The times. (Owosso, Mich.) 1882-1897, 1886-07-16
THE ACADTAN. WILD MAN.

Louisiana there winds to the sea a slow
brown bayou called the Terrebonne,
from the fertility of the black loamy
land through which it flows. Big sugar
plantations lie along its course, but
near the mouth are the homes of many
Acadians, for this was one of the
streams along which they settled in
Louisiana.
They cultivate little rice farms and
orange groves, and live in summer upon
their fishing and the produce of their
gardens in winter-upon the game that
abounds in the marshes. Since their
exile they, like the Bourbons, have for
gotten nothing and have learned moth
ing. Their language, customs and
manners are identically the same as the
day when
With the turn of the tide the ships sailed out
And the coasts of their beloved land grew
misty with distance.
In among these thriving little farms
is large tract of land, a melancholy,
weedy waste. Great forest trees have
grown up in the midst of what were fair
fields that waved with golden rice.
Fences and boundaries long ago rotted
away. The bitches are choked with
grass, and young willows grow along
their line. The whole is matted with
the tangled growth of the lavish vegeta-
ton brought up from this fertile soil by
the tropical suns and wild rains. Some
times at dusk you will catch glimpse
of bent figure skulking away from the
door of ruined cottage whose CHM
neys have fallen in, whose roof is q
green pulpy mass of lichen, and whose
walls totter forward to q fall. The
neighbors will explain that it is only
old Allandin, the wild man.
If you will lie in wait about this hour
of the day, concealed in the underbrush,
you may catch closer glimpse of him.
He looks seventy, but is not really so
old. His once tall form is bent, and he
walks with the quick, creeping move
ments of an animal. Long gray hair
hangs in filthy matted locks to his waist
and mingles with his great sweeping
beard. Two large dark eyes gaze out
from wrinkled, pallid face through
the rough hair with glare like cat.
His hands are like rough, knotted
claws, and his whole body has growth
of coarse hair upon it. His only cover
ing is pair of brown blankets, through
which hole has been torn to admit
his head, and he creeps silently away
every night into the forest swamps.
This is the story the neighbors tell
Thirty years ago there was no more
prosperous farm in the parish than that
of Etienne Allandin, and no more
respected man than its rich young
owner. He was alone in the world with
the exception Of some distant cousins,
but his friends were many, and he was
betrothed to a pretty young girl who
was to marry him in the next March.
His face was plain, except for his
splendid dark eyes, but he had q warm,
gentle heart, and was q fine parti, so
that he would not have asked any
parent around for twenty miles for their
daughter in vain. According to old
Acadian usage, he built new house
that winter, spending loving care upon
the nest that was to hold his little mate.
The wedding day approached. The
happy bridegroom made ready the
marriage cor6eiiIc, rs was usual, only
his gifts were the most splendid ever
seen in that simple neighborhood. The
wedding gown was of real white silk,
the veil, wreath of wax orange flowers,
with the white shoes and gloves, had
come all the way from New Orleans.
He rose early that lovely March morn
ing, and arrayed himself carefully in
his black, shiny clothes, casting tender,
amused glances at the little feminine
garments lying on that pride of every
Acadian woman's heart, plump,
strong bed with ruffied pillows. He
was making up q parcel of these gar
ments ready to be carried to the bride
when an embarrassed and sympathetic
delegation came to inform him that the
bride had disappeared. She had eloped
with a handsome young good-for-naught
who had been refused by her parents,
and had left not word for her be-
trothed. Alandn stood like man
stunned; then he turned every one out,
and shut himself in with his ruined
Soon the neighbors whispered that
the new house was empty and Allandin
had gone away to the swamp. From
that day he never spoke to any human
being. All day the man hid in his
house, and with nightfall went to the
forest, and like wild beast sought his
food. Crawfish, lizards, field mice, and
birds, eaten raw, were his sustenance.
His hair and beard grew long and
his clothes fell to pieces, and
blanket became his only garb. In all
these thirty years he has never spoken,
and now he knows no human language.
His only sounds are few inarticulate
cries, and he shuns his kind like q
haunted animal. The sympathetic Aca-
dams have never disturbed him, and at
nights when they hear faint echo from
the swamps of wild human cry, they
look sadly at each other and say:
UC'eSk e Ddn1,re AMandin cal p'=M Y