The Story of Louis Riel: The Rebel Chief

by J. E. Collins

Not in their whole nature is there any impulse so strong as the love to talk. Therefore, when the morning's meal is ended, the pretty mother laces the boots around her shapely little ankles, puts her blanket about her, and sallies out to one of her friend's houses for the morning's gossip. In speaking of her dress, I neglected to state that although the Metis woman had for gown the costliest fabric ever woven in Cashmere, she would not be content, on the hottest summer day, in walking twenty paces to her neighbour's door, unless she had this blanket upon her. The hateful looking garment is the chief relic of her barbaric origin, and despite the desire which she always manifests to exhibit her personal charms at their best, she has no qualms in converting herself into a hideous, repulsive squaw, with this covering. If she be of a shy nature, she will cover her head with this garment when a stranger enters her abode; and many a curious visitor who has heard of the bright eyes and olive cheeks of the half-breed woman is sorely disappointed when drawing near to her on the prairie path, or in the village street, to see her pull the hideous blanket over her face while he passes her by. Not always will she do this, for the wild women of the plains, and the half breed beauties, find a strong charm in strange faces; and after she has received some little attentions, and a few trinkets or trifles, she will be ready enough to appoint a tryst upon the flowery prairie, under the mellow moon.

We might forgive her for all this, if she could but restrain her tongue. From morn to noon, from noon to dewy eve, this unruly member goes on prattling about every conceivable thing, especially the affairs of her neighbours. We have seen that she goes out after she has eaten her breakfast; and she returns not till her appetite begins to be oppressive. She will then kiss her dusky little offspring, who, during her absence, has likely enough tried to stuff himself with coals, and then played with the pigs. In the evening one is pretty certain to find at some house a fiddler and a dancing party, which ends with a bountiful supper; though frequently, if the refreshments include whiskey, the party terminates with a regulation "Irish row." At nearly every such dance there is a white lad or two, and they are certain to monopolize the attention and the kisses of the prettiest girls. As the Indian had to sit by and see the white man come and take away the most beautiful of the wild girls, so too must the half-breed bear with meekness the preference of the Metis belle for the Caucasian stranger.

The morals of the women are not over good, nor can they be said to be very bad. Amongst each other their virtue reaches a standard as high as that which prevails in our Canadian community. It is when the women are brought into contact with the white men that this standard lowers. Then comes the temptation, the sin, the domestic heartburnings, and the hatred towards those who tempted to the fall.

The half-breed young men are fatally fond of show. The highest aim of their social existence seems to be to possess a dashing horse or two, and to drive a cariole. It is stated, on excellent authority, that a young man who wishes to figure as a beau, and to get the smiles of the pretty girls, will sometimes sell all his useful possessions to purchase a horse and cariole.

But it must not be supposed that this sort of spirit pervades the entire community. A large portion of the people are thrifty and frugal, and maintain themselves by continuous, well-directed toil.

The French half breeds profess the Roman Catholic religion, and they have a number of churches. At the head of the Roman communion is Archbishop Tache, of St. Boniface. This is the gentleman who provided the munificence for Louis Riel's education. He is the same bishop whose name so many hundreds of thousands of our people cannot recall without bitterness and indignation.

CHAPTER III.

Such, then, was the condition of Red River before the person who is the subject of this book appeared upon the scenes. But perhaps it is as well that I should relate one occurrence which fanned into bright flame the smouldering embers of discord between the half-breeds and their white neighbours. An officer of the Hudson Bay Company, living at an isolated post, had two daughters. As they began to arrive toward young-womanhood he was anxious that they should have an education, in order that they might, in proper season, be able to take their position in society. There were good schools at Red River, and thither the officer sent his daughters, placing them under the care of a guardian whom he knew would exercise an authority as judicious as his own. The two girls were remarkably handsome, and whenever they walked through the settlement, or drove abroad with their guardian, they attracted all the attention. Many a half-dusky heart was smitten of their white skin, which he would compare in colour to the pure snow that covers the plains. Now had the faces of the Red River beauties been Parian white, instead of dusky olive, the young beaux of the settlement would not have found their hearts beating half so wildly about the two pale daughters of the Hudson Bay Company's officer. They would indeed have languished for chestnut eyes, and complexions of Spain and the southern vineyards of France. But here amongst their sturdy "tiger blossoms," and passionate prairie roses blew two fair cold lilies; and their hearts bounded beyond measure at the thought of winning a look or a kindly smile. But the guardian watched the two pale girls closely, and permitted them to do little beyond his surveillance. There were not many whites in the circle of their acquaintance, but of this few, nearly every one was a suitor for one or other of the girls, yet for all the advances their hearts were still whole and they moved,

"In maiden meditation fancy free."

Now in Red River was a young half-breed, almost effeminate in manners, handsome in face and form, and agreeable and gentle in his address. He was indeed a sort of Bunthorne of the plains, just such a person as a romantic, shallow girl is most apt for a rose's period to sigh out her soul about. You find his type in fashionable civilised circles, in the languid dude who displays his dreams in his eyes to captivate the hearts of the silly girls, and—discreetly —keeps his mouth shut, to conceal his lack of brains. The two white daughters of the Company's officer were girls of ordinary understanding, but one of them had gotten too much poetry into her sweet head, and stood on the verge of a dizzy steep that overlooked a gulf, the name of which was Love. At a party given by one of the foremost of the half-breed families, this girl met Alexander, the Scottish half-breed, whose person and manners have been just described. There was something in the dreamy, far-away expression of the young Metis' eyes, which stirred the blood in the veins of the romantic girl. When they rested upon her, the soul of their owner seemed to yearn out to her. The voiceless, tender, passionate appealing in the look she was unable to forget when she walked along the grassy lanes, or trod the flower-rimmed path of the prairie.