Mr. Prohack
MR. PROHACK BY ARNOLD BENNETT Author of "Clayhanger," etc. CONTENTS CHAPTER I THE NEW POOR
shoulders. The beginnings of my dinner went fast, but after soup there
was a lull before greater food, and I paid attention again to my
neighbors. They were talking in English.
"A Huron of Lorette--does that mean a full-blooded Indian of the Huron
tribe, such as one reads of in Parkman?" It was the Englishman who
asked, responding to something I had not heard.
"There's no such animal as a full-blooded Huron," stated the Canadian.
"They're all French-Indian half-breeds now. Lorette's an interesting
scrap of history, just the same. You know your Parkman? You remember how
the Iroquois followed the defeated Hurons as far as the Isle d'Orleans,
out there?" He nodded toward where the big island lay in the darkness of
the St. Lawrence. "Well, what was left after that chase took refuge
fifteen miles north of Quebec, and founded what became and has stayed
the village of Indian Lorette. There are now about five or six hundred
people, and it's a nation. Under its own laws, dealing by treaty with
Canada, not subject to draft, for instance. Queer, isn't it? They guard
their identity vigilantly. Every one, man or woman, who marries into the
tribe, as they religiously call it, is from then on a Huron. And only
those who have Huron blood may own land in Lorette. The Hurons were, as
Parkman put it, 'the gentlemen of the savages,' and the tradition lasts.
The half-breed of today is a good sort, self-respecting and brave, not
progressive, but intelligent, with pride in his inheritance, his
courage, and his woodscraft."
MR. PROHACK BY ARNOLD BENNETT Author of "Clayhanger," etc. CONTENTS CHAPTER I THE NEW POOR