Creole culture

“ The creole was absorbed by one great fear,—the fear of failing to furnish an heir to that adumbrating Empire. Thérèse, let us smile together at the endurance of thrones. Why, a crown scarcely seems worth the commission of a crime. It cannot even bring sleep to eyes that stare widely during whole nights.
Europe resounded with the blare of trumpets and clarions, the reverberations of cannon and the clashing of swords, while skilful needle-women embroidered a purple mantle for the creole's graceful shoulders. ”

“ This society is the freest and most refined to be found in the country.
Upon the coast of the Mississippi, from Baton Rouge to many miles below the city, the proximity of the large plantations presents an opportunity of close and constant intercourse. A very large majority of these are the property and habitations of the cultivated and intelligent Creoles of the State. And here let me explain the term Creole, which has led to so many ludicrous, and sometimes to painful mistakes. It is an arbitrary term, and imported from the West Indies into Louisiana. ”

“ The Creole songs, according to Lafcadio Hearn, are 'Frenchy in construction but possess a few African characteristics of method.' 'There could neither have been creole patois nor creole melodies but for the French and Spanish blooded slaves of Louisiana and the Antilles. ”

“ The difference in type between the white creoles and the European races from whom they have sprung, a difference often considerable, is due principally to changed environment—especially to the tropical or semi-tropical climate of the lands they inhabit. The many patois founded on French and Spanish, and used chiefly by creole negroes, are spoken of as creole languages, a term extended by some writers to include similar dialects spoken in countries where the word creole is rarely used. ”

“ Unique is getting to imply merely excellent or perhaps only unusual; its exact etymological value is departing forever. Creole, which should be applied only to Caucasian natives of tropical countries born of Latin parents, is beginning to carry with it in the vulgar tongue of to-day a vague suspicion of negro blood. ”

“ I would also recommend those interested in such folklore to peruse the Creole novel of Dr. Alfred Mercier—Les Saint-Ybars, which contains excellent examples of the Louisiana dialect; and Baissac’s beautiful little stories, “Recits Créoles,” rich in pictures of the old French colonial life. The foreign philological reviews and periodicals, especially those of Paris, have published quite a variety of animal fables, proverbs, stories in various Creole dialects ”

“ The castes are confounded and have formed an American stock, in which we may distinguish the psychological traits of the Indian and the negro, while the shades of skin and forms of skull reveal a remote intermixture. If all the races of the New World were finally to unite, the Creole would be the real American.
He is idle and brilliant. There is nothing excessive either in his ideals or his passions; all is mediocre, measured, harmonious. ”

“ The above ancient Creole ditty contains some curious information about the occupations which some of our old-fashioned colored Creoles alone follow, and of which they alone know the secrets. We are indebted therefor to a gentleman of this city who has made a rich collection of these songs. ”

“ Nearly all the Creoles here—white—know English, French, and Spanish, more or less well, in addition to the patois employed only in speaking to children or servants. When a child becomes about ten years old, it is usually forbidden to speak Creole under any other circumstances.
But I do not suppose this will much interest you. I shall endeavour—this time I’m afraid to promise—to secure you some Mexican or Havanese music ”

“ Get up to resume your promenade, and you hear a dozen languages in as many steps; while every nation, and tribe, and people—French, English, Irish, German, Spanish, Creole, Chinese, African, Quadroon, Mulatto, American—jostles you in good-humored confusion.
Some gigantic negresses, with gaudy kerchiefs, like turbans, about their heads, are selling fruits, and sit erect as palm-trees. They look like African or Indian princesses, a little annoyed at being separated from their thrones and retinues, but none the less regal "for a' that." ”

“ From this son sprang the proud Creole family of De Charleu. It rose straight up, up, up, generation after generation, tall, branchless, slender, palm-like; and finally, in the time of which I am to tell, flowered with all the rare beauty of a century-plant, in Artemise, Innocente, Felicité, the twins Marie and Martha, Leontine and little Septima; the seven beautiful daughters for whom their home had been fitly named Belles Demoiselles. ”

“ Reading, writing, and arithmetic are taught there in two languages, French and Spanish. There is also the house of the French nuns, who have some young girls as boarders, and who have a class for day students. There is also a boarding school for young Creole girls, which was established about fifteen months ago.... The Creole women lacking in general the talents that adorn education have no taste for music, drawing or, embroidery, but in revenge they have an extreme passion for dancing and would pass all their days and nights at it. ”

“ All who have ever entered a French Creole family have observed the gentle and respectful bearing of the children, their strict yet unconstrained observance of all the proprieties of their position, and also the affectionate intercourse between these and their parents, and toward each other—never an improper word ”

“ Pride and a natural feeling of good manners prevent the stranger from seeing such performances. The creole speaks of the wealth of his 163 country in the most exaggerated manner; he has so many of the good things of the world at his door, that he naturally boasts; he thinks little of other parts of the world; he has no idea of leaving his own fruits and flowers. The roads are bad; he cares little for their use. ”

“ Turiault tells us that in the towns of Martinique, where the Creole is gradually changing into French, the Bitacos, or country negroes who still speak the patois nearly pure, are much ridiculed by their municipal brethren:—Ça ou ka palé là, chè, c’est nèg:—Ça pas Créole! (“What you talk is ‘nigger,’ my dear:—that isn’t Creole!”) In like manner a young Creole negro or negress of New Orleans might tell an aged member of his race: “Ça qui to parlé ça pas Créole: ça c’est gombo!” I have sometimes heard the pure and primitive Creole also called “Congo” by colored folks of the new generation. ”

“ The Creole negro is gracefully shaped, finely proportioned: his limbs are lithe, his neck long;—his features are more delicate, his lips less thick, his nose less flattened, than those of the African;—he has the Carib's large and melancholy eye, better adapted to express the emotions.... Rarely can you discover in him the sombre fury of the African, rarely a surly and savage mien: he is brave, chatty, boastful. His skin has not the same tint as his father's,—it has become more satiny ”

“ The Creoles, although considerably less oppressed than the coloured races, had felt themselves more so; because, being more enlightened and civilized, they had a livelier feeling and perception of the yoke than the Indians and half-castes. Children and descendants of the Spaniards, who looked with sovereign contempt upon every thing Creole, even to their own offspring, the white Mexicans imbibed hatred of Spain almost with their mothers' milk. ”

“ The proper meaning of the word “creole” is very different from that which we attach to it. It signifies a person of Spanish or French descent, born in Louisiana or in the southern or tropical countries. The great majority of the planters here are French creoles, and it is said they are kinder and better masters than Americans or Scotch, the latter being considered the most severe. Intelligent on most subjects, they are resolute in the belief that England must take their cotton or perish. ”

“ Sifting down the mass of conflicting definitions, it appears that to a Caucasian, a Creole is a native of the lower parishes of Louisiana, in whose veins some traces of Spanish, West Indian or French blood runs.19 The Caucasian will shudder with horror at the idea of including a person of color in the definition, and the person of color will retort with his definition that a Creole is a native of Louisiana, in whose blood runs mixed strains of everything un-American, with the African strain slightly apparent. ”

“ The dialect thus formed by the aid of traits common to many negro tribes was a solution into which their differences fell to become modified; when the barriers of language were broken down, the common African nature, with all its good and evil, appeared in a Creole form. The forced labor, the caprice of masters, and the cruel supervision of the overseers engendered petty vices of theft, concealment, and hypocrisy. The slave became meaner than the native African in all respects; even his passions lost their extravagant sincerity, but part of the manliness went with it. ”

“ In a tier near the ground a man is standing and calling—standing head and shoulders above the rest—callimg in the Américaine tongue. Another man, big and red, named Joe, and a handsome little Creole in elegant dress and full of laughter, wish to stop him, but the flat-boatmen, ha-ha-ing and cheering, will not suffer it. ”

“ The Creole dialects are corruptions of French, Spanish and Portuguese. Mr. Cable's stories revealed to English readers the singularly quaint charm of the phraseology and manners of the Creoles of Louisiana, who are of French descent. Besides the American and Creole inhabitants, the population is made up of Germans, Irish, Italians, Spaniards, Scandinavians, Jews, Negroes, mixed races, Indians, Chinese and Malays. A large international trade is carried through New Orleans ”

“ As a general rule, even while questioning her fidelity, the creole freely confesses her kindness of heart, and grants her capable of extreme generosity and devotedness to strangers or to children whom she has an opportunity to care for. Indeed, her natural kindness is so strikingly in contrast with the harder and subtler character of the men of color that one might almost feel tempted to doubt if she belong to the same race. Said a creole once, in my hearing:—"The gens-de-couleur are just like the tourtouroux: [48] one must pick out the females and leave the males alone." ”

“ With this single exception, the narrow thread-like line of descent from the Indian wife, diminished to a mere strand by injudicious alliances, and deaths in the gutters of old New Orleans, was extinct. The name, by Spanish contact, had become De Carlos; but this one surviving bearer of it was known to all, and known only, as Injin Charlie.
One thing I never knew a Creole to do. He will not utterly go back on the ties of blood, no matter what sort of knots those ties may be. For one reason, he is never ashamed of his or his father's sins; and for another,—he will tell you—he is "all heart!" ”

“ Kind feelings exist between the populations, and the prejudices which have so effectually kept them apart for so long a time are giving way rapidly now, since most of the younger portion of the Creole-French population are educated in the United States, and away from New Orleans; consequently they speak the English language and form American associations, imbibe American ideas, and essay to rival American enterprise. ”

“ Creoledom wakes up as slowly and cautiously as possible; and has not fairly begun to enter upon the business of the day until the sun has warmed the streets. The comparatively new generation of American citizens, when brought into contact with this older population, is utterly unable to understand the difference of character ”

“ Economy and simplicity govern “La Cuisine Creole”; and its many savory dishes are rendered palatable more as the result of care in their preparation than any great skill or expensive outlay in the selection of materials. The Creole housewife often makes delicious morceaux from the things usually thrown away by the extravagant servant. She is proud of her art, and deservedly receives the compliments of her friends. ”

“ Even some of the spectators unaffected by the charms of the beautiful Creole, cannot restrain themselves from a certain feeling of envy; while others more deeply interested feel chagrined to the heart’s core, by what they are pleased to designate an impudent avowal! ”

“ Mounn ouè défaut les-zautt, yo pas ni zié pou ta yo. (Les gens voient les défauts des autres, ils n’ont pas d’yeux pour les leurs.)
“Folks see the faults of others; they have no eyes for their own.” [88] — [Martinique.]
[88] This proverb, not being of true Creole origin, receives a place here as an illustration of effective patois. In Louisiana we never say ta yo, but so quenne....Were all proverbs used by the Creole-speaking people included in this collection, it would be considerably longer. Nearly all familiar English proverbs have received Creole adoption, with slight modifications ”

“ Creoles, Tagals, Chinese, and Mestizoes. The Spaniards and the Tagals need no explanation, for the latter are the pure natives of the islands. Creole, I believe, is variously used in different locations; but it is a Spanish word, coming from criolla, which means grown up. They are one thing in the Spanish West Indies, another in Brazil.
"A more general definition is a person born in any country, but not of native blood. In the Philippines, Creoles are the children of Spanish fathers and native mothers. Mestizoes are children of Chinese parents on one side and natives on the other. ”

“ A beautiful country and full of interest, if, forsooth, one might exist without a stomach. Everything is Creole—Creole cows, Creole milk, Creole eggs—even the ‘niggers’ are Creoles, and all speak French. My limited vocabulary of pure Parisian French has stood a heavy drain and has occasionally precipitated upon my hearers consequences which I feared would prove serious;—item—Night before last we stopped in a hamlet of shanties and at last found the ‘Hotel,’ kept by a talkative, voluble French idiot and his wife. ”