264 



J. G. BOUEINOT 



" While floats our country's banner 

 O'er Chebuctou's glorious wave ; 

 And the frowning lulls of Scatarie 

 The trembling surges brave. 

 While breezy Aspotogon 

 Lifts high its summit blue, 

 And sparkles on its winding way 

 The gentle Sissibou. 



" The memory of the Red Man 



It lingers like a spell 



On many a storm-swept headland 



On many a leafy dell; 



Where Tusket's thousand islets 



Like emeralds stud the deep ; 



Where Blomidon, a sentry 



His endless watch doth keep. 



lake, 



" It dwells round Catalone's blue 



'Mid leafy forests hid — 



Round fair Discousse and the rushing tides 



Of the turbid Pisiquid. 



And it lends Chebogue, a touching grace, 



To thy softly flowing river, 



As we sadly think of the gentle race 



That has passed away forever." 



The poet has certainly used much poetic license in the closing words of his charming 

 verses, for the records of history show that the Micmacs, during the wars between France 

 and England on this continent, were far from being the " gentle race " here described. 

 Indeed we have already read in a previous part of this monograph that they were con- 

 sidered among the most cruel and relentless of all the Indian nations. So far, too, from it 

 being true that they have "passed away forever" the fact is that while they do not 

 increase they are still numerous ' in the island of Cape Breton, where they live on reserves 

 by the side of the Bras d'Or, near the most picturesque parts of that beautiful sea. At 

 Escasoni, prettily situated on the north side of the east arm of the lake — one of the 

 poetic names given in the verses before us — the Indians own a fine reserve. On Chapel 

 Island, once called St. Villemai, at the entrance of St. Peter's Inlet, they have a good 

 chapel ; and here the whole tribe assembles every summer for two weeks to celebrate the 

 feast of St. Ann, and to attend the annual religious mission. They cultivate patches 

 of land, and live in small cabins, but a few of them are still nomadic in their habits and 

 periodically visit the towns and villages, near which they remain for a week in their 

 birch-bark wigM'ams, making various wooden ware for which they obtain a ready market. 

 But as a rule the Indians of the island are more steady and industrious than those of 

 Nova Scotia proper." Some of them still remember the stories that have come down from 

 their ancestors of the French rés;me, and it was not long since the present writer copied 



1 By the Census of 18S1 there were 2-50 .Micmacs in Caps Breton County ; 100 in Inverness; 90 in Victoria; 

 110 in Richmond, or 550 in the Island. 



■■^ In the report of the Indian department for 1S90 (Can. Sess. P., No. 12), there is the following favourable 

 account of the Indians of Cape Breton : 



" In the northern counties, notably in those of Cape Breton Island, they are more enterprising and tlirifty than 

 their bretiiern in the southern counties, where the tendency to roam about the country keeps them from becoming 

 domestic \i their habits, and improving their lands. Tlie Indians of the southern counties are also more jirone to 

 the intemperate use of intoxicants, as the temptations to which they are exposed in their wandering life are 

 greater than those the Indians of Cape Breton have to encounter. Tlie principal sources from which the former (Nova 

 Scotia Indiansi derive their subsistence are coopering, basket-making, and the other manufactures in which Indians 

 are esi^ecially skilled. On the other hand, the Indians of Cape Breton devole themselves for the most part to the 

 cultivation of the soil, and to employments which necessitate their remaining more at home; and the superiority 

 of the one mode of life over the other is proven by the far more comfortable circumstances in which the latter 

 Indians are found than the former." 



