Rand and the MicmacsClark, Jeremiah S. (Jeremiah Simpson)
History
Rand and the Micmacs
Clark, Jeremiah S. (Jeremiah Simpson)
Indians of North America -- Canada; Micmac Indians; Rand, Silas Tertius, 1810-1889
At last Glooscap was disgusted with the treachery of the foreigners, and
saddened by the weakness of his own people; so, by way of giving vent to
his righteous indignation, he turned his kettle upside down, and
transformed his two dogs into rocks, where they stand to-day, the
guardians of Blomidon, still looking westward awaiting his return. Then
the Great Snowy Owl retreated into the depths of the forest, where his
mournful cry is often heard as he wails again and again:
“Koo-koo-skoe,—I am so sorry.” The lordly Glooscap sailed away to the
land of the setting sun on Fundy’s ebbing tide as it returned again to
the ocean; there he makes his home in the Acadie of the blessed, until
the faithless interlopers have either changed their barbarian habits, or
gone to their own place. When all men shall have learned to honour Truth
he will return and usher in the millennium amidst the wildest rejoicing
of the elements.
But oh, the people are weary of waiting for his return, the stoutest
hearts are failing; for search-party after search-party has come back,
bringing only ample proofs of his unceasing love; Glooscap will never
return to beautiful _Megamaage_ the Acadie, or Wholesome Place of the
Micmacs; Kenap and Sakumow now drown the memory of the former times by
destroying body and soul with the withering curse of the pale-face, or
take up the wail of the old women and re-echo the mournful cry of the
Wobekookoogwes, the great Snowy Owl, which comes again with startling
clearness from the depth of the forest: “I am so sorry,—Koo-koo-skoo.”
And now as the camp-fire has burned low, and the melancholy cry of the
owl resounds through the lonely archways of the forest, let us repeat
the final word of the _Booske-atookwa_, the sage story teller, and
reverently say _Kespeadooksit_,—the story is ended.
We have spent a few moments, idly perhaps, in hastily reviewing some
features of the Mythology of the Micmacs, and we have found a weird
delight in studying what was to them most sacred. But the mythology of
the people, beautiful as it is, is not by any means the life-giving
Truth; the outgrowth of the human mind, this rugged faith must fail to
lead that mind to anything outside of itself; for the most magnificent
statue on which man ever worked is still at heart a stone. Like
Tennyson’s Prophet, the Mythology of the Micmacs is dead:
“Dead!
And the people cried with a stormy cry;
‘Send them no more for evermore,
Let the people die.’
Dead!
‘Is he then brought so low?’
And a careless people came from the fields
With a purse to pay for the show.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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