Their minds were filled with amazement on this wonderful subject; but their curiosity to see it seemed quite stifled by the Doctor’s dream, and the subject for the present was dropped, with a remark from Jim, “that he was not sure but that this accounted for the white people digging up all the Indians’ graves on the frontiers, and that their bones were brought here and sold.” The Catacombs were thus left for Daniel and myself to stroll through at our leisure, and the Indians were contented with the sketch I made, which, with Daniel’s account, put them in possession of the principal features of that extraordinary and truly shocking place.
As their visit to the Catacombs and the Morgue was abandoned, we resolved to drive through the Champs Elysées and visit the woods of Boulogne, the favourite drive of the Parisians, and probably the most beautiful in the world. We had been solicited by M. Franconi, of the Hippodrome, to enter into an arrangement with him to have the Indians unite in his entertainments three days in the week, where their skill in riding and archery could be seen to great advantage, and for which he would be willing to offer liberal terms. He had invited us to bring the Indians down, at all events, to see the place; and we agreed to make the visit to M. Franconi on our way to the woods of Boulogne. The view was a private one, known only to a few of his friends, who were present, and his own operatic troupe. We were very civilly and politely received; and, all walking to the middle of his grand area, he proposed to make us the offer, on condition that the Indians were good riders, which I had already assured him was the case, and which seemed rather difficult for him to believe, as they had so little of civilization about them. As the best proof, however, he proposed to bring out a horse, and let one of them try and show what he could do. This we agreed to at once; and, having told the Indians before we started that we should make no arrangement for them there unless they were pleased with it and preferred it, they had decided, on entering the grounds, that the exercises would be too desperate and fatiguing to them and destructive to their clothes, and therefore not to engage with him. However, the horse was led into the area and placed upon the track for their chariot-races, which is nearly a quarter of a mile in circumference; and, the question being put, “Who will ride?” it was soon agreed that Jim should try it first. “Wal, me try em,” said Jim; “me no ride good, but me try em little.” He was already prepared, with his shield and quiver upon his back and his long and shining lance in his hand. The horse was held; though, with all its training, it was some time, with its two or three grooms about it, before they could get the frightened creature to stand steady enough for Jim to mount. In the first effort which they thought he was making to get on, they were surprised to find that he was ungirthing the saddle, which he flung upon the ground, and, throwing his buffalo robe across the animal’s back and himself astride, the horse dashed off at his highest speed. Jim saw that the animal was used to the track, and, the course being clear, he leaned forward and brandished his lance, and, every time he came round and passed us, sounded a charge in the shrill notes of the war-whoop. The riding was pleasing and surprised M. Franconi exceedingly, and when he thought it was about time to stop he gave his signal for Jim to pull up, but, seeing no slack to the animal’s pace, and Jim still brandishing his weapons in the air and sounding the war-whoop as he passed, he became all at once alarmed for the health of his horse. The Indians at this time were all in a roar of laughter, and the old gentleman was placing himself and his men upon the track as Jim came round, with uplifted arms, to try to stop the animal’s speed, just finding at that time that Jim had rode in the true prairie style, without using the bridle, and which, by his neglect of it, had got out of his reach, when he would have used it to pull up with. Jim still dashed by them, brandishing his lance as they came in his way: when they retreated and ran to head him in another place, he there passed them also, and passed them and menaced them again and again as he came around. The alarm of the poor old gentleman for the life of his horse became very conspicuous, and, with additional efforts with his men, and a little pulling up by Jim, who had at length found the rein, the poor affrighted and half-dead animal was stopped, and Jim, leaping off, walked to the middle of the area, where we were in a group, laughing to the greatest excess at the fun. The poor horse was near done over, and led away by the grooms, M. Franconi came and merely bade us good-by, and was exceedingly obliged to us. Whether the poor animal died or not we never heard, but Jim was laid up for several days. On asking him why he ran the horse so hard, he said it was the horse’s fault, that “it ran away with him the moment he was on its back—that the creature was frightened nearly to death; and he thought, if it preferred running, he resolved to give it running enough.” The Doctor told him he acted imprudently in getting on, which had caused all the trouble. “In what way?” inquired Jim. “Why, by letting the animal see that ugly face of yours; if you had hid it till you were on, there would have been no trouble.”
We were all obliged to laugh at the Doctor’s wit; and having taken leave of the polite old gentleman, we were seated in our carriages again for a drive through the woods of Boulogne.
In the midst of these wild and truly beautiful grounds the Indians and all got down for a stroll. The native wildness of the forests and jungle seemed in a moment to inspire them with their wild feelings, which had, many of them, long slumbered whilst mingling amidst the crowds of civilization, and away they leapt and bounded among the trees in their wild and wonted amusements. Their shrill yells and the war-whoop were soon lost in the distant thickets which they penetrated, and an hour at least elapsed before they could all be gathered together and prepared to return. Their frightful yells had started up all the rabbits that were unburrowed in the forests; and whilst hundreds were bounding about, and many taking to the open fields for escape, they encompassed one, and with their united screams had scared it to death. This they assured us was the case, as they brought it in by the legs, without the mark of any weapon upon it.
Few scenes in Paris, if any, had pleased them more than this, and in their subsequent drives they repeatedly paid their visits to the “woods of Boulogne.”
On their return home poor Jim lay down, complaining very much of lameness from his hard ride on Franconi’s horse, which he knew would prevent him from dancing for some days, as he was getting very stiff, and afraid he would not be well enough to go and see the “Industrious Fleas” (as they were called), where he and the Doctor and Jeffrey had arranged to go with Daniel and several young American acquaintance, who had decided it to be one of the choicest little sights then to be seen in Paris, and which from all accounts is an exhibition of female nudities in living groups, ringing all the changes on attitude and action for the amusement of the lookers-on. There was a great deal of amusing conversation about this very popular exhibition, but in this poor Jim and the Doctor reluctantly submitted to disappointment when Mr. Melody very properly objected to their going to see it.
Jim had laid himself on his back at this time, and, not feeling in the best of humour, began in a tirade of abuse of the Frenchwomen, of whom he and the Doctor had seen more perhaps on the previous evening in the Jardin Mabille in the Champs Elysées, and the masquerade in the Grand Opera House, than they had seen since they entered Paris.
Their enterprise on that evening had taken place after their exhibition had closed, when Jim and the Doctor started with Jeffrey and Daniel and two or three friends who were pledged to take care of them. It was on Sunday evening, when the greatest crowds attend these places, and I have no other account of what they did and what they saw than that they gave me on their return home. They had first gone to the splendid bal in the popular garden, where they were told that the thousand elegant women they saw there dancing were all bad women, and that nearly all of them came to those places alone, as they had nothing to pay, but were all let in free, so as to make the men come who had to pay. This idea had tickled Jim and the Doctor very much, for, although they were from the wilderness, they could look a good way into a thing which was perfectly clear. It was a splendid sight for them, and, after strolling about a while, and seeing all that could be seen, they had turned their attention to the “Bal Masqué” in the Grand Opera. Here they had been overwhelmed with the splendour of the scene, and astonished at its novelty, and the modes of the women who, Jim said, “were all ashamed to show their faces,” and whose strange manœuvres had added a vast deal to the fund of his objections to Frenchwomen, and which he said had constantly been accumulating ever since he first saw so many of them kissing the ends of little dogs’ noses, and pretty little children on their foreheads. His mind here ran upon kissing, of which he had seen some the night before, and which he had often observed in the exhibition rooms and in the streets. He had laughed, he said, to see Frenchmen kiss each other on both cheeks; and he had observed that, when gentlemen kiss ladies, they kiss them on the forehead: he was not quite sure that they would do so in the dark, however. “In London always kiss em on the mouth; ladies kiss em Indians heap, and hug em too: in France ladies no kiss em—no like em—no good.”
In speaking of the bal in the gardens, “he didn’t see anything so very bad in that, but as for the masquerade, he looked upon it as a very immoral thing that so many thousands of ladies should come there and be ashamed to show their faces, and have the privilege of picking out just such men as they liked to go with them, and then take hold of their arms, as he said he repeatedly saw them, and lead them out.” Amongst the Indians, he said, they had a custom much like that to be sure, but it was only given once a-year, and it was then only for the young married men to lend their wives to the old ones: this was only one night in the year, and it was a mark of respect that the young married men were willing to pay to the old warriors and chiefs, and the young married women were willing to agree to it because it pleased their husbands. On those occasions, he said, “none are admitted into the ring but old married men, and then the young married woman goes around and touches on the left shoulder the one who she wishes to follow her into the bushes, and she does it without being ashamed and obliged to cover her face.”
The Doctor’s prejudices against the Frenchwomen were nothing near as violent as those of Jim, and yet he said it made him feel very curious when he saw some thousands with their faces all hidden: he said it must be true that they had some object that was bad, or they wouldn’t be ashamed and hide their faces. Mr. Melody told Jim and the Doctor, however, that he didn’t consider there was so very much harm in it, for these very women had the handiest way in the world to get rid of all their sins. If they happened accidentally or otherwise during the week to do anything that was decidedly naughty or wicked, they went into their churches very early in the morning, where the priest was in a little box with his ear to the window, where the woman kneeled down and told in his ear all the sins she had committed during the week, and she then went away quite happy that, having confessed them to him, he would be sure to have them all forgiven by the Great Spirit. They had a great laugh at this, and all thought that Mr. Melody was quizzing them, until Bobasheela and Daniel both told them it was all true, and if they liked to go with them any morning they would take them into any of the French churches or chapels, where they could see it; and would venture that they would see many of the same women confessing their sins whom they had seen at the bal and the masquerade, and in this way they could tell who had behaved the worst, for the most guilty of them would be sure to be there first. The Doctor seemed evidently to look upon this still with suspicion and doubt; and as the splendid church of St. Roch was nearly opposite to their rooms, and only across the street, it was proposed that the Doctor and Jim should accompany Daniel and their friend Bobasheela immediately there, where in five minutes they could see more or less women at confession, and at the same time a fine sight, one of the most splendid churches in Paris, and the place where the Queen goes on every Sunday to worship. This so excited the party, that they chiefly all arose and walked across the street to take a view of the church and the Frenchwomen confessing their sins into the ears of the priests. They happened to have a fair opportunity of seeing several upon their knees at confession; and the old Doctor had been curious to advance up so near to one, that he said he saw the priest’s eyes shining through between the little slats, and then he was convinced, and not before. He said that still it didn’t seem right to him, unless the Great Spirit had put those men there for that purpose. He thought it a very nice place for a young girl to tell the priest where she would meet him, and he had a very good chance to see whether she was pretty or not. Jim had by this time studied out an idea or two, and said, he thought that this way of confessing sins aided the bals and masquerades and the industrious fleas very much; and he believed that these were the principal causes of the great number of the poor little deserted and parentless babes they had seen in the hospital where they had been.