Jean Baptiste: A Story of French Canada

by James Edward Le Rossignol

All the wild animals came, at one time or another, to the lake. Almost every evening Jean saw red deer drinking there; occasionally a caribou; and once a moose, with great branching horns and outstretched muzzle, calling loudly to his mate, came to the end of the point, plunged into the water, and swam over to the other side. There were lynx and wild-cat in the forest that at times made a fearful noise by night. There were foxes, too; a few lone wolves; and now and then a vagabond bear, seeking for honey, nests of ants, raspberries and blueberries, catching a hare or a marmot now and then, and glad to make a meal of dead fish or carrion when he could find such dainties.

All these and many more, the hunter and the hunted, came and went; some with rush and clamour; others silently and on tiptoe; but always leaving some token of their presence by which Jean knew that they had been near. In the evening and morning twilight he caught glimpses of them as they passed; by night he knew them by the sounds they made, the odours they exhaled, or their bright eyes glowing in the dark; by day he saw their tracks in the soft earth, the marks of teeth and claws on the trees, the remains of their feasts, and all the signs of life and death that tell the joyous and fearful tragedy of the forest.

Jean had a mind to take part in the tragedy, to be one of the characters of the play; and the more he thought of it the more alluring it seemed. Not only could he lead an independent and enjoyable life in the woods; but he could obtain a good income from the sale of skins; and even accumulate a small fortune, if he had good luck. He had traversed the forest in every direction for a distance of twenty miles or more, and had carefully estimated the probable catch of a winter's work. There was scarcely a pond in all that region where there were not scores of muskrats; and although the price of a single skin was not high, they would be worth a good sum in the aggregate. Of more valuable fur-bearing animals there was that old stand-by, the beaver; with the skunk, the mink and the otter; squirrel and weasel; wild-cat and lynx; wolf and bear; red fox and hare--all of which were well worth taking for the skins alone, not to mention the meat, which was excellent food in the cold weather.

Then there was the marten, or Hudson Bay sable, a rare and valuable fur; and finally, and most highly prized of all, the black or silver fox, which often sold for fabulous sums; as much as a thousand dollars being paid, at times, for a single skin. In his explorations Jean had seen the marten several times; and knew of a place on a sandy hillside that was the home of a whole family of silver foxes; for one morning he had seen father, mother and four cubs playing, like kittens, on the carpet of pine-needles near their hole. Yes, he could make a good living in the wilderness, preying upon the beasts of prey.

Cruel? True; yet no man can say that without hypocrisy but the vegetarian; he who eats neither meat nor fish; wears neither wool, silk, leather, nor garments trimmed with fur. But if we must defend the trapper, let us say that for every fox that he takes a hundred hares are kept alive; and that by killing a single otter he saves the lives of a thousand trout. Moreover, while the beasts resemble man in some respects, they are by no means human. They suffer some pangs when they come to die, but during their lifetime they are not continually haunted by the thought of death. The king of terrors has no terror for them; and at the end they lay down their life without regret, and with no fear of torment in any life to come. It is as though the good God in pity had given them compensation for having withheld the gift of reason: the knowledge of good and evil which is at once the glory and the shame of man, the source of his profoundest joy and sorrow, his salvation and damnation. Which of them would not rather be one of the beasts that perish, than a man, made in the image of God, fated to follow evermore the gleam of an ideal that might lead to the heights of eternal glory, or the bottomless abyss of eternal degradation and loss?

As for Jean Baptiste he accepted cheerfully the law of life and death as it was in the wilderness. He would live there, as the others did, according to his strength and cunning; and he would kill, too, not wantonly, but for a purpose; and when his strength failed, through sickness, accident or old age, he would lie down to die, as they did; with a few moans, perhaps, but without any vain regrets. What is death, after all, that men should fear it so? In the midst of the amenities of civilised life it seems a dreadful thing to die; but in the forest it is the merest incident. The good God cares for sparrows; gives them food and drink and everything else that they need; and after a while takes away their breath. So also He cares for man. The generations come and go; the earth abides; and God lives. Life and death, both are good; for living or dying we are the Lord's. Thus Jean Baptiste learned the lesson of the wilderness.

At the same time Jean was learning another lesson; for he was getting a distant view of himself and his past life; and seeing everything, as he thought, in the true perspective. He was lifted up, at times, into a kind of third heaven; where he had such a vision of eternal values, that the world of men, with all their thoughts and feelings, their words and deeds, seemed little and far away. The friends and neighbours seemed like puppets in a show, and his own part in the play as vain and futile as the rest. The work that he had done, the plans that he had made, the ends for which he had striven, no longer seemed desirable or worth while. He cared no longer for the opinion of men, whether good or bad; for any help that they might give him, or any harm that they might do. No longer did he hate his enemies or love his friends. The place where he had lived and the people he had known had lost all power over him; for the thought of them caused neither satisfaction nor regret, neither joy nor sorrow, neither hope nor fear. His own personality, even, had lost its value; for the memory of the past was fading away; the outlook was narrowing; and he was living in the present only; borne along upon the tide of time, his individuality lost in the great ocean of existence of which he was so small a part. He was intoxicated by the thin air of those altitudes, and deceived by the illusions of the mountain-top.

From this plane of thought Jean descended suddenly and with something of a shock to solid earth, on one of those cold, grey days of August that come to remind us that summer is passing, and that soon the snows of winter will begin to fall. Instinctively he went about the cabin and found many gaping chinks that should be filled with moss. He looked at the wood-pile, and saw that it was almost gone. He examined his store of provisions, and saw that it was running low. Firearms, fishing-tackle, traps, snowshoes, traineau, clothes, moccasins--all required attention, for the cold season was coming, and it was necessary to be prepared. Already the beavers were preparing for the winter, and the human animal knew that he must do the same; for the wilderness is kind to those who keep her commandments, but implacably cruel to those who will not live according to her law. So Jean determined to rest and play no more; laid philosophy aside; spent the day in the forest, chopping dry wood for fuel; and in the evening, by the light of a blazing fire, he sat down to mend the traps of Michel Gamache.

CHAPTER XXIV

THE RELAPSE