An Accursed Race | Page 5

the south and west of France, who are reputed to be
of Cagot descent at this day, are, like their ancestors, tall, largely made,
and powerful in frame; fair and ruddy in complexion, with gray-blue
eyes, in which some observers see a pensive heaviness of look. Their
lips are thick, but well-formed. Some of the reports name their sad
expression of countenance with surprise and suspicion--"They are not
gay, like other folk." The wonder would be if they were. Dr. Guyon, the
medical man of the last century who has left the clearest report on the
health of the Cagots, speaks of the vigorous old age they attain to. In
one family alone, he found a man of seventy-four years of age; a
woman as old, gathering cherries; and another woman, aged

eighty-three, was lying on the grass, having her hair combed by her
great-grandchildren. Dr. Guyon and other surgeons examined into the
subject of the horribly infectious smell which the Cagots were said to
leave behind them, and upon everything they touched; but they could
perceive nothing unusual on this head. They also examined their ears,
which according to common belief (a belief existing to this day), were
differently shaped from those of other people; being round and gristly,
without the lobe of flesh into which the ear-ring is inserted. They
decided that most of the Cagots whom they examined had the ears of
this round shape; but they gravely added, that they saw no reason why
this should exclude them from the good-will of men, and from the
power of holding office in Church and State. They recorded the fact,
that the children of the towns ran baaing after any Cagot who had been
compelled to come into the streets to make purchases, in allusion to this
peculiarity of the shape of the ear, which bore some resemblance to the
ears of the sheep as they are cut by the shepherds in this district. Dr.
Guyon names the case of a beautiful Cagot girl, who sang most sweetly,
and prayed to be allowed to sing canticles in the organ-loft. The
organist, more musician than bigot, allowed her to come, but the
indignant congregation, finding out whence proceeded that clear, fresh
voice, rushed up to the organ-loft, and chased the girl out, bidding her
"remember her ears," and not commit the sacrilege of singing praises to
God along with the pure race.
But this medical report of Dr. Guyon's--bringing facts and arguments to
confirm his opinion, that there was no physical reason why the Cagots
should not be received on terms of social equality by the rest of the
world--did no more for his clients than the legal decrees promulgated
two centuries before had done. The French proved the truth of the
saying in Hudibras -
He that's convinced against his will
Is of the same opinion still.
And, indeed, the being convinced by Dr. Guyon that they ought to
receive Cagots as fellow-creatures, only made them more rabid in
declaring that they would not. One or two little occurrences which are

recorded, show that the bitterness of the repugnance to the Cagots was
in full force at the time just preceding the first French revolution. There
was a M. d'Abedos, the curate of Lourbes, and brother to the seigneur
of the neighbouring castle, who was living in seventeen hundred and
eighty; he was well-educated for the time, a travelled man, and sensible
and moderate in all respects but that of his abhorrence of the Cagots: he
would insult them from the very altar, calling out to them, as they stood
afar off, "Oh! ye Cagots, damned for evermore!" One day, a half-blind
Cagot stumbled and touched the censer borne before this Abbe de
Lourbes. He was immediately turned out of the church, and forbidden
ever to re-enter it. One does not know how to account for the fact, that
the very brother of this bigoted abbe, the seigneur of the village, went
and married a Cagot girl; but so it was, and the abbe brought a legal
process against him, and had his estates taken from him, solely on
account of his marriage, which reduced him to the condition of a Cagot,
against whom the old law was still in force. The descendants of this
Seigneur de Lourbes are simple peasants at this very day, working on
the lands which belonged to their grandfather.
This prejudice against mixed marriages remained prevalent until very
lately. The tradition of the Cagot descent lingered among the people,
long after the laws against the accursed race were abolished. A Breton
girl, within the last few years, having two lovers each of reputed Cagot
descent, employed a notary to examine their pedigrees, and see which
of the two had least Cagot in him; and to