And then the other side of this liaison the Cajun has with water: hurricanes. WATER!
The Cajun just deals with it. He takes a boat to his front door, or pumps out the front
yard. The water always rises fast.
Chance and the contest. Why do so many Cajun's love to gamble? Certainly it is a
way to circumvent one's daily lot, whether in terms of excitement, or of fortune. Even if 2
men have only a few cents, they can stand on the bank of the bayou and bet whether one
muskrat will beat another across the water. One man ends up with the money. But the
Cajun is unlike any other gambler. No doubt the religious differences between the hill
people and the Cajuns account for some of the attitudes. There is no forbidding, stern
face of a John Calvin or John Wesley hovering in the Cajun background. The very Gallic
genes may provide some answer. How else to account for such a radical difference, in
France and her neighbors? Perhaps the Gallic capacity for rolling with the fate while still
maintaining a wry detachment must be included. when the Cajun came to South Louisiana
in the 18th century he had to engage dangerous, uncertain conditions. He took a chance.
He had lost his last gamble in Nova scotia. there were no guarantees now and it was no
game. Each time he raised his traps or planted his seeds, his entire familyy was on the line.
So he played games of chance and expressed ritualistically a cavalier disdain for hazard,
somehow gaining a magical control over his fate.

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