Two Years in the French West Indies Part 10

But the best possible occasion on which to observe what my friend the baker called _la belle jeunesse_, is a confirmation day,--when the bishop drives to Grande Anse over the mountains, and all the population turns out in holiday garb, and the bells are tapped like tam-tams, and triumphal arches--most awry to behold!--span the road-way, bearing in clumsiest lettering the welcome, _Vive Monseigneur_. On that event, the long procession of young girls to be confirmed--all in white robes, white veils, and white satin slippers--is a numerical surprise. It is a moral surprise also,--to the stranger at least; for it reveals the struggle of a poverty extraordinary with the self-imposed obligations of a costly ceremonialism.

No white children ever appear in these processions: there are not half a dozen white families in the whole urban population of about seven thousand souls; and those send their sons and daughters to St. Pierre or Morne Rouge for their religious training and education. But many of the colored children look very charming in their costume of confirmation;--you could not easily recognize one of them as the same little _bonne_ who brings your morning cup of coffee, or another as the daughter of a plantation _commandeur_ (overseer's a.s.sistant),--a brown slip of a girl who will probably never wear shoes again. And many of those white shoes and white veils have been obtained only by the hardest physical labor and self-denial of poor parents and relatives: fathers, brothers, and mothers working with cutla.s.s and hoe in the snake-swarming cane-fields;--sisters walking bare-footed every day to St. Pierre and back to earn a few francs a month.

[Ill.u.s.tration: A CONFIRMATION PROCESSION.]

... While watching such a procession it seemed to me that I could discern in the features and figures of the young confirmants something of a prevailing type and tint, and I asked an old planter beside me if he thought my impression correct.

"Partly," he answered; "there is certainly a tendency towards an attractive physical type here, but the tendency itself is less stable than you imagine; it has been changed during the last twenty years within my own recollection. In different parts of the island particular types appear and disappear with a generation. There is a sort of race-fermentation going on, which gives no fixed result of a positive sort for any great length of time. It is true that certain elements continue to dominate in certain communes, but the particular characteristics come and vanish in the most mysterious way. As to color, I doubt if any correct cla.s.sification can be made, especially by a stranger. Your eyes give you general ideas about a red type, a yellow type, a brown type; but to the more experienced eyes of a creole, accustomed to live in the country districts, every individual of mixed race appears to have a particular color of his own. Take, for instance, the so-called capre type, which furnishes the finest physical examples of all,--you, a stranger, are at once impressed by the general red tint of the variety; but you do not notice the differences of that tint in different persons, which are more difficult to observe than shade-differences of yellow or brown. Now, to me, every capre or capresse has an individual color; and I do not believe that in all Martinique there are two half-breeds--not having had the same father and mother--in whom the tint is precisely the same."

VIII.

I thought Grande Anse the most sleepy place I had ever visited. I suspect it is one of the sleepiest in the whole world. The wind, which tans even a creole of St. Pierre to an unnatural brown within forty-eight hours of his sojourn in the village, has also a peculiarly somnolent effect. The moment one has nothing particular to do, and ventures to sit down idly with the breeze in one's face, slumber comes; and everybody who can spare the time takes a long nap in the afternoon, and little naps from hour to hour. For all that, the heat of the east coast is not enervating, like that of St. Pierre; one can take a great deal of exercise in the sun without feeling much the worse. Hunting excursions, river fishing parties, surf-bathing, and visits to neighboring plantations are the only amus.e.m.e.nts; but these are enough to make existence very pleasant at Grande Anse. The most interesting of my own experiences were those of a day pa.s.sed by invitation at one of the old colonial estates on the hills near the village.

It is not easy to describe the charm of a creole interior, whether in the city or the country. The cool shadowy court, with its wonderful plants and fountain of sparkling mountain water, or the lawn, with its ancestral trees,--the delicious welcome of the host, whose fraternal easy manner immediately makes you feel at home,--the coming of the children to greet you, each holding up a velvety brown cheek to be kissed, after the old-time custom,--the romance of the unconventional chat, over a cool drink, under the palms and the ceibas,--the visible earnestness of all to please the guest, to inwrap him in a very atmosphere of quiet happiness,--combine to make a memory which you will never forget. And maybe you enjoy all this upon some exquisite site, some volcanic summit, overlooking slopes of a hundred greens,--mountains far winding in blue and pearly shadowing,--rivers singing seaward behind curtains of arborescent reeds and bamboos,--and, perhaps, Pelee, in the horizon, dreaming violet dreams under her foulard of vapors,--and, encircling all, the still sweep of the ocean's azure bending to the verge of day.

... My host showed or explained to me all that he thought might interest a stranger. He had brought to me a nest of the _carouge_, a bird which suspends its home, hammock-fashion, under the leaves of the banana-tree;--showed me a little fer-de-lance, freshly killed by one of his field hands; and a field lizard (_zanoli te_ in creole), not green like the lizards which haunt the roofs of St. Pierre, but of a beautiful brown bronze, with shifting tints; and eggs of the _zanoli_, little soft oval things from which the young lizards will perhaps run out alive as fast as you open the sh.e.l.ls; and the _matoutou falaise_, or spider of the cliffs, of two varieties, red or almost black when adult, and bluish silvery tint when young,--less in size than the tarantula, but equally hairy and venomous; and the _crabe-c'est-ma-faute_ (the "Through-my-fault Crab"), having one very small and one very large claw, which latter it carries folded up against its body, so as to have suggested the idea of a penitent striking his bosom, and uttering the sacramental words of the Catholic confession, "Through my fault, through my fault, through my most grievous fault."... Indeed I cannot recollect one-half of the queer birds, queer insects, queer reptiles, and queer plants to which my attention was called. But speaking of plants, I was impressed by the profusion of the _zhebe-moin-mise_--a little sensitive-plant I had rarely observed on the west coast. On the hill-sides of Grande Anse it prevails to such an extent as to give certain slopes its own peculiar greenish-brown color. It has many-branching leaves, only one inch and a half to two inches long, but which recall the form of certain common ferns; these lie almost flat upon the ground. They fold together upward from the central stem at the least touch, and the plant thus makes itself almost imperceptible;--it seems to live so, that you feel guilty of murder if you break off a leaf. It is called _Zhebe-moin-mise_, or "Plant-did-I-amuse-myself,"

because it is supposed to tell naughty little children who play truant, or who delay much longer than is necessary in delivering a message, whether they deserve a whipping or not. The guilty child touches the plant, and asks, "_Ess moin amise moin?_" (Did I amuse myself?); and if the plant instantly shuts its leaves up, that means, "Yes, you did." Of course the leaves invariably close; but I suspect they invariably tell the truth, for all colored children, in Grande Anse at least, are much more inclined to play than work.

The kind old planter likewise conducted me over the estate. He took me through the sugar-mill, and showed me, among other more recent inventions, some machinery devised nearly two centuries ago by the ingenious and terrible Pere Labat, and still quite serviceable, in spite of all modern improvements in sugar-making;--took me through the _rhummerie_, or distillery, and made me taste some colorless rum which had the aroma and something of the taste of the most delicate gin;--and finally took me into the _cases-a-vent_, or "wind-houses,"--built as places of refuge during hurricanes. Hurricanes are rare, and more rare in this century by far than during the previous one; but this part of the island is particularly exposed to such visitations, and almost every old plantation used to have one or two cases-a-vent. They were always built in a hollow, either natural or artificial, below the land-level,--with walls of rock several feet thick, and very strong doors, but no windows. My host told me about the experiences of his family in some case-a-vent during a hurricane which he recollected. It was found necessary to secure the door within by means of strong ropes; and the mere task of holding it taxed the strength of a dozen powerful men: it would bulge in under the pressure of the awful wind,--swelling like the side of a barrel; and had not its planks been made of a wood tough as hickory, they would have been blown into splinters.

I had long desired to examine a plantation drum, and see it played upon under conditions more favorable than the excitement of a holiday _caleinda_ in the villages, where the amus.e.m.e.nt is too often terminated by a _voum_ (general row) or a _goumage_ (a serious fight);--and when I mentioned this wish to the planter he at once sent word to his commandeur, the best drummer in the settlement, to come up to the house and bring his instrument with him. I was thus enabled to make the observations necessary, and also to take an instantaneous photograph of the drummer in the very act of playing.

The old African dances, the _caleinda_ and the _bele_ (which latter is accompanied by chanted improvisation) are danced on Sundays to the sound of the drum on almost every plantation in the island. The drum, indeed, is an instrument to which the country-folk are so much attached that they swear by it,--_Tambou!_ being the oath uttered upon all ordinary occasions of surprise or vexation. But the instrument is quite as often called _ka_, because made out of a quarter-barrel, or _quart_,--in the patois "ka." Both ends of the barrel having been removed, a wet hide, well wrapped about a couple of hoops, is driven on, and in drying the stretched skin obtains still further tension. The other end of the ka is always left open. Across the face of the skin a string is tightly stretched, to which are attached, at intervals of about an inch apart, very short thin fragments of bamboo or cut feather stems. These lend a certain vibration to the tones.

In the time of Pere Labat the negro drums had a somewhat different form.

There were then two kinds of drums--a big tamtam and a little one, which used to be played together. Both consisted of skins tightly stretched over one end of a wooden cylinder, or a section of hollow tree trunk.

The larger was from three to four feet long with a diameter of fifteen to sixteen inches; the smaller, called _baboula_, [5] was of the same length, but only eight or nine inches in diameter.

Pere Labat also speaks, in his West Indian travels, of another musical instrument, very popular among the Martinique slaves of his time--"a sort of guitar" made out of a half-calabash or _cou_, covered with some kind of skin. It had four strings of silk or catgut, and a very long neck. The tradition or this African instrument is said to survive in the modern "_banza_" (_banza neg Guinee_).

The skilful player (_bel tambouye_) straddles his ka stripped to the waist, and plays upon it with the finger-tips of both hands simultaneously,--taking care that the vibrating string occupies a horizontal position. Occasionally the heel of the naked foot is pressed lightly or vigorously against the skin, so as to produce changes of tone. This is called "giving heel" to the drum--_baill y talon_.

Meanwhile a boy keeps striking the drum at the uncovered end with a stick, so as to produce a dry clattering accompaniment. The sound of the drum itself, well played, has a wild power that makes and masters all the excitement of the dance--a complicated double roll, with a peculiar billowy rising and falling. The creole onomatopes, _b'lip-b'lib-b'lib-b'lip_, do not fully render the roll;--for each _b'lip_ or _b'lib_ stands really for a series of sounds too rapidly filliped out to be imitated by articulate speech. The tapping of a ka can be heard at surprising distances; and experienced players often play for hours at a time without exhibiting wearisomeness, or in the least diminishing the volume of sound produced.

It seems there are many ways of playing--different measures familiar to all these colored people, but not easily distinguished by anybody else; and there are great matches sometimes between celebrated _tambouye_. The same _commande_ whose portrait I took while playing told me that he once figured in a contest of this kind, his rival being a drummer from the neighboring burgh of Marigot.... "_Ae, ae, yae! mon che!--y fai tambou-a pale!_" said the commande, describing the execution of his antagonist;--"my dear, he just made that drum talk! I thought I was going to be beaten for sure; I was trembling all the time--_ae, ae, yae!_ Then he got off that ka, mounted it; I thought a moment; then I struck up the 'River-of-the-Lizard,'--_mais, mon che, yon larivie-Leza toutt pi!_--such a River-of-the-Lizard, ah! just perfectly pure! I gave heel to that ka; I worried that ka;--I made it mad--I made it crazy;--I made it talk;--I won!"

During some dances a sort of chant accompanies the music--a long sonorous cry, uttered at intervals of seven eight seconds, which perfectly times a particular measure in the drum roll. It may be the burden of a song: a mere improvisation:

"Oh! yoe-yoe!"

(Drum roll.) "Oh! missie-a!"

(Drum roll.) "Y bel tambouye!"

(Drum roll.) "Aie, ya, yaie!"

(Drum roll.) "Joli tambouye!"

(Drum roll.) "Chauffe tambou-a!"

(Drum roll.) "Gene tambou-a!"

(Drum roll.) "Craze tambou-a!" etc., etc.

... The _crieur_, or chanter, is also the leader of the dance. The caleinda is danced by men only, all stripped to the waist, and twirling heavy sticks in a mock fight, Sometimes, however--especially at the great village gatherings, when the blood becomes oyerheated by tafia--the mock fight may become a real one; and then even cutla.s.ses are brought into play.

But in the old days, those improvisations which gave one form of dance its name, _bele_ (from the French _bel air_), were often remarkable rhymeless poems, uttered with natural simple emotion, and full of picturesque imagery. I cite part of one, taken down from the dictation of a common field-hand near Fort-de-France. I offer a few lines of the creole first, to indicate the form of the improvisation. There is a dancing pause at the end of each line during the performance:

Toutt fois lanmou vini lacase moin Pou pale moin, moin ka reponne: "Khe moin deja place,"

Moin ka crie, "Secou! les voisinages!"

Moin ka crie, "Secou! la gade royale!"

Moin ka crie, "Secou! la gendamerie!

Lanmou pouend yon poigna pou poignade moin!"

The best part of the composition, which is quite long, might be rendered as follows:

Each time that Love comes to my cabin To speak to me of love I make answer, "My heart is already placed,"

I cry out, "Help, neighbors! help!"

I cry out, "Help, _la Garde Royale!_"

I cry out, "Help, help, gendarmes!

Love takes a poniard to stab me; How can Love have a heart so hard To thus rob me of my health!"

When the officer of police comes to me To hear me tell him the truth, To have him arrest my Love;-- When I see the Garde Royale Coming to arrest my sweet heart, I fall down at the feet of the Garde Royale,-- I pray for mercy and forgiveness.

"Arrest me instead, but let my dear Love go!"

How, alas! with this tender heart of mine, Can I bear to see such an arrest made!

No, no! I would rather die!

Dost not remember, when our pillows lay close together, How we told each to the other all that our hearts thought?... etc.

[Ill.u.s.tration: MANNER OF PLAYING THE KA]

The stars were all out when I bid my host good-bye;--he sent his lack servant along with me to carry a lantern and keep a sharp watch for snakes along the mountain road.

IX.

... a.s.suredly the city of St. Pierre never could have seemed more quaintly beautiful than as I saw it on the evening of my return, while the shadows were reaching their longest, and sea and sky were turning lilac. Palm-heads were trembling and masts swaying slowly against an enormous orange sunset,--yet the beauty of the sight did not touch me!

The deep level and luminous flood of the bay seemed to me for the first time a dead water;--I found myself wondering whether it could form a part of that living tide by which I had been dwelling, full of foam-lightnings and perpetual thunder. I wondered whether the air about me--heavy and hot and full of faint leafy smells--could ever have been touched by the vast pure sweet breath of the wind from the sunrising.

And I became conscious of a profound, unreasoning, absurd regret for the somnolent little black village of that bare east coast,--where there are no woods, no ships, no sunsets,...only the ocean roaring forever over its beach of black sand.

CHAPTER III. --UN REVENANT

I.

He who first gave to Martinique its poetical name, _Le Pays des Revenants_, thought of his wonderful island only as "The Country of Comers-back," where Nature's unspeakable spell bewitches wandering souls like the caress of a Circe,--never as the Land of Ghosts. Yet either translation of the name holds equal truth: a land of ghosts it is, this marvellous Martinique! Almost every plantation has its familiar spirits,--its phantoms: some may be unknown beyond the particular district in which fancy first gave them being;--but some belong to popular song and story,--to the imaginative life of the whole people.

Almost every promontory and peak, every village and valley along the coast, has its special folk-lore, its particular tradition. The legend of Thoma.s.seau of Perinnelle, whose body was taken out of the coffin and carried away by the devil through a certain window of the plantation-house, which cannot be closed up by human power;--the Demarche legend of the spectral horseman who rides up the hill on bright hot days to seek a friend buried more than a hundred years ago;--the legend of the _Habitation Dillon_, whose proprietor was one night mysteriously summoned from a banquet to disappear forever;--the legend of l'Abbe Piot, who cursed the sea with the curse of perpetual unrest;--the legend of Aimee Derivry of Robert, captured by Barbary pirates, and sold to become a Sultana-Valide-(she never existed, though you can find an alleged portrait in M. Sidney Daney's history of Martinique): these and many similar tales might be told to you even on a journey from St. Pierre to Fort-de-France, or from Lamentin to La Trinite, according as a rising of some peak into view, or the sudden opening of an _anse_ before the vessel's approach, recalls them to a creole companion.

And new legends are even now being made; for in this remote colony, to which white immigration has long ceased,--a country so mountainous that people are born (and buried) in the same valley without ever seeing towns but a few hours' journey beyond their native hills, and that distinct racial types are forming within three leagues of each other,--the memory of an event or of a name which has had influence enough to send one echo through all the forty-nine miles of peaks and craters is apt to create legend within a single generation. Nowhere in the world, perhaps, is popular imagination more oddly naive and superst.i.tious; nowhere are facts more readily exaggerated or distorted into unrecognizability; and the forms of any legend thus originated become furthermore specialized in each separate locality where it obtains a habitat. On tracing back such a legend or tradition to its primal source, one feels amazed at the variety of the metamorphoses which the simplest fact may rapidly a.s.sume in the childish fancy of this people.