_Bell_,--Here, sir, I have brought Fry to you, as you ordered.
_Justice_--Fry, you great rascal! What for you kill M. Rolette's calf?
_Fry_,--I did not kill M. Rolette's calf.
_Justice_ (shaking his fist).--You lie, you great ---- rascal! Bell, take him to jail. Come, gentlemen, come, _let us take a leetle quelque-chose_.
The Canadian boatmen always sing while rowing or paddling, and nothing encourages them so much as to hear the "bourgeois"[5] take the lead in the music. If the passengers, more especially those of the fair sex, join in the refrain, the compliment is all the greater.
Their songs are of a light, cheerful character, generally embodying some little satire or witticism, calculated to produce a spirited, sometimes an uproarious, chorus.
The song and refrain are carried on somewhat in the following style:
BOURGEOIS.--Par-derrière chez ma tante, Par-derrière chez ma tante.
CHORUS.--Par-derrière chez ma tante, Par-derrière chez ma tante.
BOURGEOIS.--Il y a un coq qui chante, Des pommes, des poires, des raves, des choux, Des figues nouvelles, des raisins doux.
CHORUS.--Des pommes, des poires, des raves, des choux, Des figues nouvelles, des raisins doux.
BOURGEOIS.--Il y a un coq qui chante, Il y a un coq qui chante.
BOURGEOIS.--Demande une femme à prendre, Des pommes, des poires, des raves, des choux, etc.
BOURGEOIS.--Demande une femme à prendre, Demande une femme à, etc.
And thus it continues until the advice is given successively,
Ne prenez pas une noire, Car elles aiment trop à boire, Ne prenez pas une rousse, Car elles sont trop jalouses.
And by the time all the different qualifications are rehearsed and objected to, lengthened out by the interminable repetition of the chorus, the shout of the bourgeois is heard--
"Whoop la! à terre, à terre--pour la pipe!"
It is an invariable custom for the voyageurs to stop every five or six miles to rest and smoke, so that it was formerly the way of measuring distances--"so many pipes," instead of "so many miles."
The Canadian melodies are sometimes very beautiful, and a more exhilarating mode of travel can hardly be imagined than a voyage over these waters, amid all the wild magnificence of nature, with the measured strokes of the oar keeping time to the strains of "_Le Rosier Blanc_," "En roulant ma Boule_," or "_Lève ton pied, ma jolie Bergère."_