Mason & Dixon

by Thomas Pynchon

  “Will ye come with wee Dodd and me on my Keel, as ye did last time, Jere?”

  “Why aye, Mr. Snow, and I thank thee . . . ?”

  So it is he now approaches the Harbor, down the River widening out of darkness, into a dawn singing of Staithemen and Keel-Bullies. . . .”How theer!” “Eeh, watcheer!”— the Fleets of Keels carried down and sailing up-stream, the Beam-Work of the first Staithes, penn’d upon the sunrise, both sides of the river a-rumble with the coal in the shoots and the coal-filled waggons upon the wood rails, the Dyer’s Bath of Morning, no redder than Twopenny Beer, spilling ’cross the World east of Chester-le-Street, punctuated by the Geometry of Tunnels, Bridges and earthwork Embankments sizable as Pyramids, the great inclin’d Waggon-Ways, whose Tracks run from the Mine-Heads inland for miles down to the Spouts upon Wear. . . .

  America, waiting, someplace. Going out to the collier Mary and Meg, bound again for London River, riding atop the Huddock, Dixon sees Fog, pale and shifting, approach like a great predatory Worm. He has snicker’d at Gin-shop tales of Keelmen lost in the fog, never expecting any such mishap in his own life, having ever plann’d to spend as much of it as he may upon dry land. But here it comes, the flanks of the aqueous Creature seething ever closer, as young Dodd the Peedee gives a shout of alarm, and Mr. Snow, in his Post of Keel-Bully, begins to swear vigorously. Already half the Shoreline is obscur’d. Far away upon the Shields a bell-buoy rings in the dank morning, and somewhere closer, upon now-invisible Rounds, yet goes the Bell of the Tagareen Man, ship to ship, Iron seeking Iron,— and then, like that, wrapped in the sulfurous Signatures of fresh Coal, have a Score of Savages appear’d out of the Sea-Fret, paddling Pirogues, shouting strange jibber-jabber, the words incomprehensible, yet the vowels unmistakably North British. How to explain this?

  “That wild Indian sounds a bit like poor old Cookie, don’t it?”

  “They’ve painted themselves—” Aye, black as Coal-dust.”

  “How-ye,—” calls Mr. Snow, “What place is this?”

  “Why, ye’ve floated to America, ye buggers!”

  “Heer, we’ll foy yese in . . . ?”

  “America . . . Eehh . . . ?”

  “Eeeh, y’ Gowks!” A grappling hook, blackened and lethal, comes flying out of the Fret, just missing young Dodd and catching the Huddock. “They’re attacking!” screams the Peedee, scrabbling in the coal. And just then, out there, like Hounds let loose, the church bells of America all begin to toll, peculiarly lucid in the fog, a dense Carillon, tun’d so exotically, they might be playing anything,— Methodist hymns, Opera-hall Airs, jigs and gigues, work songs of sailors, Italian serenades, British Ballads, American Marches.

  “Now listen heer ye’s,” the Keel-Bully to Forces invisible, “there’s nought to fear from huz, being but poor peaceable Folk lost in this uncommon Fret, who’ll be only too pleased to gan wi’ ye’s, wheerever ye say.” In a lower voice, to his own, “They want the Coal. Let them find us.” Carefully, sensing the Tides thro’ his Soles, he steers them further into the Obscurity. The others, keeping silent, may be anywhere. Snow reacts to ev’ry Splash, ev’ry shift of whatever is flowing past. Soon the Fog begins to clear.

  They seem to rock beneath the Belfries of a great Estuarial Town. It smells like Coal. Ordinary Water-Birds coast above, quite at home. “Why I believe they’re Geordies, as much as huz!” the Keel-Bully exclaims. Nor do they appear the faces of strangers. Yet where are Keelmen ever as silent as these have now fallen,— and why are the Faces beneath these Basin-crops so unmovingly resentful? Snow and even little Dodd know them. Some stood before the Assizes after the strikes of ’43 and ’50, and were sentenced to the Gallows, though ’twas later said they were transported to America. Why aye, if this be America, then here they are, in company with Alehouse champions of Legend carrying their Black-jacks big as Washing-tubs, celebrated Free-for-all Heroes, Keel racers from the coaly Tyne, worshiped even Wearside,— “Dobby, is it you, whatcheer!”— as if for Dixon ev’ry Phiz a-reel, ev’ry Can bought and taken, and nocturnal Voice lifted in harmony, down his Time, sooner or later would come to be reprised in this late-Day Invisibility,— and the Fret, for a moment, has made possible some America no traveler’s account has yet describ’d, because as yet none has return’d, tho’ many be the mates and dear ones who bide.

  And when he sees the little Collier-Brig at last, her Sails not merely be-grim’d, but silken black, with Coal-Dust,— the Mary and Meg,— Dixon suffers a moment and a half of Dread, for her stillness in the Water, her evenness of Trim in a Light never seen upon the Shields. . . . Was it so, the first time,— did he simply miss it, with his Mind then pitch’d so immoderately further East? Or is this a particular and strong Message concerning America, meant not for him but for someone else, that he may only have got in the way of?

  It is dangerous Passage, along the Coast down to the Thames and into the Pool, turning ever to Windward, often into the Teeth of Gales, among treacherous Sands, and the Channels ever re-curving, like great Serpents a-stir. Catching a windward Tide at the King’s Channel, beating up toward the Swin, keeping out of the Swatchways and attending ever her Soundings, the Mary and Meg, threading nicely among Rocks, Shallows, a thousand other Vessels each bound its own way, desiring despite her ghostly look to live briskly whilst she may, brings Dixon at last to Long Reach, above Gravesend, guided to her Moorage in the Tier by the slowly rising Dome of St. Paul’s, to Westward.

  Tomorrow, he and Mason are to sign the Contract.

  25

  Miss Tenebræ, perplex’d, puts down her Embroidery. “This case, Uncle, languish’d in court for eighty years, yet just when Mason and Dixon happen to find themselves nicely between Transits of Venus, suddenly ev’ry-one agrees there shall be the Survey in America. Aren’t you at least suspicious?”

  “You dark Girl. Must all be Enigmata? The Celestial Events were eight years apart,— the Term beyond Human Arrangement. Had the Survey taken longer, they’d have likely observ’d the second Transit from somewhere in America. As it was, running the Line would take them four of those years, with an extra year for measuring a Degree of Latitude in Delaware. . . .”

  The days before their Departure are Humid, splash’d into repeatedly by Rain. Upon their meeting again in London after a year and a Half, to sign their Contract with the Proprietors, who arrive back’d by Agents, Lawyers, and Bullies, Dixon, as soon as it is possible to do so,— the Sketch-Artists having dash’d in a few last Details and crept away,— takes off his Hat. “I was sadden’d to hear of Dr. Bradley’s Death, Sir.”

  “Thank you for the Letter you wrote, Jeremiah.”

  Without agreeing to it, they find themselves, if but for Form’s sake, out roistering in what proves to be a sort of sustain’d flow of Strong Drink, in which Mason will obscurely recall being included Gin, and Gin’s Hogarthian Society, winding up a Fortnight later in the unpromising Streets of Falmouth, a Town dedicated to Swift Communication, all Hurry, huge Sums at Stake, Veterinarians in Coaches-and-six, Brokers of News to and fro at the Gallop, last-Minute Couriers’ Pouches, dilatory Visitors swimming back to Shore from another precise Departure, even as the next Packet after her makes ready to put to sea.

  Mason’s Nose approaches the Surface of his Ale, withdraws, approaches again. Presently, “If I only might have spoken with Bradley,— you recall our departure from Plymouth? Aye? He had put himself then to the labor of coming down,— between appointments with Pain, for the final Illness, as they said, was from Gravel. Upon the Landing, he kept apart from the others, even from cheery Mr. Birch, who was ev’rywhere at once . . . Mr. Mead and Mr. White pointing to various Lines and Tackle and correcting one another’s Terminology . . . whilst betwixt Dr. Bradley and me, silent Conversation pass’d.” Mason’s Brow clearly unhappy. “I believe he had come to apologize,” giving away this solemn confidence snappily as another might the Punch-Line of a Joak (for as I
often noted, no matter what Sentiments might lie ’pon his Phiz, Mr. Mason was in the Habit of delivering even his gravest Speeches, with the Rhythms and Inflections of the Taproom Comedian). “I was loading an unreasonable weight of Hope upon that Mission, upon the Purity of the Event. Look ye at what I intended to escape. Rebekah lost, my Anchor to all I knew of Birth and Death,— I was adrift in Waters unknown, Intrigues and Faction within the Royal Society, as among Nations and Charter’d Companies. Foolishly seeking in the Alignment of Sun, Venus, and Earth, a moment redeem’d from the Impurity in which I must ever practice my Life,— instead, even this pitiable Hope is interdicted by the deadly l’Grand,—’ . . . not at war with the sciences,’— Poh. In Plain Text, that Brass Voice announc’d,— ‘The Business of the World is Trade and Death, and you must engage with that unpleasantness, as the price of your not-at-all-assur’d Moment of Purity.— Fool.’ ”

  “Eeh! Tha were trans-lating all thah’ French Jabber? hardly a bonny Sentiment, Mr. Mason.”

  “Mr. Dixon, I am cerrtain that you, as the unwaverring Larrk of the Sanguine, will find us a way past that.”

  Dixon’s Smile acknowledging the Pronoun, “I imagine,” he says carefully, “such Moments to lie beyond any Price that might be nam’d . . . ?”

  “Oh, I’ve had ’em for half a Crown sometimes,” Mason mutters, “tho’ of course your own Experience,— ”

  “Here’s The Dodman. Might we go in this one, do tha guess . . . ?”

  “Why not? What’s it matter? Savages, Wilderness. No one even knows what’s out there. And we have just, do you appreciate, contracted, to place a Line directly thro’ it? Doesn’t it strike you as a little unreasonable?”

  “Not to mention the Americans . . . ?”

  “Excuse me? They are at least all British there,— aren’t they? The Place is but a Patch of England, at a three-thousand-Mile Off-set. Isn’t it?”

  “Eeh! Eeh! Thoo can be so thoughtful, helping cheer me up wi’ thy Joaks, Mason,— I’m fine, really,— ”

  “Dixon, hold,— are you telling me, now, that Americans are not British?— You’ve heard this somewhere?”

  “No more than the Cape Dutch are Dutch . . . ? ’Tis said these people keep Slaves, as did our late Hosts,— that they are likewise inclin’d to kill the People already living where they wish to settle,— ”

  “Another Slave-Colony . . . so have I heard, as well. Christ.”

  “This from Quakers of Durham, whose Relations have gone there, and written back. There may be redeeming Qualities to the place. Who knows? The Food? The Lasses? Whatever else there is?”

  “The Pay,— I suppose.”

  “Being from Staindrop,” Dixon declares,” ’tis seldom at much personal Ease, that I discuss the Unpriceable,— yet, our last time out,— all for an Event that would occupy a few Hours, in some Places, but Minutes,— even with the late War as Precedent,— Hundreds of Lives for some log Palisado, Thousands in Sterling for some handful of Savages’ Scalps,— even so, that Transit made no Market sense, whatso-fairly-ever . . . ?”

  “You think they paid us too much?” Fear of Enthusiasm immediately entering Mason’s Gaze.

  “There were moments when they must have thought so . . . ?”

  “Such as?”

  “Oh, eeh, never mind.”

  “A certain Exchange of Letters? Correct?”

  “I didn’t say thah . . . ?”

  “The Letter to Bradley? You think that’s what put us in the Stuffata? That when we sign’d the letter, we sign’d our careers away? Yet look ye here, we’re hir’d again,— aren’t we?”

  “Out of nowhere . . . ?”

  “Surely we are rehabilitated,— all Suspicions wash’d away in the Stream of Time, all Resentments by Star-light heal’d.— What did we even do, that has to be absolv’d? We represented our unwillingness to proceed upon a fool’s errand.”

  “Aye, and they replied, that we were cowards, and must proceed . . . ?”

  “Just so.”

  “Whereupon we touch’d our Hats, o-bey’d, and sail’d off in the same ship that had nearly been blown out from under us . . . ? We did our Duty.”

  “And more,— not only getting for them their damn’d Transit Observations, but withal their damn’d Longitude,— ”

  “Their ’cursèd local Gravity,— ”

  “Damme, Dixon,— ’twas first-rate work,— surely that has preponderated against one Letter to Bradley,— rest his Soul,— yet, I cannot speak easily, even now, of my dismay at how he us’d me,— ”

  “You mean ‘huz’ . . . ?”

  “Very well,— tho’ as to who may have felt more piercingly the harshness of the Reply, having presum’d, alas so foolishly, some Connection deeper than this hateful unending Royal Society Intrigue,— ”

  “Their infamy’s no fresh News to me,” Dixon quietly, “— what we must face is the probability that from now on, tho’ we fight like Alexander and labor like Hercules, we shall always be remember’d as the Star-gazers who turn’d Tail under fire.”

  “So might I have done,” cries Mason, “had there been but room to turn it,— the irony how keen!”

  “Eeh . . . ? Well . . . I wasn’t as scared as thah’, tho ’f course I did feel— ”

  “Hold,— who said I was scared?”

  “Who?— Did I . . . ?”

  “Were you scared? I wasn’t scared. You thought I was scared? I thought you were scared.— ”

  “I do recall a Disinclination, as who would not, to perish beneath the water-line of some, forgive me, miserable Sixth-Rate . . . ?”

  “Sounds like headlong panic to me,” says Mason. “Thank goodness I was calmer about it.”

  “Calmer than what? An hour and a half of great Hellish Explosions and mortal screaming? Aye, Serenity,— we’ll make a Quaker of thee yet.”

  “They’d decertify me out of Astronomy,— strictly C. of E. in this Trade,— I’d never micro in on another Star in that Town again. All the Pubs in Greenwich, shewn my Likeness,— aahhrr!”

  “I cannot sound why they’ve hir’d us again . . . ?”

  “Nor I. They believe, however, that we do know why. In London, they credit us with a Depth of Motive at least equal to their own. They have to, otherwise they but spin, to no purpose. One may be altogether innocent of Depth,— well take yourself for example, forthright son of the Fells or if you like blunt Geordie,— ”

  “Eeh, aye,— yet I’m no stranger to intriguing, why tha need go no further than Bishop for thah’, though there’s plenty in Staindrop for fair,— yet are Londoners ever a-scan, ev’ry word tha speak, ev’ry twitch o’ thy Phiz, for further meanings, present or not,— ”

  “They’ve but lately discover’d simple Metaphors. . . . Then ye find too late ye’ve insulted them,— or been quietly classified, or slander’d,— never knowing quite which word or gesture has done the job. . . .”

  “ ’Tis call’d, I believe, Being from the Country . . . ?”

  Mason lets his head abruptly drop. “Yet, I thought I had quite got the Thames-side way of talking, the Philosophical Parlance, the fashions of the Day,— that the Bumpkin within had been entirely subdued.”

  “In Bishop we say, ‘Ye may take the Boy out of the Country,—’ ”

  “Yes yes, ‘but never the Country out of the Boy.’ ”

  “Naa, that’s not it,— ‘But tha’ll never take the Girl out of the City,’ ’s how we say it . . . ?”

  Mason is staring, shaking his head, “What . . . does that mean?”

  “Something about Women?”

  “You don’t believe that they’ve forgiven us at the Royal Society.”

  “Nor ever shall . . . ? Tho’ eventually, ’tis they who’ll look hasty and childish, whilst we’ll be deem’d to’ve shewn a higher order of Courage than
the World at present recognizes.”

  “ ‘Eventually’? Oh dear.”

  “Why aye, we shan’t live to see it . . . ?”

  “So I shall die a documented Coward. Splendid. Attainted before the Ages, my Sons as well, oh thank you, Dixon, that’s wonderful, that cheers me prodigious.”

  “Or,” Dixon trying to speak clearly, “Co-adjutor in an honorable act of Defiance, taken in the full knowledge, that those Bastards upon high would slap us down . . . ?”

  “Oh, not I, as Chauncey said when the Bums came in,— I didn’t assume any such thing.— Did you? That we were bound to fail?” He shakes his head vigorously, as if there is something upon it, that he wishes to dislodge. “Why on Earth did you sign the Letter?”

  Dixon shrugs. “Emerson was right about them, they’re evil folk, the lot, your Royal Society . . . ? We had to resist them, somehow . . . ?”

  “Or, expressing it more hopefully, we tried to make a positive Suggestion, as to an alternative Station, reachable in time, taken from a list well known to all.”

  “Your suggestion of Scanderoon was particularly unfortunate,” Maskelyne had rush’d to advise Mason, having led him into a Critique of his Cape Mission which seem’d to consist of ev’ry, to Maskelyne, flaw’d decision Mason had made.

  “How?” Mason protested. “It wasn’t my idea. Scanderoon was ever listed as one of the Alternates.”

  The little Muskrat, His eyes were unable to come to rest. He paced about far too energetickally. “I don’t suppose Mr. Peach has ever spoken to you of the Levant Company . . . of that lively traffick in Muslins and Bombazines, passing thro’ Aleppo, to the Sea, and the Warehouses of the Factors, at Scanderoon?”

  “Mr. Peach does business with Aleppo,— no one who has learn’d Silk, can afford not to,” Mason replied. “Yet, alas, unaccountably, it has remain’d absent from our Discourse.”