Memoir | Page 8

By means of great application, and by the aid of light
from heaven, he accomplished the task of translating into their
language a number of the prayers and chants of the church, so that they
now sing the _Kyrie_, the _Gloria in Excelsis_, the _Credo_, &c, even
the _Te Deum_, on the Roman or Parisian tone, (for this worthy priest
came from Paris). They know many hymns of the Blessed Virgin,
which they sing equally well, also the prose Dies Irae. They sing mass
fairly well, especially the tone Royal, and the mass for the dead. Some
persons may be surprised at this, and perhaps harbor a doubt of it, but I
can testify as a witness to its truth. More than a hundred times they
have sung it for me. So recently as the month of August, 1823, I was in
a parish called Havre-a-Bouchers, when twenty-six canoes filled with
Indians arrived there; they came to have their children baptised, and for
confession, &c. There were eight singers among them, and during the
week that they remained, they sang mass for me each day, and one
might say conducted themselves like canons or like Trappists! They
have clear voices. These poor Indians might shame some of our
European Catholics by their zeal and their piety; they will go fifty or
even a hundred leagues to find a priest and to receive the Sacraments,
and as it often happens that they have no provisions when they arrive,
they pass two or three days without eating, occupied only with their
souls and forgetful of the wants of the body.
While in Halifax, which is the capital of Nova Scotia, I found myself
overladen with work. The priest who was with me being in very
delicate health and often indisposed, most of the work fell to me. He
was at length obliged to go away for change of air and was absent for a
month, during which time it fell to me to baptize, confess, marry, visit
the sick in town and country, and be on my feet day and night, besides
saying mass on Sundays and Holy days.
Although I knew very little English, I preached twice in that language
in the Catholic church of the town, where there were about two
thousand Catholics, of whom the greater number were Irish.
Soon I felt constrained to go further into the Province of Nova Scotia to
minister to the wants of the poor, neglected inhabitants. The first place

to which I went was a parish called Chezzetcook, composed of French
Acadians, who were without a priest. It is seven leagues from the town
(Halifax) and when it possessed a missionary the Indians had been
accustomed to go there. They were not long in learning of my presence,
and came from a circuit of fifteen or twenty leagues. I had a
transparancy representing the suffering souls in purgatory, which our
Revered Father Abbot had made. The figures expressing different
shades of grief and of the desire as well as the hope of seeing God,
combined with the brilliant and real looking flames, were well
calculated to produce an impression. I showed it to them and explained
it by means of one of their interpreters who knew French. At once
penetrated with compassion and charity for the suffering souls in
purgatory they began to weep, and to look up the money they had with
them so as to have the Holy Sacrifice offered on behalf of these
suffering souls, and that without my having said anything to give them
the idea. They all wear the cross, some have it hung round their necks,
others fasten it on their breast. It is seldom that an Indian leaves home
without his beads; they generally have them and do not neglect to say
them, sometimes repeating the chapelet several times a day, as well as
in the middle of the night, when they rise to pray. They observe all the
fasts of the Church, and the penances imposed on them they generally
perform on Fridays. On that day in a spirit of penitence, and in memory
of the passion of Jesus Christ, a man will hold out to his wife the backs
of his hands, which the wife strikes with a rod, giving twenty, thirty, or
fifty blows. She then in turn presents her hands and receives the same
chastisement from her husband. This chastisement is dealt out
indiscriminately, children are thus chastized by their parents, and what
is surprising, the little Indians when struck on the hands do not
withdraw them, no matter how much they feel the pain. I have seen
them bleeding, yet in spite of that they were firm and motionless. Their
religion is not only exterior, they have it in their heart as