A Short History of Indians in Canada (9 page)

BOOK: A Short History of Indians in Canada
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The calves grew quickly, and, instead of huddling by their mothers, they began running around the field like
idiots, playing with each other. Luke would sit on the fence and watch them. One of them, Mary, according to Luke, came all the way over to the fence to let Luke pet her. “I didn’t even have salt on my hand. Bet the bears wouldn’t do that.” On the weekends, when we crossed the field on our way to the zoo, the calves would bounce along behind us like rubber balls, all the way to the creek.

“I’m going to get a good job, soon,” Mum said. “I’ve got my name in at the big companies in town. This is just temporary. We’ll be back on our feet in no time.”

“How come you cry at night, Mum?”

“That’s a nightmare you’re having, Luke.”

“It’s the animals at the zoo he hears,” I said.

Mum got a job at the Woolworth’s store, but she didn’t stop smoking. When
Star Wars
came to town, we all went to see it. Granny, Mum, Luke, and me. Even Granny liked the movie. Mum bought a big bag of popcorn, and Luke and me each got a medium soft drink.

We didn’t hear the cows until we got home. Granny lit a cigarette and blew a silvery stream into the night sky. “They’ll go on like that for days,” she said. And she opened the porch and went in.

Luke and me stood in the yard and listened. It was the strangest sound, low and urgent, almost a wail, as though the cows were calling out to each other in the dark. Luke covered his ears.

“It’s the bull,” I said. “You’re too young to understand. ”

The cows kept up the racket for the next couple of
nights. Granny said she could hear them all day long, that they never stopped. But, by Saturday, when we got up to go to the zoo, the cows were quiet.

The sun was low in the trees, when we got to the field. The grass was bright and wet, and the cows were moving through it, their heads dug in to the ground. They didn’t even look up when we climbed the fence. Luke was the first to notice.

“Where are the calves?”

The calves were gone. The field wasn’t very large. You could see along the fence line and all the way down to the creek. Luke walked out among the cows. “What happened to the calves, Caroline?”

“Maybe they had to move them. You know, when they brought in the bull.”

“Why would they do that?”

“I don’t know. Maybe they just did.”

“Maybe someone stole them.”

“Come on. We’ll miss Mr. Noah feeding the bears. You can ask him about the calves.”

But Luke didn’t want to leave the field. He ran down and looked in the brush as if the calves were hiding in holes by the water. By the time we got to the zoo, Mr. Noah was already feeding the foxes. He saw us as we watched through the fence.

“Good morning to you!” he bellowed. “You children come to watch old Noah feed his family? They’re hungry, today. Can you hear them roar?”

Mr. Noah put the buckets down. He wiped his hands
on his pants and came over to the fence. “When I’m done with the feeding, I might be able to find a few more of them cookies”

Luke looked back toward the field. “What happened to the calves, Mr. Noah?”

“The calves?”

“The calves in the field,” Luke backed away from the fence. “What happened to the calves in the field?”

“Don’t know for sure. Took them to the feed lot, I suspect,” said Mr. Noah. “Thompson generally does that as soon as the calves are big enough.”

“When do they bring them back?”

“Don’t bring them back, son. They fatten them up and then it’s off to the slaughterhouse.”

“They don’t kill them?”

Mr. Noah shook his head. “Where do you think such things as steaks and hamburgers come from?”

For the rest of the morning, Luke wouldn’t come out of the field. He stood near the fence and watched the cows. I knew he was upset, and so was I, I guess, but I was hungry, too. Mum was in the kitchen when I got home.

“Hi, honey,” she said. “Where’s Luke?”

“He’s watching the cows.”

“Well, I’ve got something wonderful to tell the both of you.”

“They took the calves in Mr. Thompson’s field to the slaughterhouse, Mum. All of them.”

Mum took a cigarette from her purse. “I got a job
today with the telephone company, honey. A real one. I have to take a week’s training in the city. Granny’s going to look after you and Luke while I’m gone. Maybe we can all go to a movie when I get back.”

Luke came home later. We didn’t talk about the cows. Mum told us all about her new job and how we might be able to get a television set for Christmas.

“We won’t be able to get our house right away,” she said. “That’ll come later.”

I had trouble getting to sleep that night. The air was humid with the promise of a hard rain, and, even with the window open, I was sticky and uncomfortable. I listened for the cows, but the field was silent. Later, I heard one of the gibbons cry out in its cage.

Where the Borg Are

By the time Milton Friendlybear finished reading Olive Patricia Dickason’s
Canada’s First Nations
for a tenth-grade history assignment, he knew, without a doubt, where the Borg had gone after they had been defeated by Jean-Luc Picard and the forces of the Federation. And he included his discovery in an essay on great historical moments in Canadian history.

Milton’s teacher, Virginia Merry, was not as impressed with Milton’s idea as he had hoped. “Milton, ” she said, in that tone of voice that many lapsed Ontario Catholics reserved for correcting faulty logic, bad grammar, and inappropriate behaviour, “I’m not sure that the Indian Act of 1875 is generally considered an important moment in Canadian history.”

“Why not?”

“But I am positive that there is no significant correlation between the Indian Act and
Star Trek.
” She said this with the natural assurance that the well-educated are able to manage, even though she had never read the
Indian Act and only knew about
Star Trek
because her husband watched it every night while they ate dinner.

“But it’s all here,” said Milton. “Pages two hundred and eighty-three to two hundred and eighty-nine.”

“Your handwriting could use some attention,” said Ms. Merry, and she wrote a note on Milton’s paper in thin, delicate letters that reminded him of the doilies on the back of his grandfather’s easy chair.

When Milton got home from school, he showed his paper to his mother, who sat at the table and looked at the grade for a long while. “Sixty percent’s not too good, eh?”

“Ms. Merry said I have a vivid imagination.”

“What’s this about neatness?”

“That’s because she’s a Borg.”

His mother read the paper, and, when she was done, she nodded thoughtfully. “Maybe you should go and talk to your grandfather.”

Milton liked his grandfather a great deal and would have liked him just as much if he did not have a thirty-six-inch television set that was hooked up to the biggest satellite dish on the reserve.

“Hiya,” said his grandfather. “You’re just in time.”


Star Trek
?”

“You bet.”

“Are the Borg in this episode?”

“Who knows,” said his grandfather. “It’s always a surprise.”

The episode did not have anything to do with the
Borg. It was about a hypnotic space game that would have turned the
Enterprise’s
crew into automatons had it not been for the quick thinking of Data and Wesley.

“I wrote a paper on the Indian Act,” Milton told his grandfather as they waited for
The Simpsons
to come on. “For my history class.”

“Oh, ho,” said his grandfather. “I’ve heard about that one, all right.”

“My teacher didn’t think that it was a great historical moment.”

“That’s probably because she’s not Indian.”

“But I read this really neat book, and guess what?” Milton waited in case his grandfather wanted to guess. “I think I know where the Borg went after they were defeated by Jean-Luc Picard and the forces of the Federation.”

“Boy,” said his grandfather, “that’s probably the question of the century.”

Milton took his
Canada’s First Nations
out of his backpack and put it on the coffee table next to his grandfather’s recliner. “Everybody’s been looking for them somewhere in the future, right?”

“That’s right.”

“But if this book is correct, I think the Borg went back in time.”

“Ah,” said Milton’s grandfather.

“Into the past.”

“Ah.”

“Europeans,” said Milton, and he turned to page two
hundred and eighty-four in the history book and pointed to the eighth word of the first line. “That’s where the Borg went.”

Milton’s grandfather looked at the word just above Milton’s finger. “Holy!” he said, and he sat up straight and hit the mute button.

“That’s right,” said Milton. “‘Assimilation.’ According to this book, the Indian Act is…” And Milton paused so he could find the right tone of voice. “An assimilation document.”

Milton’s grandfather picked up the book and turned it over.

“It was written by this woman,” said Milton. “A university professor.”

“Those women,” said Milton’s grandfather, “they know everything. Is she Indian?”

“She’s Metis.”

“Close enough,” said Milton’s grandfather. “Does that Indian Act say anything about resistance being futile? That would sure clinch it.”

“So, you think I’m right about the Borg having come to Earth and taken over.”

“It makes a lot of sense,” said Milton’s grandfather, “but I suppose we better get a copy of this Indian Act and read the whole thing before we jump to conclusions.”

When Milton got home, his mother was waiting for him. “So,” she said, “what did your grandfather think of your idea?”

“He liked it.”

“You know, stuff like that might hurt people’s feelings.”

“It would explain why dad took off.”

“It would, would it?”

“Sure,” said Milton. “He was assimilated.”

The next day, after school, Milton went to the library and looked up the Indian Act. There were all sorts of listings for Indians, but the act itself was not there. Milton looked under “Borg,” too, but it wasn’t there either.

“I’m looking for the Indian Act,” Milton told the woman at the desk. “Do you know where I can find it?”

“Is it a…play?” asked the woman.

“I don’t think so,” said Milton, though he didn’t know exactly what it was. “It’s got to do with history.”

The woman went to work on her computer and in a matter of minutes found the act. Milton was impressed.

“It’s not hard,” the woman explained. “This computer is connected to all the rest of the libraries in the province and to the National Library in Ottawa.”

Milton began to feel a little queasy. “Sort of like…a collective?”

“Exactly,” said the woman, who did not particularly look like a Borg. “Do you want me to request a copy of the act for you?”

“Oh, yes,” said Milton.

“Is this for a school assignment?”

“Yes,” said Milton.

“Research is fun, isn’t it?” said the woman.

“It certainly is,” said Milton.

The Indian Act didn’t arrive right away. By the end of the second week, Milton figured that the Borg were on to him and that he might wind up disappearing the same way his father had. But when he got home from school the next day, his mother told him that the library had called. “They said to tell you that your
Indian Act
thing is in.”

Milton raced down to the library. The woman was still sitting at the reference desk, and she smiled when she saw him. Beside her on the floor was a stack of rather large, very old-looking books.

“The Indian Act,” she said, and she leaned over and gave the stack of books a pat.

“All that?” said Milton.

“No,” said the woman. “These are the Revised Statutes of Canada for particular years. The original Indian Act is in the 1875–1876 volume. This one contains the revisions for 1886. This one is for 1906. There are a couple for the 1950s and one for 1970.

“Wow!”

“The Indian Act was revised a great many times.”

“So it probably represents a great moment in Canadian history.”

“I don’t think so,” said the woman. “Most great moments in Canadian history have holidays.”

Milton looked at the stack for a few moments. “Okay,” he said, and he began to stuff the books into his backpack.

“Oh, you can’t take them out of the library,” said the
woman. “These are government documents. They don’t circulate.”

Of course, thought Milton. The Borg wouldn’t want their secret to get out.

“But you can xerox the parts that you need.”

“How much is xeroxing?

“Ten cents a sheet.”

Those Borg, thought Milton, as he hauled the books to one of the long tables by the window. They don’t leave much to chance.

Milton spent the rest of the afternoon reading in each volume and taking notes. It was a long laborious process, but he was determined not to let the Borg and their ten-cents-a-sheet rule deter him. That evening, he showed his grandfather what he had found.

“What do you think?”

Milton’s grandfather got up and stretched his legs. “I don’t know,” he said. “It sure sounds like the Borg.”

“All the stuff about assimilation must be Borg,” said Milton. “Look at this. ‘Every Indian who is admitted to the degree of doctor of medicine, or to any other degree, by any university of learning, or who is admitted, in any province of Canada, to practise law, either as an advocate, a barrister, solicitor or attorney, or a notary public, or who enters holy orders, or who is licensed by any denomination of Christians as a minister of gospel, may, upon petition to the Superintendent,
ipso facto
become and be
enfranchised.
’”

“Whoa,” said Milton’s grandfather. “That could
certainly limit the choices Native people might want to make.”

“It sure could,” said Milton. “I don’t think I want to be…‘enfranchised.’”

“It sounds better than ‘assimilated,’” said his grandfather, looking at Milton’s notes. “But it’s probably the same thing.”

“So,” said Milton. “What are we going to do?”

“It may be more complicated than we imagine.” Milton’s grandfather closed his eyes for a moment and then opened them. “Look at this section, ‘The Governor in Council may authorize the Minister, in accordance with this Act, to enter into agreements on behalf of her Majesty for the education, in accordance with this Act, of Indian children.’ Now that sounds more like the Vulcans than the Borg.”

“You think so?”

“Sure,” said his grandfather, “the Vulcans were always the intellectual ones.”

Milton stood up and walked around in a circle. “You mean it was the Vulcans who came back in time?”

“It gets worse.” Milton’s grandfather sighed. “Look at this.”

Milton leaned over his grandfather’s shoulder. “Management of Indian Moneys?”

“And these.” Milton’s grandfather ran his finger down the notes that Milton had taken. “‘Descent of Property,’ ‘Sale of Property,’ ‘Rent,’ ‘Sale of Timber Lands.’ Who does that sound like to you?”

“Oh, no.” Milton paled. “Ferengis?”

“Yep,” said Milton’s grandfather. “Sounds like we might be dealing with the Ferengis.”

“And the Ferengi
Rules of Acquisition
?”

“Let’s check it out.” Milton’s grandfather went to the bookcase and came back with a small notebook. “I’ve been keeping track of the Ferengi
Rules of Acquisition
in case there was something worth knowing.”

“How many are there?

“At last count, there were two hundred and eighty-five.”

For the next little while, Milton and his grandfather went through the Ferengi
Rules of Acquisition,
looking at each one carefully.

“Maybe you’re right,” said Milton. “Look at this. Rule Twenty-six. ‘The vast majority of the rich in this galaxy did not inherit their wealth; they stole it.’”

“And Rule Twenty-seven,” said Milton’s grandfather. “‘The most beautiful thing about a tree is what you do with it after you cut it down.’

“And Rule Forty-two. ‘Only negotiate when you are certain to profit.’” Milton’s grandfather shook his head. “Boy, I sure wish I had known about this before we signed those treaties.”

Milton felt a shiver go up his spine. “Look at Rule Sixty-one.”

Milton’s grandfather ran a finger down the page. “‘Never buy what can be stolen.’”

“You’re right,” said Milton. “The Borg didn’t come back in time. And neither did the Vulcans. It was the Ferengis.”

The next day Milton stayed after class and apologized to Ms. Merry. “I was wrong about the Europeans being Borg,” he told her.

“It’s all right,” said Ms. Merry. “I’m sure it was an easy mistake to make.”

“They’re really Ferengis.”

When Milton finished writing “Racism hurts everyone” on the blackboard fifty times, he went back to his grandfather’s house to talk with him.

“I’ve been thinking,” said Milton, “and something doesn’t make sense.”

“That’s the trouble with life,” said his grandfather. “Television is a lot simpler.”

“It sure is,” said Milton.

“So,” said his grandfather, hitting the mute so he could still see what Captain Cisco and Dax and Quark were doing on
Deep Space Nine,
“what doesn’t make sense?”

Milton put the Indian Act and the Ferengi
Rules of Acquisition
on the coffee table side by side. “We know that the Borg and the Vulcans and the Ferengis have little in common.”

“That’s true,” said Milton’s grandfather.

“I mean, the Borg want to assimilate everyone. The Vulcans want everything to be logical. And the Ferengis are only concerned with profit.”

“I see your point,” said his grandfather. “Europeans seem to have many of the bad habits of all three.”

“They could be Klingons, too, because the Klingons are warriors and because Klingons love to fight simply for the sake of fighting.”

“Don’t forget those tricky Romulans,” said Milton’s grandfather. “Now that I think about it, those treaties have Romulan written all over them. What else does that Indian Act say?”

“Not much,” said Milton, and he made a face. “It has a bunch of stuff about who’s an Indian and who’s in charge of Indian affairs and how you can get an Indian declared mentally incompetent.”

“Boy,” said Milton’s grandfather, “if you were a Romulan, that would be a handy thing to know.”

“So, what should we do?”

“Maybe you better talk to your teacher,” said his grandfather. “And see if she can help us.”

Milton wasn’t sure he wanted to talk to Ms. Merry again, but he was very sure he didn’t want to get her upset and have to spend the afternoon writing on the blackboard.

“Hello, Milton,” Ms. Merry said with a cheery chirp, when Milton stopped by after school the next day.

“I have this problem,” said Milton, glancing at the blackboard. “I was hoping you could help me with it.”

Ms. Merry listened patiently as Milton explained what he had learned about assimilation and the Indian Act and how the Borg, or the Vulcans, or the Ferengis, or the Klingons, or quite possibly the Romulans, figured in the history of North America. Along with his theories on space travel, wormholes, and time warps.

BOOK: A Short History of Indians in Canada
13.56Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

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