The Young Seigneur Part 24

"Henri! Henri! it is your turn."

"I am going to be an advocate."

"And I am going to be a Rouge," replied little Rudolphe.

"Hah,--we are all Rouges," replied Henri.

"O, well--I will be, then--Monseigneur, like Monsieur Chamilly."

The garden stretched behind the manor-house. Along its paths these children delighted to explore the motherly currant-bushes. Old-fashioned flowers stocked it, and, as Chrysler walked away among them, they reminded him of the simple gardens of his childhood before the showy house-plant era had modernized our grounds. There were erect groups and rows of hollyhocks; monkshood offered its cl.u.s.ters of blue caps; striped tulips and crimson poppies flourished in beds of generous shapes; delicate astors, rich dahlias, and neat little bachelors' b.u.t.tons peeped in crowds from green freshnesses. This was one of Madame's domains, where she walked, weeded and superintended every morning in broad straw hat and ap.r.o.n; and it was to Chrysler one of the attractions of the Manoir.

CHAPTER XXVIII.

GRANDMOULIN.

"Que Demosthenes, En haranguant, Entraine Athenes, Come un torrent!"

--JACQUES VIORR--LE JARGON DU BEL-ESPRIT.

The events to which all others were leading now began to happen.

The great nomination day,--Sunday--is here. Ma.s.s is over, the whole parish, aye and crowds from far and near behind, surge all over the square, where the Church looks down upon them in serenity and silence.

When Chrysler came up, the Cure and his vicar were sitting on their gallery, and a man of strong frame stood upon the crier's rostrum looking round with the a.s.sertive consciousness that he was a recognized figure. His face wore a beard of strong but thin black wisps, which would have been Vand.y.k.e in form had it been heavier, but allowed the forcible outlines of his chin and cheek to be visible; and his locks, imitated by many a follower throughout the Province, were worn like Gainbetta's in a long and swelling black ma.s.s behind. His countenance, evidently from long experience, was so controlled that no trace of natural expression could be discerned upon it beyond an appearance of caution and diplomacy; but whatever its specific character, it bore without gainsay the stamp of power.

The man was Grandmoulin.

After looking this way and that way for several moments allowing the a.s.semblage to hush, he began in a quiet tone.

"My friends!"

He paused deliberately some moments to permit the people's curiosity to concentrate upon him.

"My brothers!"

This with a rising, powerful voice.--Then higher:

"French--Canadians!!" separating the two words.

The audience strained with attention to hear him. What he had to say next became a matter of suspense.

Then with inflection of pa.s.sionate enthusiasm:

"Canadian FRENCHMEN!!!" he cried, hurling out all his force. And the people could no longer restrain themselves; the rhetorical artifice took them by storm, and they shouted and cheered with one loud, far-echoing, unanimous voice.

Grandmoulin kept his att.i.tude erect and immovable.

"My friends," he proceeded, when the applause began to subside, "I address you as heritors and representatives of a glorious national t.i.tle. To wear it--to be called 'Frenchman' is to stand in the ranks of the n.o.bility of the human race. I address you as a generous, a great, a devoted people, a people brave of heart and unequalled in intellectual ability, a people proud of themselves, their deeds and the deeds of their fathers in New France and in the fair France of the past, a people above all intensely national, patriotic, jealous for the advancement of their tongue and their race. I address you as faithful of the ancient Church which was founded on the Petrine Rock, and names itself Catholic, Apostolic, Roman; whose altars G.o.d has preserved unshaken through the centuries amid terrible hosts of enemies, bitter oppressions, diabolical persecutions; of whose faith your hearts, your bodies, your race itself, are the consecrated depositories set apart and blessed of Heaven."

"I address you further, Frenchmen of Canada, as an oppressed remnant, long crushed and evil treated under alien conquerors; who despoiled you of your dominion, your freedom and your future, and whose military despotism, history records, spurned your cry during eighty years with unspeakable arrogance; till you rose like men in the despair of the '37, for the simplest rights, brandishing in your hands poor scythes and knives against armies with cannon, O my compatriots!--and compelled them to dole you a little justice!"

"The brave and generous who still remain of the generation before, recount to you those living scenes, and your hearts take part with the wronged and valiant of your blood!"

"In this secluded countryside you see too little how they still insult you. Ask yourselves frankly whether that for which our nation strove has ever yet been had. What have we gained? Is not the battle still to be fought? There are no facts more patent than that the English are our conquerors, that they rule our country, that they are aliens, heretics, enemies of our Holy Religion, and that they are heaping up unrighteous riches, while we are becoming despised and poor."

"Think not that I speak without emotions in my breast. There was a day, my poor French-Canadian brothers,--a solemn day, when I bound myself by a great oath to the cause of my people. It was when my father told me, his voice choking with, tears, of the murder of my grandfather, ignominiously thrown from the gallows for the felony of patriotism! Was I wrong to rise in grief and wrath, and swear with tears and prayers before our good Ste. Anne that I would never rest or taste a pleasure until I free the French-Canadians?"

"'It is I who will defend my race and my religion!' cried I then, and I have ever striven to do this, and still so strive."

Having thus played along each different key of his hearer's prejudices, he turned them towards his end.

"It is possible you may think I have, been speaking of everything but politics, and that you are asking yourselves what I really mean. Do you know what this election signifies? _It is a contest of the French with the English._ It is a question whether that arrogant minority shall continue to impose their ideas, their leaders, their execrable heresies, their taxes and restrictions upon this great French-Canadian Province--the only country which you have been able to hold for your own. You are here, at least, the majority! If their artifices have succeeded in excluding you from a part in governing the Dominion, there is one thing left; _you can govern this Province if you stand by me!_ If you stand by my me you can make our country purely and powerfully French! The ballot gives us the government: we will legislate the English. We will repay their oppressions with taxes and leave the Frenchman free; we will overvalue their properties, and undervalue our own; we will divide their const.i.tuencies; we will proclaim parishes out of townships; we will deprive them of offices, hara.s.s their commerce, vex their heretical altars; we will force new privileges from the Federal power; we will colonize the public lands with our own people exclusively, and repatriate our children lost; we will possess ourselves of those palaces and that vast wealth they wring from our labor, and finally, free as these great stretches of the valley, we shall live at peace in our own land."

A sullen murmur pa.s.sed about. The pa.s.sions were being roused. "The English eat the French-Canadians," repeated several.

"Messieurs of Dormilliere, you can judge of me! They have said of me all sorts of calumnies, all kinds of insinuations. I have been painted as black as the evil spirits. Men are here who will tell you 'Grandmoulin is a hypocrite; Grandmoulin is a robber, a liar, a libertine,'--that I have ruined my Province and sold my people and committed all the list of mortal sins. But, my brothers, I turn from those who a.s.sert these wicked falsehoods and I justify myself to you."

"Because I have not sought peace with the strong--because I have not acted a vanquished to the victors--because I have suffered--but that is nothing--because I have freely poured out every energy, as I do to-day,"

(and there was certainly vast physical effort in the output he was then making of himself) "they have branded me that disturber, that robber, that murderer, that liar and that villain."

"Messieurs, let me tell you a secret that will explain! Scan close and you will find that there is no man who says these things of me who is not either a friend of the English, and traitor to you, or else has been rejected by my a.s.sociates as unworthy to represent our patriotic ambitions. I must speak even of the agreeable young man of intellect and eloquence who opposes me. I do not blame him: I forgive him. He is young and inexperienced, and he sees things from certain aspects only. Have you never considered that it was natural for one whose father was an Englishman, and whose Protestant grandfather came across the seas among the army that conquered us, to look from a standpoint different from ours. If his birth and sympathies lead him in another direction from me, and my enemies have succeeded in prejudicing his mind, make allowance for him as I myself do, _and trust me_. I adjure you by the holy names of Mary and Joseph, I am your friend: understand only that Grandmoulin is your friend! Let the confidence be complete, and the triumph of your race in the Province of Quebec is secure!"

To Chrysler's utter surprise, the orator, pausing a moment, singled him out; pointed his finger towards him, and, turning to the people, cried: "Have I not said Mr. Haviland was a friend of your conquerors? Let me show you his adviser at this crisis of his plans!"

Grandmoulin knew he was in a community saturated with the Rouge tradition. He knew that even with all the weak and corruptible elements of the "back parishes" his chances were inferior on their face to Chamilly's, and he felt that he must at least retain his adherents here or lose the county. It was only after a final, truly magnificent effort of eloquence that he withdrew, and cheers upon cheers followed him, especially from a party among whom Cuiller, in a state of intoxication, was prominent. It was the first time that Grandmoulin had appeared in the neighborhood, and he had evidently created a great impression.

CHAPTER XXIX.

CHAMILLY.

"Mais, n'avons-nous pas, je vous prie, Encore de plus puissants liens?

A tout preferons la patrie: Avant tout soyons Canadiens."

--POPULAR SONG.

Chamilly rose upon the rostrum when Grandmoulin went down. He opened quietly, after the exciting peroration of his opponent, and in a manner which lulled and calmed the a.s.sembly.

"People of Dormilliere, I have had a cause for wonder during Mr.

Grandmoulin's discourse. I have been wondering at the perfect courage with which he invents a fact, a reason, a principle, an emotion, in cases where almost the whole world knows that none of these exist."

"I am accounted a person informed in the events of '37. I have studied all the accounts and doc.u.ments that are accessible, and have made a point of conversing with the survivors of that time. I state with the fullest knowledge, and you have long known the value of my word, that it is a falsehood that Mr. Grandmoulin's grandfather died a martyr as he has alleged, nor is he known to have been concerned in the rebellion in any way."