An Accursed Race | Page 2

before sunrise, or to be found after

sunset within the walls of the town. But still, as the Cagots were
good-looking men, and (although they bore certain natural marks of
their caste, of which I shall speak by-and-by) were not easily
distinguished by casual passers-by from other men, they were
compelled to wear some distinctive peculiarity which should arrest the
eye; and, in the greater number of towns, it was decreed that the
outward sign of a Cagot should be a piece of red cloth sewed
conspicuously on the front of his dress. In other towns, the mark of
Cagoterie was the foot of a duck or a goose hung over their left
shoulder, so as to be seen by any one meeting them. After a time, the
more convenient badge of a piece of yellow cloth cut out in the shape
of a duck's foot, was adopted. If any Cagot was found in any town or
village without his badge, he had to pay a fine of five sous, and to lose
his dress. He was expected to shrink away from any passer-by, for fear
that their clothes should touch each other; or else to stand still in some
corner or by-place. If the Cagots were thirsty during the days which
they passed in those towns where their presence was barely suffered,
they had no means of quenching their thirst, for they were forbidden to
enter into the little cabarets or taverns. Even the water gushing out of
the common fountain was prohibited to them. Far away, in their own
squalid village, there was the Cagot fountain, and they were not
allowed to drink of any other water. A Cagot woman having to make
purchases in the town, was liable to be flogged out of it if she went to
buy anything except on a Monday--a day on which all other people
who could, kept their houses for fear of coming in contact with the
accursed race.
In the Pays Basque, the prejudices--and for some time the laws--ran
stronger against them than any which I have hitherto mentioned. The
Basque Cagot was not allowed to possess sheep. He might keep a pig
for provision, but his pig had no right of pasturage. He might cut and
carry grass for the ass, which was the only other animal he was
permitted to own; and this ass was permitted, because its existence was
rather an advantage to the oppressor, who constantly availed himself of
the Cagot's mechanical skill, and was glad to have him and his tools
easily conveyed from one place to another.

The race was repulsed by the State. Under the small local governments
they could hold no post whatsoever. And they were barely tolerated by
the Church, although they were good Catholics, and zealous frequenters
of the mass. They might only enter the churches by a small door set
apart for them, through which no one of the pure race ever passed. This
door was low, so as to compel them to make an obeisance. It was
occasionally surrounded by sculpture, which invariably represented an
oak-branch with a dove above it. When they were once in, they might
not go to the holy water used by others. They had a benitier of their
own; nor were they allowed to share in the consecrated bread when that
was handed round to the believers of the pure race. The Cagots stood
afar off, near the door. There were certain boundaries--imaginary lines
on the nave and in the isles which they might not pass. In one or two of
the more tolerant of the Pyrenean villages, the blessed bread was
offered to the Cagots, the priest standing on one side of the boundary,
and giving the pieces of bread on a long wooden fork to each person
successively.
When the Cagot died, he was interred apart, in a plot burying-ground
on the north side of the cemetery. Under such laws and prescriptions as
I have described, it is no wonder that he was generally too poor to have
much property for his children to inherit; but certain descriptions of it
were forfeited to the commune. The only possession which all who
were not of his own race refused to touch, was his furniture. That was
tainted, infectious, unclean--fit for none but Cagots.
When such were, for at least three centuries, the prevalent usages and
opinions with regard to this oppressed race, it is not surprising that we
read of occasional outbursts of ferocious violence on their part. In the
Basses-Pyrenees, for instance it is only about a hundred years since,
that the Cagots of Rehouilhes rose up against the inhabitants of the
neighbouring town of Lourdes, and got the better of them, by their
magical powers as it is said. The people of