by Edward Cline
After a moment, Jack smiled with decision. “I will make the attempt, and compose a pamphlet on this subject. Will you read it?”
“Of course,” said Hugh. “It so happens that, while you have been watching melting snow, I have been contemplating chimney swifts.”
This time Jack looked baffled.
Hugh said, “The behavior of recent governments in London caused me to recall a day one spring here when I observed the nesting ritual of a flock of swifts. Finding a suitable open hollow oak, they circled round and round it, and when the leader dropped down inside it to begin building its nest, the flock changed the direction of its circling, following the next in seniority until it dropped into the oak. One by one they left the moving ring, the direction of the circle changing each time a swift left the flock. Swifts, of course, cannot build regular nests in tree branches, but construct theirs with their own drool on the sides of walls and inside hollow trees.” Hugh’s expression changed to one of contented deviltry. “I believe the analogy between swifts and politicians to be strikingly thorough and just.”
And this time Jack cocked his head in appreciation. “It’s a deserving analogy, Hugh. I look forward to reading it. I have had to clear swifts from my own chimneys.” He paused. “It is better than your analogy of epergne and empire,” he added.
Hugh looked surprised. “You remember that?”
“There’s not much that I forget. Do you still endorse the idea?”
“Yes, I do.”
Jack said nothing. He rose and said with excited conviction, “Well, I want to return to Morland and begin my composition.”
“Will you stay for dinner?” asked Hugh.
“No, thank you. I don’t think I’ll have an appetite even for supper until I’ve put some words on paper.” Jack glanced around the study. “How is Reverdy settling in?”
“With difficulty. We both expected it. There aren’t as many distractions here as there are in London, or even in Eckley, Surrey.” Hugh beamed. “She has set herself to read a number of books. She brought Mr. Rousseau’s Émile with her, and some paltry novels on the advice of her mother. But she abandoned Rousseau to begin Hyperborea.” His smile broadened. “She put Mr. Rousseau aside, saying he was too aimlessly pedantic.” Hugh left his desk to walk his friend to the study door.
Jack folded his arms. “It will be interesting to hear what she will say about Hyperborea.” He paused. “Etáin has read it, many times, and claims that it is appropriate that it had something to do with what you and I are.”
Hugh laughed and slapped Jack on the back once. “Modesty be damned! I must express agreement with that sentiment! I told Reverdy that you helped to copy it out in a Cornwall cave. That intrigued her, as well as my own recommendation.”
Jack sighed. “Well, it seems that now Caxton is obsessed with words. Mr. Reisdale is also composing a fragment, on some obscure religious dispute.”
“Yes,” said Hugh nodding. “He dropped me a note about it. Obscure? No. He wishes to connect the dispute between Benjamin Hoadley and Francis Atterbury to the evolution of religious and general liberty. Why, your own Mr. Proudlocks is assisting him in the writing of it — as a copier — just as you once assisted Redmagne.”
“Yes. Anymore, John spends almost as much time in Mr. Reisdale’s library as he does at Morland. Well, perhaps he will help copy out my own creation.”
“I am certain he will. And when you have finished it, I will send a copy of it to Mr. Jones in London. He may readily agree to employ it in the House, when it convenes again, though not ascribe its reasoning to a former felon and smuggler. I am certain that should Mr. Pannell be in the House that day and hear your name, he will recognize it after all this time, and pelt Mr. Jones with distracting and grand-sounding irrelevancies for the delectation of the Commons.”
They were standing on the porch of Meum Hall now. Jack asked, “Speaking of copies, how are we to have these printed, now that Mr. Barret is gone?”
Hugh said, “We will need to send them to an Annapolis printer, I suppose. Or to Mr. Talbot in Philadelphia, who knows some printers there. I am sure that neither ailing Mr. Royle nor his foreman, Mr. Hunter, will agree to print anything we may submit to the Gazette’s office, not even for ready money. But let us first give them something to spurn!”
Jack untied his horse’s reins, which he had secured to the balustrade of the porch steps, mounted, waved Hugh good day, and rode off.
When Hugh went back inside, he found Reverdy standing halfway down the central staircase in the breezeway. She held his copy of Hyperborea in one hand. “What did Mr. Frake want?” she asked.
“My advice,” said Hugh. “He is going to compose a pamphlet on the current troubles. His first.”
Reverdy gestured with the book. “I am surprised that it will be his first effort.”
“He did not write that, but was fired by it. As was I.” Hugh added, “In anything that matters to him, he says little. For all his sociability, Jack is still very much the solitary man. He suffers fools nought, and has little to say to them. I have seen him silence them with his dismissive quiescence many times.”
“I had observed that effect myself.” Reverdy glanced at the book in her hand. “I wonder how many fools have read this, and not been similarly fired, but remained indifferent or dead to it.”
“Undoubtedly, countless fools, as numerous as once were the kings of ancient Mercia and Wessex. But they do not matter. Only those capable of being moved by the work will want to bring to life in their own actions the spirit of Drury Trantham.”
“Yes,” replied Reverdy gravely. Then she grinned. “I have not yet finished it, but I know now why you were moved by it. I know now why you chose to stay here.” Her smile tempered. “This land is your Hyperborea.”
“I am happy that you understand that, Reverdy,” said Hugh with solemnity. “And grateful.”
She nodded once, then turned to ascend the stairs again to her room.
“Reverdy,” Hugh called after her.
She paused and turned on the landing above to look inquiringly down on her husband.
“I am quite proud of you, my dear,” said Hugh.
With a faint nod of her head, she answered, “And I of you.”
* * *
When he returned to Morland, Jack went immediately to his study and sat down at his desk. He found a few sheets of paper, and drew forward the inkwell. Then he changed his mind, pushed the inkwell aside, and picked up a pencil. He wrote rapidly, remembering everything he had said to Hugh at Meum Hall.
Etáin knocked on the door and came in. “How are Hugh and Reverdy?” she asked.
“They are well,” Jack answered with unintended curtness.
Etáin then saw a look in her husband’s face that she knew so well, one of a purpose that would not be denied, even for her. She smiled and said, “I will leave you alone. Will you have dinner?”
“No,” said Jack. “But ask Mrs. Beck to prepare me some tea.”
“Yes.” Etáin turned and left the study.
For the next few hours, Jack wrote feverishly, propelled by the momentum of the possible. The thoughts now crowded into his mind and spilled out onto the paper, thoughts marshaled by years of perceptiveness, foresight, and commitment to truth. Sheet after sheet became filled with words, sentences, and paragraphs. He was so obsessed by the effort that when he chanced to look up and out his window, he was startled to notice a tea service sitting on his desk; he vaguely remembered Ruth Dakin bringing it in. Later, when he was nearly finished, he glanced again out his window, and saw that dusk was beginning to darken the fields beyond.
He reached a point in his effort when only a conclusion remained to be composed. He poured himself some tea from the earthenware pot; it was cold, but he drank it. Then he lit a pipe, sat back, and read without pause.
He argued in his “fragment” that a repeal of the navigation laws would effectively end Britain’s legal and legislative authority over the colonies in all
matters, and that the North American colonies would consequently become either thirteen independent nations, or unite under one central government to become a single large nation. They might even acknowledge the authority of the king and Parliament, but, in practice, exist as sovereign nations, or as one sovereign nation, in their own right.
Britain, he explained, would never allow such a thing to occur, not even under the most sympathetic, friendly ministry. “The alternatives to repeal of the navigation laws and subsequent legislation will be war and independence, or war and conquest,” he had written.
The abolition of this political and economic connexion with Britain, he continued, is precisely what many colonials will not yet concede; or rather, they will not admit its necessity in order to regain the “liberties” they claim Britain to be infringing upon. “They must know that it would be the end of a British North America.” They do not, or cannot, perceive themselves as men first, and Britons second.
What are the alternatives? he asked in the fragment. In the best scenario, the abolition of all navigation and manufacturing acts and laws, the abolition of taxes on colonial goods to and from Britain, and a recognition of the freedom to trade with nations other than Britain without penalty or harassment, must also be accompanied by Parliamentary representation for the thirteen colonies, which might henceforth be deemed “counties” divided into “boroughs.” This representation would imply the supremacy of the British legislative and judicial branches of government over those of the colonies. Colonial assemblies would either be abolished or severely delimited in their legislative powers. British judicial decisions would override colonial ones. The colonies would need to conform to a multitude of British political practices and customs, including a universal union of church and state. Special legislation would likely be enacted that would enable the Crown to pay the new lieutenant-governors, their councils, and the judiciary directly, allowing them complete independence from colonial influence.
Thus, the former colonies would lose their tacit independence as surely as if they were conquered by arms, and become the object of royal and Parliamentary caprice and scheming.
But, he warned, further into the fragment, such a scenario is a fantasy. The politicians would oppose it, for it would mean an end of revenue and authority. They would be obliged to take seriously the “rights of Englishmen,” and moved to cavort around the Constitution as best they could to wring some larcenous advantage from the arrangement. They had that power now, and would not surrender it.
British merchants would oppose it, for it would mean the end of a captive market for their goods and the drying up of artificially cheap raw materials for their manufactures. They would not surrender that statutory boon, and would call for a tighter regulatory grip on colonial trade.
The entire system of sinecures, placemen, and other ministerial and royal appointees, if colonial revenue due the Crown should abruptly evaporate, would in a short time become bankrupt and destitute. These persons would know it, and realize, too, that raising taxes in Britain to compensate for lost colonial revenue to ensure their lucrative entitlements, could cause a crisis and perhaps even revolt in England itself. They would be among the most stubborn and vocal opponents of American “independence” or of the notion of America becoming “separate from but equal to” Britain.
However, wrote Jack, the worst scenario, and the more likely one, would be the wholesale introduction of the most sinister and obnoxious element of British politics, unprincipled party competition for power and place, together with the inevitable corruption and politicking that are both offensive to colonials, and the subjects of grave satire even in British drama. Exceptions would eventually be made to everything granted in the name of liberty and equity to the colonials, who would find themselves in the same or worse circumstances as they endured now, except that then they would be under a firmer and more confident hand than they are at present. And when that realization occurred to them, the colonials must decide to fight for their liberties as Englishmen, or as Americans for an independence that would better secure those liberties and not leave them to the invidious mercies of legislators across an ocean.
“They must decide to fight, or to submit; and if to submit, then ignobly, bitterly, shamefully, after all the stirring, defiant words they had spoken.”
That was where the fragment stopped.
Unbidden, the proud, serene face of Augustus Skelly on the Falmouth gallows came to his mind, together with the man’s words that were addressed directly to him that day long ago: “This Briton will never be a slave.”
And the boy who was now a man answered, more than fifteen years later: But, I am no longer a Briton.
The question came to him then: Was I ever?
Perhaps. Perhaps not, he mused. It had never been an issue to him of what he was or was not. But he could not think of the words that answered that paradoxical question with ineluctable finality.
He looked at the steady hand that held the sheet of paper, the hand that had written all those words. He felt proud of that hand. It was his, as were the words. The answer to that question lay somewhere in that hand, he thought.
Jack put down the sheet of paper. A stern smile bent his mouth at this moment. He was satisfied that he had said everything that needed to be said. All that remained to write was a conclusion.
The floor clock in a corner chimed nine. Unconsciously, at some point, perhaps hours ago, he had paused to light his desk lamp. He saw now that blackness had enveloped the fields beyond the window. A few lonely snowflakes, lit faintly by the circle of light from his desk, swirled briefly against the window glass, then flew away on the wind into the night.
Jack glanced once more at the last sentence, and decided that it was a proper conclusion.
* * *
On January 1, 1766, the Frakes and Kenricks exchanged visits and New Years’ presents, and even traveled together to Williamsburg to see a pair of comedies and a pair of Shakespeare’s tragedies at the theater near the Capitol Building. Morland and Meum Halls settled into an involuntary lassitude governed by the early winter months. There was little work to do except repairs and planning.
In early February, Hugh received a bundle of copies of his fragment, “The Chimney Swifts of Chicanery,” from the Annapolis printer, as well as several numbers of the Pennsylvania Gazette from Otis Talbot in Philadelphia. In one of the Gazettes he encountered an item that reported the death of the Duke of Cumberland on October 31st. He read the item and was surprised that he read it with indifference. His failure to bow to the Duke many years ago, he thought, ought to be regarded as a tidemark in his life. Strangely, he felt nothing at all. He showed the item to Reverdy. She read it, and only after a moment seemed to remember the role the late Duke had played in her husband’s life.
“Oh, him,” she remarked. “Well, I suppose he’s gone now.” She smiled at her husband and handed the newspaper back to him without further interest.
In early March, another passel of Pennsylvania Gazettes and copies of the New York Journal arrived at Meum Hall. One item reported the death of Prince Frederick William, the King’s youngest brother, at the age of fifteen, on December 19th. On the next day, the Dauphin of France died, at age thirty-seven.
In another of the New York papers was an item reporting that on January 1st, James Francis Edward Stuart, the “Old Pretender,” had died in Rome. His eldest son, Charles Edward Louis Philip Casimir Stuart, the “Young Pretender” to the English throne, had led the Jacobite Rebellion in 1745. He immediately adopted the title “Henry the Ninth.” Pope Clement the Thirteenth, however, refused to acknowledge “Bonnie Prince Charlie” as king of any nation, even though the father and the heir-presumptive son had campaigned partly in the name of Catholicism and lost England, and even though Charles’s younger brother, Henry, was a cardinal. It was suggested that Clement’s refusal stemmed from knowledge of Charles’s furtive adoption of the Protestant faith during a secret visit to London in 1750, in an attempt to rais
e the Stuart banner again.
After an itinerant and stormy life on the Continent, Charles would eventually retire to Florence, Italy, where he was taken care of by a bastard daughter. He would die there, wracked by asthma, the dropsy, and the effects of alcoholism, nearly a century after his father precipitated the Glorious Revolution of 1688.
* * *
Chapter 19: The Strategists
A year before his victory at Quebec, Brigadier-General James Wolfe wrote his mother from Louisbourg about North America: “…This will, some time hence, be a vast empire, the seat of power and learning.… There will grow a people out of our little spot, England, that will fill this vast space.…”
Five years before the Declaration of Independence, Horace Walpole, novelist, letter-writer, and stalwart Whig, would write: “The tocsin seems to be sounded in America. I have many visions about that country, and fancy I see twenty empires and republics forming upon vast scales over all that continent, which is growing too mighty to be kept in subjection to half a dozen exhausted nations in Europe.”
Wolfe and Walpole foresaw the future of America without benefit of pamphlets, governors’ reports, military appraisals, or ministerial conferences at Whitehall. They judged the continent and its inhabitants, and resigned themselves to an inevitability that was as tangible as it was abstract. In this sense, they were more honest and perceptive than those who charged themselves with the task of securing that continent in the name of Magna Britannica.
Instances of the hopelessness of administering a continent for the exclusive benefit of the mother country began when the collector of customs for Rhode Island in late November 1765 followed Virginia’s lead and issued clearance certificates without stamped papers. That colony was followed by New York, Pennsylvania, and New Jersey, even though the Surveyor Generals could not indemnify subordinate collectors against penalties for taking such extralegal actions. The collectors in Connecticut, Maryland, and the Carolinas were the last to issue the certificates.
