Chapter 35:
Note on the Americans called Crakeurs or Gaugeurs
I also said in the first part of my memoirs, that while visiting Tougoulou, Franklin, and other places situated in the hinterland of the United States, I had found some Anglo-Americans of a peculiar sort, called Crakeurs or Gaugeurs, who are nearly all one-eyed. I wanted to know the reason for this. The reader will perhaps not be displeased if I give an account at this time of what I learned about this on the spot.
The reader will remember that I said above that the inhabitants of North Carolina harvested a large quantity of potatoes, with which they made a kind of tafia which they call whiskey. These Crakeurs are very fond of this liquor; when they drink some of it, since they are by nature quarrelsome and mean, they quarrel among themselves, and agree to fight on the day they appoint. Their fights are very much like English pugilism or boxing, except that they are more murderous. When the Crakeurs have agreed on the day and the hour when they are supposed to fight, they gather as many spectators as they can; they form them in a circle and stand in the center, and at a signal given by the oldest among the spectators, the fight begins.
It is interesting to note that these men are very careful, from their infancy on, never to cut their fingernails which they simply let grow. In order to make them very tough, they smear them with tallow and then hold them in front of the fire; the tallow, as it melts, penetrates the pores of the nail and makes it extremely hard when it has dried. I have seen some which were as hard and as dangerous as the claws of a lion. Not satisfied with this weapon, they even arm their heels with spurs, which they never take off, not even to go to bed, and whose rosette is a very sharp pointed spike. It is with such weapons that they present themselves for the fight; it is easy to imagine how deadly they are.
When the elder among them has given the signal for the fight, by saying: Any thing is allowed, then the two antagonists attack each other with their teeth, spurs and fingernails, which they use very skilfully. When one of the two succumbs, the other makes the most of his advantage, and inhumanly tears him to pieces, and easily succeeds in tearing out one of his eyes. Until then the onlookers watch the fight with the greatest calmness; it is only at this time that they put an end to the fight; and if they do not do it quickly, it happens sometimes that both eyes are torn out. Then the victor climbs up on the stump of a tree, a great number of which are cut approximately three feet above ground; and there, all covered with blood, he crows over his victory; he insults the assembly, challenges all the spectators one after the other, by telling them that there is not among them a man his equal. Anger excites his imagination to such an extent, that when no one presents himself to avenge his insults, he defies the Creator to descend from the heavens to try his strength with him. When he has finished all his provocations, he comes down from the tree stump and every one applauds and proclaims him the victor. Since these fights occur often, it follows that you meet in this nation few men who do not have one eye put out in this manner.
These men are very wicked and do not wish to submit to any government; for the most part they live, more often than not, only by hunting. They plant a little tobacco which they carry, during the winter, to seaboard towns, and which they barter for wisky, firearms, and gunpowder. Although I remained only a few days among them, I had the opportunity of being invited to a meal which amused me a great deal by its singularity, although the food was very bad. This is how it was:
One of these men, having recognized me as a stranger, invited me to have dinner at his house with several of his friends; his wife, who had heard that in well-bred company it was proper to serve tea, asked her husband to get some in exchange for tobacco; he brought her half a bushel of it. She put it all in a cooking-pot and added to it a large ham; she boiled the whole lot until the ham was cooked. The guests having arrived, she took the ham out on an earthenware dish, threw away the liquor, and placed the tea leaves on another dish, and served the whole on the table. I saw all the faces light up at the sight of an inviting dish about which they were building up high hopes, and every one was getting ready to have a real treat. I observed, without saying a word, not being in a hurry to be the first one to give an opinion on food that I knew was not fit to eat; and I watched each one chew with all his might the tea leaves which no longer had any agreeable taste, when suddenly the wife flew into a great rage against her husband, at whose head she threw her plate, reproaching him for having brought her inferior tea, and for having used the money, which good tea would have cost, to buy whiskey for himself. This comical scene made me laugh a great deal; but it was not without difficulty that I succeeded in making the woman listen to reason, and in making her understand that it was not the tea leaves which were used, but instead their infusion, mixed with a little sugar.
Since I had not eaten anything, and was very hungry, I decided to taste the ham which I found rather good, and to which the tea had given an excellent flavor. I ate a great deal of it, since it constituted the whole dinner.
These men go around almost naked. They are addicted to idleness and drunkenness to such an extent that it is the women who are obliged to do everything. They are somewhat better dressed than the men. In winter, they spin cotton and flax which they mix together; from this they make a cloth which serves for all their clothes, even for shirts. These women are as hard-working as the men are lazy.
The farther one goes into the hinterlands of the United States, which are nearly all inhabited by the same kind of men, the more dangerous and mean one finds them. They often murder travelers to rob them. Their closest neighbors are scarcely any safer; they go to the homes of those whom they believe to have some wealth; and when they have succeeded in getting into a house, they kill all those they find there, lead away the cattle, and carry away all the goods which they sell afterwards in another state. These thieves wear their hair cut very close to their heads, and paint their bodies and faces with different colors in the manner of the savages; so that their appearance is truly frightful.
There is in each state of the United States a governor who, once in office, looks upon himself as an absolute sovereign. He uses all means which are in his power to secure the devotion of the persons under his administration; impunity is one of those which he uses with the greatest success. Thus it is most difficult to obtain restitution of the stolen goods from the thieves of whom I have just spoken, and who are placed under the protection of one of these governors. The request for the restitution of goods is often made without success.
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