian
Let us feast it while we may!"
* * * * *
"'Ah! the accursed heathens,' exclaimed my late father, 'an honest
man can not be sure of his property for a moment! Not satisfied with
having stolen my favorite song, which I always keep to wind up with at
weddings and feasts, just see how they've played the devil with it! One
would hardly recognize it. It is Christians instead of good wine that
they are going to treat themselves to, the scoundrels!'
"Then the imps went on with their hellish song, glaring at my late
father, and curling their long snouts around their great rhinoceros
tusks:
"Come, my tricksy Traveler's Guide,
Devil's Minion true and tried.
Come, my Sucking-Pig, my Simple,
Brother Wart and Brother Pimple;
Here's a fat and juicy Frenchman
To be pickled, to be fried!"
* * * * *
"'All that I can say to you just now, my darlings,' cried my late
father, 'is that if you get no more fat to eat than what I'm going to
bring you on my lean carcass you'll hardly need to skim your broth.'
"The goblins, however, seemed to be expecting something, for they kept
turning their heads every moment. My late father looked in the same
direction. What was that he saw on the hill-side? A mighty devil, built
like the rest, but as long as the steeple St. Michel, which we passed
awhile back. Instead of the pointed bonnet, he wore a three-horned
hat, topped with a big thorn bush in place of a feather. He had but
one eye, blackguard that he was, but that was as good as a dozen. He
was doubtless the drum-major of the regiment, for he held in his hand
a saucepan twice as big as our maple-sugar kettles, which hold twenty
gallons, and in the other hand a bell-clapper, which no doubt the dog
of a heretic had stolen from some church before its consecration. He
pounded on his saucepan, and all the scoundrels began to laugh, to
jump, to flutter, nodding to my late father as if inviting him to come
and amuse himself with them.
"'You'll wait a long time, my lambs,' thought my late father to
himself, his teeth chattering in his head as if he had the shaking
fever--'you will wait a long time, my gentle lambs. I'm not in any
hurry to quit the good Lord's earth to live with the goblins!'
"Suddenly the tall devil began to sing a hellish round, accompanying
himself on the saucepan, which he beat furiously, and all the goblins
darted away like lightning--so fast, indeed, that it took them less
than a minute to go all the way around the island. My poor late father
was so stupefied by the hubbub that he could not remember more than
three verses of the song, which ran like this:
"Here's the spot that suits us well
When it gets too hot in hell--
Toura-loura;
Here we go all round,
Hands all round,
Here we go all round.
"Come along and stir your sticks,
You jolly dogs of heretics--
Toura-loura;
Here we go all round,
Hands all round,
Here we go all round.
"Room for all, there's room for all
That skim or wriggle, bounce or crawl--
Toura-loura;
Here we go all round,
Hands all round,
Here we go all round."
"My late father was in a cold sweat; he had not yet, however, come to
the worst of it."
Here José paused. "But I am dying for a smoke, and, with your
permission, gentlemen, I'll light my pipe."
"Quite right, my dear José," answered D'Haberville. "For my own part,
I am dying for something else. My stomach declares that this is
dinner-hour at college. Let's have a bite to eat."
Jules enjoyed the privilege of aristocratic descent--he had always a
magnificent appetite. This was specially excusable to-day, seeing that
he had dined at noon, and had had an immense deal of exercise since.
CHAPTER III.
LA CORRIVEAU.
Sganarelle.--Seigneur commandeur, mon maitre, Don Juan, vous demande
si vous voulez lui faire l'honneur de venir souper avec lui.
Le même.--La statue m'a fait signe.
+Le Festin de Pierre.+
What? the ghosts are growing ruder,
How they beard me....
To-night--why this is Goblin Hall,
Spirits and specters all in all.
+Faustus.+
José, after having unbridled the horse and given him what he called
a mouthful of hay, made haste to open a box which he had ingeniously
arranged on the sled to serve, as needs might be, both for seat and
larder. He brought out a great napkin in which were wrapped up two
roast chickens, a tongue, a ham, a little flask of brandy, a good big
bottle of wine. He was going to retire when Jules said to him:
"Come along and take a bite with us, José."
"Yes, indeed, come and sit here by me," said Archie.
"Oh, gentlemen," said José, "I know my place too well--"
"Come now, no affectations," said Jules. "We are here like three
soldiers in camp; will you be so good as to come, you obstinate fellow?"
"Since you say so, gentlemen, I must obey my officers," answered Jules.
The two young men seated themselves on the box which served them also
for a table. José took his place very comfortably on a bundle of hay,
and all three began to eat and drink with a hearty appetite.
Archie, naturally abstemious, had soon finished his meal. Having
nothing better to do, he began to philosophize. In his lighter moods he
loved to propound paradoxes for the pleasure of the argument.
"Do you know, brother mine, what it was that interested me most in my
friend's story?"
"No," exclaimed Jules, attacking another drumstick; "and what's more,