by James Morrow
“No doubt, my Lord,” Barnaby said.
“Howbeit, some would say his benefactors were in sooth the prodigies,” Knox said. “Such a fœtus once cured my grandfather’s shingles.”
“Mrs. Webster, when you address the Court next week, you will avoid all mention of Dr. Cavendish’s monsters, je vous en prie,” Montesquieu said. “We must distance our arguments from peasant superstition.”
“Your attitude’s sensible, Monsieur le Baron,” Barnaby said, “though I for one can’t speak too highly of peasant superstition, for’t hath kept me gainfully employed these past fifty years.” He lifted the treatise from Montesquieu’s grasp. “If I am to believe Ebenezer Trenchard, Jenny, you’ve wrought a demon disproof to beat the one that Newton ne’er devised. Ah, but doth the world in fact want a demon disproof? That’s the question I now put to you wights.”
“Most men are indifferent to metaphysics,” Bledsoe said with a sigh.
“My own taste runs more to pirate tales,” Knox confessed.
“Most men are indifferent,” Montesquieu echoed, “but their canons are not. I assure you, Dr. Cavendish, that even as we speak, our civilization’s greatest law books reach out and press Mrs. Webster’s argumentum grande to their collective breast.”
“For a person chary of superstition, you seem passing eager to credit books with minds and souls,” Barnaby said.
“I have lived so long amongst books,” Montesquieu said, “I cannot but believe they do have souls.”
“You strike me as a clever fellow”—Barnaby returned the Sufficiency to the Baron—“and I’m sure you mean to save my Jenny, but I hope you know your enemy. These cleansers are made of iron.”
“I’ll wager they’ve never battled a French jurist,” Montesquieu said.
Barnaby touched his right temple. “If my Bicephalic Girl were here, her dexter head would say, ‘I have every faith in Jenny’s lawyer.’” He pointed to his left temple. “But then the sinister head would reply, ‘I have every fear of Jenny’s brother.’”
“’Tis not Dunstan we should fear, but rather his malevolent wife,” Jennet said, lifting the quill from her desk. “For whilst my brother hath his Paracelsus trident and his pricking needles and his other pretensions to philosophy, Abigail heeds only the madness in her skull.” She blew upon the feather, wondering what sort of equation might describe the vane’s exquisite ripple. “I’faith, good sirs, I have seen this woman’s brain at work, and I say it traffics less with rational discourse than doth flint with flour.”
“Then may God help you, Monsieur,” said Bledsoe to Montesquieu.
“Then may God help Mrs. Webster,” the Baron replied.
C H A P T E R
The
Eleventh
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A Metaphysics Debate Captivates Humankind, or at Least that Portion of Humankind Owning Subscriptions to The Pennsylvania Gazette
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Charles Louis de Secondat, Baron de la Brède et de Montesquieu, stepped out of his hired coach, bid his footman adieu, and presented the driver with a one-pound note and a dip of his plumed hat, the worthy Herr Strossen having steered them a smooth course along the pocked and pitted length of Ridge Road. A kind of carnival was unfolding amidst the hills surrounding Manayunk Courthouse, every knoll a-swarm with Philadelphia rustics chattering in a half-dozen tongues as they read that morning’s Pennsylvania Gazette and patronized stalls dispensing German-Town lager, meat pies, roasted potatoes, and apple tarts. The Baron screwed his hat in place, fastening it to his bewigged head, and started toward La Maison de Justice. Weaving through the boisterous, earthy mob, he felt the same vague discomfort he’d endured earlier that year upon seeing, in the Mayor of Antwerp’s mansion, Pieter Breughel’s painting of a peasant wedding. Montesquieu was a man who believed the world’s common people deserved political freedom and personal sovereignty—he endorsed this ideal with every atom of his being—and yet he would admit to a difficulty in extending the principle to the sorts of excessively common people who populated Breughel paintings and attended witch-trials.
It took him four attempts, each louder and angrier than the last, to convince the marshals stationed outside the courthouse that he was Rebecca Webster’s advocate and must therefore be granted immediate entry. He pulled his portmanteau tight against his chest and, working his elbows in the manner of a fledgling attempting flight, jostled his way through the foyer. The main hall was packed front to back, side to side, and, if you considered the score of ill-scrubbed youths perched on the rafters, top to bottom. Numerous spectators sat in the aisles, so that Montesquieu had to advance gingerly, like a man crossing a brook by stepping from stone to stone.
Moving past the journalists’ desk, he nodded toward Monsieur Benjamin Franklin, who was too busy scribbling to notice the gesture, then proceeded to the defense table and set down his portmanteau. Along the opposite wall loomed the three Purification Commissioners, black of dress, sour of face: ravens contemplating a carcass. Beside them rose the jury-box, crammed with twelve men whose principal qualifications for determining Madame Crompton’s fate were that each held title to twenty acres and had nothing better to do before Sunday.
“Oyez! Oyez!” The bailiff banged his pike against the floor as if cracking the ice-cake on a cistern.
The spectators grew silent. Bedecked in a dark frock coat and a ludicrous periwig spouting white curls, the ancient John Hathorne emerged from his alcove at the languid velocity of a pallbearer. Solemnly, awkwardly, he ascended to the judge’s bench, then cleared his throat with a reverberant rasp.
“The Court is now in session,” he said, punctuating each syllable with a tap of his wooden mallet. “Mr. Broom, you may arraign the defendant.”
“Rebecca Webster will come before the bench!” the bailiff declared.
The antechamber door flew open, and the prisoner strode into the hall, attired in her linen shift and accompanied by four marshals holding pikes and stifling yawns. An iron chain arced betwixt her wrists like a purgatorial watch fob. She brought her lean body to full height and approached Judge Hathorne. For the first time since pledging himself to her cause, Montesquieu realized that he was in love with Jennet Stearne Crompton. The sensation was at once uplifting and confounding, like a good law in need of an especially subtle interpretation.
“State your name,” the bailiff commanded.
“Rebecca Webster,” she replied tonelessly.
“Rebecca Webster, the Crown sayeth you have committed the abhorrent crime of sorcery, and this Court doth thereby charge you with heresy against the Christian faith, according to the Witchcraft Statute of King James the First as ratified in the year 1718 by the Pennsylvania Assembly. How plead you, guilty or nay?”
“There being no such crime as sorcery, I must perforce assert my innocence.”
“The jury will disregard all rogue opinions from the defendant,” Hathorne said.
“The Court proposes that you solicit its leniency by forthwith signing a confession of Satanic compact,” the bailiff informed Madame Crompton. “Will you do this?”
“If you put the thumbscrews to me I might,” she said, “but mayhap not even then.”
“His Majesty’s witch-courts have ne’er resorted to torture, Mrs. Webster,” Hathorne said, “a fact with which you are well acquainted.”
The marshals escorted Madame Crompton to the defense table, where Montesquieu greeted her by clasping her manacled hands betwixt his palms.
“How felicitous that you mentioned thumbscrews,” he said.
“Felicitous?” she said, assuming her chair.
“Torture is more relevant to this case than Monsieur le Juge imagines.”
Hathorne directed a trembling finger toward the Purification Commissioners. “The Crown will offer a preliminary argument.”
Securing a thick moldering Bible under his arm, Dunstan Stearne stepped toward the jury-box and bowed to the foreman, Enoch Hocking, a gnarled rustic with high cheekbones and hai
r the texture of corn silk. “Good landholders, I shall begin by confirming a rumor that flits about this courtroom like a mayfly,” the pricker said. “The defendant was indeed born Jennet Stearne, and she is truly my blood-sister.” He caressed his Bible. “Should my rôle as Crown’s advocate therefore strike you as paradoxical, let me evoke our Savior’s admonition from Luke Chapter Fourteen. ‘If any man come to me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren…and sisters…yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple.’”
Montesquieu was pleased to observe perplexity claim the countenance of every juryman. The verse in question evidently bespoke a species of Christianity with which they were unfamiliar.
“The case before you is mayhap the most important yet tried in His Majesty’s American provinces,” Monsieur Stearne continued. “If you read The Pennsylvania Gazette, you know that Mrs. Webster seeks not only to deliver herself from the gallows but to destroy the Parliamentary Witchcraft Act, thus unleashing a deluge of Sadducism, Hobbism, Deism, and atheism throughout His Majesty’s realm.”
The jurymen’s expressions shifted from bewilderment to shock.
“Sadducism?” whispered Madame Crompton. “Atheism? Is he allowed to speak such lies?”
“I fear your brother thinks them facts,” Montesquieu replied.
“Make no mistake, landholders,” Stearne said. “Mrs. Webster will not rest till she hath hacked off the witch-fighting arm of the Christian religion. Were Satan to grant her the power, she would amputate all demonology from Holy Writ, impounding every Bible in Europe and America and tearing out Leviticus page by page.” He flung open his Scripture, leafed his way eastward from Eden, and declaimed with a passion worthy of a Molièrean player. “‘A man also or woman that hath a familiar spirit, or that is a wizard, shall surely be put to death.’” He snapped the Bible shut and pivoted toward the bench, black cape swirling. “The Crown would now make its case in the particular.”
“Proceed,” Hathorne said.
“We call to the witness-stand Mr. Abraham Pollock, magistrate of Mount-Holly.”
Rage boiled up in Montesquieu’s every vein. “Pardonez-moi,” he said, rising abruptly. “By your leave, Judge Hathorne, the defense will make an opening argument.”
“Mr. Stearne hath provided the jury with all the preamble it requires,” Hathorne said. “Find your chair, Baron, that the trial may continue.”
Montesquieu resumed his seat, moving with a sluggishness that aspired to impertinence. “In France I would be heard,” he muttered.
“If you wish to return home, Monsieur, the Court will not stop you,” said Hathorne.
As Abraham Pollock climbed into the witness-stand, the audience snorted and grumbled its discontent with Hathorne’s ruling. We have sustained a Pyrrhic defeat, Montesquieu thought. If we lose many more such battles, we shall surely win the war.
Stearne and Pollock now commenced a protracted dialogue, demonologist to demonologist, during which interval they established why four particular tests—swimming an accused Satanist in a pristine current, pricking her suspicious excrescences, noting her commerce with dumb beasts, and requiring her to recite the Lord’s Prayer—enjoyed such prestige amongst witchfinders.
The luncheon recess followed. Montesquieu marched directly to the food stalls, purchased a mutton pieas puffy and fragrant as a courtesan’s pillow, and delivered it to Madame Crompton. Despite her dire circumstances, she retained a hearty appetite, devouring her portion in less than a minute.
At one o’clock the demonologists renewed their conversation. Magistrate Pollock discoursed extensively on how the Delaware River had spurned Rebecca Webster’s body, how his pricking needle had failed to bloody her Devil’s mark, and how the Pater Noster had crumbled on her tongue. Beyond this plethora of evidence lay the fact that a half-dozen cats currently inhabited the defendant’s barn, each displaying indications of Satanic ancestry.
Hathorne thanked Pollock for sharing his expertise, then offered Dunstan Stearne a conspiratorial smile. “I realize that the Crown hath barely begun to construct its case, and yet the hour grows late. Might we defer your next witness till the morrow?”
Stomach twitching, Montesquieu leapt to his feet. “Before the Court adjourns, I would question Mr. Pollock.”
“His testimony hath been discussed in full,” Hathorne replied. “Mr. Pollock, you are excused.”
Heedless of the crowd’s indignant murmurs, the Mount-Holly magistrate left the witness-stand and strode out of the hall.
“Charles, we must not let this moment pass,” Madame Crompton muttered.
“N’ayez crainte, mon amie.” He lingered briefly at the defense table, long enough to give his client’s shoulder an obliquely amorous squeeze, then dashed toward the jury-box. “Good Philadelphians, I beg that you consider Magistrate Pollock’s testimony in the light of Reason. If you study the bailiff over there”—he gestured toward the man called Broom—“you will note a black wart on his left nostril.”
Jurors, journalists, and spectators engaged in a collective contemplation of the bailiff’s nose. The man turned scarlet and cringed.
“Baron, you seem unaware that we are about to adjourn,” Hathorne said, reaching for his mallet.
A hissing spread through the hall, as if the trial had attracted an audience of vipers.
Hathorne stayed his hand and scowled. “Lest a cry of favoritism be raised against the bench,” he said to Montesquieu, “I shall permit you to waggle your tongue for a short interval.”
The hissing ceased.
“I was speaking of the bailiff’s wart,” Montesquieu continued. “Tell me, honorable landholders, shall we now apprehend Mr. Broom and prick that suspect blot? For such is our sacred duty by Mr. Pollock’s logic.” He returned to the defense table and, opening his portmanteau, dumped out a bronze basin, a tin flask, and a leather bottle bulging with water. He seized the flask and struck it with his knuckles, producing a hollow bong. “Consider this container. Empty as a drunkard’s mug. I bid you now imagine that my vessel”—he filled the basin with water—“is the lung of an accused sorcerer.” He stoppered the flask, set it a-float, and carried the demonstration to the jury. “See how it swims? Do we therefore call this vessel bewitched? Or do we simply admit that it obeys the law of buoyancy, the same principle as raised Rebecca Webster from the Delaware?”
“Baron, you will finish this absurd presentation within one minute,” Hathorne said.
Montesquieu retrieved the flask and laid it on the floor. “Now watch how easily I make the enchantment disappear, a mere matter of purging the lung in question.” He inflicted his boot heel on the flask, rendering it as flat as a centime, then picked up the squashed vessel, held it over the basin, and dropped it in the water. The flask sank instantly. “Look, gentlemen, the vessel founders! The spell is broken!”
“And hence the Court is adjourned!” Hathorne shouted, hammering on the bench.
“Each time a supposed witch is launched upon a river,” Montesquieu yelled over Hathorne’s frantic cadence, “we learn little about the condition of her soul and much about the status of her lungs! Purged, she sinks! Full, she rises!”
“Purged, she sinks!” echoed Ben Franklin. “Full, she rises!”
“Adjourned!” John Hathorne cried.
“Purged, she sinks!” shouted Barnaby Cavendish from the front row. “Full, she rises!”
“Adjourned!”
“Purged, she sinks!” insisted the tallest of Franklin’s youngbloods, the Indian John Tux. “Full, she rises!”
Now the whole gallery took up the cry. “Purged, she sinks! Full, she rises!”
Montesquieu experienced a sudden rush of admiration for Pennsylvania’s yeomen. They might lack the nuances of a civilized people, but their instinctive love of la liberté was most inspiring.
“Adjourned!” roared Hathorne.
As Montesquieu strode back to the defense table, Franklin stood up, blotted his scribblings with a s
ponge, and came forward. “Congratulations, sir,” he said, clasping the Baron’s hand. “Despite Judge Hathorne’s sophistry, you have carried the day.”
Montesquieu said, “Tomorrow Dunstan Stearne interviews Rebecca Webster’s supposed victims—a marvelous opportunity to acquaint the jury with the sufficiency hypothesis.”
“And an equally marvelous opportunity for Ebenezer Trenchard to declare that the mirage called maleficium is passing from the world,” Franklin said, “and ’tis time we blamed our troubles on ourselves.”
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BY GOADING HIS MARE to her swiftest gallop, Ben Franklin managed to reach Philadelphia as twilight fell upon the city, covering Market Street in a caul of mist and murk. No sooner had he reined up before the printing-house than his writerly imagination wrought from the surrounding gloom the opening sentence of Ebenezer Trenchard’s next essay. “At the start of the Webster trial, the Baron de Montesquieu disclosed how our species might finally escape the shadowy slough of superstition to sport upon the sun-drenched plain beyond.”
He entered the shop. Characteristically, he was the first man on the scene, but as the hour progressed the other journalists arrived, and ere long the collective scratchings of five pen nibs filled the press-room, none moving faster than Ben’s. Beyond the Trenchard letter, the incipient edition of The Pennsylvania Gazette would feature William Parsons’s unsympathetic report on Dunstan Stearne’s preamble, Hugh Roberts’s scalding critique of Abraham Pollock’s witch-tests, Philip Synge’s paean to Montesquieu’s tin flask, and John Tux’s general lament over the toll the cleansers had taken on his Indian brethren. Only Nicholas Scull’s quill was unemployed, for he had elected to set his article—an attack on Hathorne’s irrational rulings—directly in type, so pure was his outrage and supreme his self-confidence.
At eight o’clock the shop’s foreman, Ned Billings, arrived with his six journeymen, each eager to assume his respective duty as compositor, framer, inker, washer, breaker, and spindle-man. Ben handed his essay to the trusty Billings, bid his colleagues farewell, and headed homeward, happy in his knowledge that, like two great ovens baking loaf upon loaf of nourishing bread, the Blaeu presses would that night yield five hundred copies of the Gazette, as they had done each night for the past eighteen months.
