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Date Posted: Monday, October 03, 04:01:14am
Author: Lij
Author Host/IP: adsl-99-186-239-143.dsl.bltnin.sbcglobal.net / 99.186.239.143
Subject: Some old French tales of my hometown....

Charlie Page's Loup Garou Story
As told by Pepe Boucher

Page was a dare-devil kind of man who hunted in the woods and feared nothing. He carried a dirque, or a big long blade knife, that open and shut with some kind of spring on its back. All he did to open the blade was press his finger on the back and puff! it was open. There be plenty of Indians in those days and they knew Page and his beeg knife. Still Page and the Indians be pretty good friends; they know he not be afraid of them or their medicine man. In fact he not think of Heaven nor Hell with fear.

One night he was going home out past Vinegar Hill, a great big black dog stood in the path and growled and gnashed his teeth at Page. The dog did not seem to know that Page never got out of any animals's path so there it stood even when Page said "A bas chien," then wagging his hand said "Au Revoir."

Other dogs get out of the big man's way when he wave his hand. Mais this one come advancing with hideous howls and gleaming red eyes that be like coals of fire in the black of the night. Then Page he be mad at the dog and he said "Bete Noir Vole! Vole!" Mais the black beast did not fly away from him nor turn its eyes from his. With a great leap it came nearer to him by five feet. Then Page cursed and lifted his big foot to kick it in the jaw. With a stealthy pantherlike movement the great frothing beast sprang at his throat.

You bet this time he tried to kick and get his knife to finish the dog whose hot breath was singeing his hair--whose great paws were tearing his shoulders and whose fangs were near his neck. With one of his powerful arms he grab the neck of the dog until his tongue hant out. The shaggy hair on the dog's neck be lashing his face and his eyes blazing with madness. The loup garou be trying to bewitch Page. He know now it be loup garou. He know that nothing but blood could save him. Struggling to use his knife the beast pushed the point against Page to make him draw his own blood. Now had Page not been almost a giant he would have turned right into a loup garou.

Throwing his whole strength into the struggle he pushed the knife through the shaggy fur, deep behind the fore legs of the loup garou. Et Sacre! There in the flash of an eye the beast disappeared in flames as the blood spurted from his veins. Then Page saw--what do you think? I'll be dog-gone you never guess. There stood Page with his shoulders scratched, his hair be singed, his nose poisoned with sulphur breath of the wolf, his knife reeking with the blood of the cursed loup garou; and facing him stood his best friend, Jean Vetal. They look and look at each other! Mais they spoke no word. Soon they part, each going to his own home. The knife had cut Jean Vetal's arm near the elbow, he doctor it and soon it be well, and then he be delivered from the loup garou power.

Page and Vetal never spoke of the horrible animal for 101 days. Mais every one saw that Vetal be powerful kind to Page. Vetal be a rich man, much richer than Page be so he give Page a horse and a cow. After 101 days be over and gone by, they tell their friends and everyone understand how well Vetal treat Page et Pourquoi.

You want to know about the time now! Bien the time sometime be a year and a day, sometime a week and a day, or it be 101 days. Always the extra one day.

___________________________________________________

My 2nd cousin now owns Otter Pond what was known as Otter Lake.
------------------------------------
The Spirit of Otter Lake
As told by Pepe Boucher

Oui, oui, this be true I think me. In the Spanish days of Vincennes, there live here a most beautiful senorita whose name be Donna Mariana Gonzalez. Her father is Don Samon Gonzalez, and he be very proud; too proud to want his daughter to marry young Duffee.

Ma foi, young people who live find way to be together, and with others they went to Otter Lake, to fish, to hunt and to boat ride. Mais one day her father give orders she be going to St. Genevieve, the Spanish settlement on the west bank of the Mississippi below Kaskaskia. Donna Mariana knew her father's word to be law and that when she be in St. Genevieve she must marry a rich old ugly Don who be very rich. He be her father's old frend. Ma foi, they say he be awful old and ugly.

No one be surprised when they not see Donna Gonzalez for days, because her father had told everyone that young Dufree see her no more till she be marry. Bien, one day some French be hunt and some be fish at Otter Lake, and they see a beautiful face float on the water. Beautiful in the distance, mais when it be fish out they see it be Donna Mariana the beautiful daughter of Samon Gonzalez.

For many years no French trap or fish around Otter Lake but they hear the moan of the drowning girl or a weird wail of a song she always sang when she be at the King's Ball. She sang, dance modouieuse--ah! I not tell how lovely she sang, and how beautiful she be. Her father wanted her to be queen, mais when she lay dead he knew she love, oui love hard, to throw herself in Otter Lake to escape the old man she love not. So many say they hear her dying cry go out to meet her lover as she struggle in the waters.

Ma foi, they make your hair stand up, when they been out at Otter Lake after dark and tell you what agony came in wails across the waters, and lights like two eyes travel with moans. Then if any be brave and try to catch the lights, they flicker here, there yonger, hither thither back of him, now before him, always beyond his reach. Then they be swallowed in the water, disappearing with an awful maddening groan. Mon, mon, I hear them not, for I go not to fish where a woman be drown.

I like not de taste of da fish nor de water when my mind recollect de ole story of Donna Mariana Gonzalez.

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Replies:

[> Ah, the French. -- AurraSing, Monday, October 03, 08:04:05pm (NoHost/173.180.105.8)

I don't want to be having issues the next time I order fish, dammit!


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[> [> LOL!! -- Lij, Monday, October 03, 08:30:50pm (adsl-99-50-229-230.dsl.bltnin.sbcglobal.net/99.50.229.230)

But just from Otter Pond/Lake.

From which, btw, I have eaten bluegill.

Tasted fine to me! But that was about 200 years after this story was supposed to have happened.

Vincennes was never under the rule of the Spanish. And the St Genevieve that he talks about was a French not Spanish settlement. Although after the French lost control of most of their colonial American territory in 1763 (end of 7 years war) the Spanish took over the west bank of the Mississippi, where St Genevieve lies.

Vincennes did have a somewhat famous Italian/Spanish trader who lived in the town named Francis Vigo. There is even a statue of him (a large one) on the grounds of the George Rogers Clark National Monument in Vincennes (See Pic: JOSEPH MARIA FRANCESCO VIGO).

Vigo funded Clark's attack on Vincennes. It's interesting to wonder that if not for this man, who would later die destitute, the United States of America might have not stretched from "sea to shining sea."

...


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