18. Mason & Dixon, by Thomas Pynchon, pp. 554-596

Two: America; 56-60

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In his field journal, Mason notes that "Cycles, or if you like, Segments of eleven Days recur again and again," which he ascribes to "the famous Eleven Missing Days of the Calendar Reform of '52." And to Dixon he tells a fantastic tale about being caught up in a time vortex, "finding myself in September third, 1752, a date that for all the rest of England, did not exist."

During their winter break, Dixon and Mason swap the direction they took on their previous break, Dixon going north to New York, where he encounters the same crew that abducted Mason on the last trip, this time more open about their revolutionary activities. In fact, he meets them "at Montagne's Tavern, upon Broad-Way, near Murray Street, which proves to be Head-quarters of the local Sons of Liberty, as well as thick with Intrigue, regardless of the Hour." He also meets up with some who figured earlier in the novel: "Foretopman Bodine, once of the Seahorse," and Philip Dimdown, who is no longer a fop but now "a serious young man upon a Mission whose end may not be predicted." Dixon is questioned by Dimdown as to his sympathies as a Quaker toward the Americans' impending struggle for independence.

"''Tis not how British treat Americans,' Dixon amiably rubescent, ''tis how both of You treat the American Slaves, and the Indians Native here, that engages the Friends more closely, -- an old and melancholy History.... My allegiance, as a Quaker born, would lie, above all, with Christ, -- withal, as a Geordie, for reasons unarguably Tribal, I can have no sympathy for any British King, -- not even one who's paid my wages, bless 'im.'" 

Mason's journey southward takes him to Williamsburg, while along the way he finds an equivalent nascent rebelliousness. In Williamsburg he is invited to play billiards with Col. Washington. The tavern is filled with smoke, and Mason and Washington overhear an argument over someone's use of the word "nigger," in which Washington is surprised to hear the voice of Gershom. "Half the Company seem to believe this is a white Customer, impersonating an African. Others, having caught Gershom's act before, recognize him right away." They began asking him for particular jokes they've heard him tell.

Then Mason recognizes another voice in the crowd, that of "Baby-Phiz Nathe McClean, or I'm a Sailor." McClean has returned to his studies at William and Mary. He tells Mason that he left the surveying party "just in time.... I should have been crazy as Captain Zhang, had I remained a week more." But he also says that "the Captain wasn't just Pipe-Smoaking in the Article of that Sha. We all felt it, as, to Appearance, did you and Mr. Dixon. Surveying a Property Line, that may be one thing, -- clearing and marking a Right Line of an Hundred Leagues, into the Lands of Others, cannot be a kindly Act."

At the end of March, the surveyors go back to work, where they find an uproar over "the great Scandal over the winter involving Tom Hynes, Catherine Wheat, and their Baby." The story of the scandal, which takes up a chapter, owes as much to Mark Twain as it does to the 18th-century novelists like Smollett and Sterne who inform the rest of Pynchon's novel.

Returning to work, Dixon encounters a suspicion that the surveyors may be spies by saying, "'Tis a gormless Spy indeed, who'd lurk where there are no more Secrets to steal. ... What is there that has not been visited, intentionally and not, an hundred times?" Captain Shelby, with whom they left the instruments for the winter, observes that "There is a love of complexity, here in America, ... pur Space waits the Surveyor, -- no previous Lines, no fences, no streets to constrain polygony however extravagant."

Dixon begins trying to learn how to use Zhang's luopan, and notes that Britain is in "the Terrestrial Sign of Draco, the Dragon." But he explains to Zhang that where he comes from, in Durham, dragons "are not at all the Chinese Variety. Some, like the Lambton Worm, lacking Wings and a fire-breathing Capacity, may indeed be of a distinct Species." And he proceeds to tell his version of the legend of the Lambton Worm. Afterward, Captain Shelby alludes to a serpentine mound on the other side of the Ohio which the Indians claim predate their inhabiting the region. He proposes that they investigate some mounds nearer to where they are.

15. Mason & Dixon, by Thomas Pynchon, pp. 460-490

Two: America; 47-50

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By late May, they reach the Susquehanna, where they make attempts to measure the width of the river, finally determining that it's about seven-eights of a mile wide. While they're there a thunderstorm comes up that terrifies Mason, but which Dixon receives with comparative calm.

Now they receive word that they should "return to the Tangent Point, and run the three and a half Miles of Meridian, or North Line, needed to close the Boundaries of the Lower Counties." The orders present young Nathanael McClean, known as Nathe, with a dilemma: He writes a friend that he has fallen in love with a milkmaid whom he calls Galactica, and that the return east will separate them. "For tho' I know next to nothing about the Sex, yet it seems, in my experience, that their reputation for Patience is gravely over-blown, and the faithful sailor's Sweetheart of Song and Romance as mythical as a Mermaid."

For the next three weeks, they are occupied again with the enigmatick Area 'round the Tangent Point, seeking to close the Eastern boundaries of Pennsylvania and Maryland, -- the Commissioners, to appearance, being anxious upon this score. 

Meanwhile, they discuss what lies ahead to the west of the Susquehanna: "Over Susquehanna begins a different Province entirely, and beginning at the Mountains, another differing from that, and so on, -- beyond Monongahela, beyond Ohio." How far they go depends on what the Penns want, Mason observes, "as Maryland's Grant ends just past Laurel Hill, from there West 'tis Penn's Line alone, dividing Penn lands from Virginia, -- who bear none of the Cost." At stake are the iron and coal deposits in the west.

On June 6, they complete the survey that closes the boundary between Maryland and Pennsylvania to the east, but the ambiguous area known as the Wedge remains, "resulting from the failure of the Tangent Point to be exactly at this corner of Maryland, but rather some five miles south, creating a semi-cusp or Thorn of that Length, and doubtful ownership." But this is no longer Mason and Dixon's problem. They "are order'd back to Susquehanna, this time to continue the West Line 'as far as the Country is inhabited."

Meanwhile, Darby and Cope, members of the surveying team who work with the chain, are so often asked they are the famous Mason and Dixon that they begin to tell people they are. They even argue over which one gets to be Mason and which Dixon -- the latter being more popular. Eventually, "Maidens in varying ratios of Indignation to Curiosity show up in camp, demanding to see Mason or Dixon, or both. Upon meeting the real Surveyors, 'Well, but you're not him, --' '-- nor you the other.'" Eventually, when Darby and Cope are summoned to see Mason and Dixon, Darby blames Cope, and Cope Darby, for perpetuating the misunderstanding. The chainmen fall to blows, but are interrupted by a delegation of angry axmen who have seen the pay-list and want to protest the hiring of "Darby and Cope, Chinamen." Dixon corrects their misreading of "Chain-men."

Before they cross the Susquehanna, they receive a package from Maskelyne, who has sent them "Fr. Boscovich's Book, De Solis et Lunae Defectibus... [inviting] their Attention to a great Variety of Data within, including a Warning as to the Attraction of Mountains.... 'First the Iron-Lodes disable my Needle,' moans Dixon, 'now the Mountains are about to throw off my Plummet?'" But Mason's worry is that "the Western Slopes of Allegheny may prove less distressing than the Windward side of that wretched Island."

On the other side of the Susquehanna, however, nothing seems very different. The iron-rich earth is red, and the story goes that if it's plowed the right way "it becomes magnetized, too, so that at Harvest-time, 'tis necessary only to pass along the Rows any large Container of Iron, and the Vegetables will fly up out of the ground, and stick to it." The entourage of the expedition has grown, "lengthen'd to a suburbs dedicated to high (as some would say, low) living. Gaming, corn whiskey, Women able to put up with a heap of uncompensated overtime, etc. There is even "the Vásquez Brothers' Marimba Quartet, who often play back-up for the Torpedo, to whom it is the musick of his Youth, his home Waters."

But as the summer goes on, Dixon has the sense that they're being "used" in the service of American politics. Mason posits that Maskelyne could be a French spy working for the Jesuits, which Dixon opines is a "Bit sophisticated for me. Tho' I don't mind a likely Conspiracy, I prefer it be formed in the interests of Trade, -- the mystickal sort you fancy is fair beyond me." Mason takes this to be an allusion to the East India Company." This is, however, only a setup for one of Pynchon's atrocious puns:

"Come, Sir, can you not sense here ... the scent of fresh Coriander, the whisper of a Sarong...?"" 

"Sari," corrects Mason. 

"Not at all Sir, -- 'twas I who was sarong."

Now they near the Redzingers' farm, which causes tension between Allègre and Frau Redzinger. For Peter Redzinger has returned to the farm, having lost his vision of Christ. She tries to tell him about the Frenchman and his duck, but he doesn't listen. Apparently Christ has taught Peter to make golems: "Kitchen-size, -- some of them quite clever, the Tasks they do, -- one that peels and cores Apples, -- ja, even pits Cherries."

Cherrycoke inserts a selection from his Spiritual Day-Book about the German sects in Pennsylvania, which seem to generate "spiritual Wonders." Mason and Dixon are about to encounter some of them when they stop at a tavern called The Rabbi of Prague, which is "headquarters of a Kabbalistick Faith" that has its own "private Salute they now greet Dixon with, the Fingers spread two and two, and the thumb held away from them likewise, said to represent the Hebrew letter Shin, and to signify 'Live long and prosper.'"


There is also supposed to be in the neighborhood a Golem "taller than the most ancient of the Trees" that was "created by an Indian tribe widely suppos'd to be one of the famous Lost Tribes of Israel." They've never seen the Golem, "only heard his steps on the nights when there is no Moon, or his voice, speaking from above the only words he knows, -- 'Eyeh asher Eyeh.'"

"That is, 'I am that which I am,' helpfully translates a somehow nautical-looking Indiv. with gigantick Fore-Arms, and one Eye ever a-Squint from the Smoke of his Pipe. 

They also learn about the author of the Pennsylvaniad, an epic in heroic couplets whose work eclipses that of Alexander Pope: "In the Constellation 'Poesia,' Sir, to frame it in more comfortable terms for you, even the Wasp of Twickenham must be assign'd the Letter Beta, for this Timothy Tox who is its Lumina."

But their conversation is cut short as "great Percussions upon the Earth are heard, coming ever closer. Trees, push'd over, crash to the ground. Bears, Bobcats, and Wolves come fleeing before whatever is just behind." And outside, "great Mud Feet are seen to stir, tall as the Eaves."

14. Mason & Dixon, by Thomas Pynchon, pp. 422-459

Two: America; 42-46

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Unfortunately, the gambling didn't go well for Mason. Not only did he lose twenty pounds, but he also suffered the indignity of seeing Lord Lepton, "this runny-nos'd, titl'd Savage, tossing their Expeditionary Funds as airy Gratuities to the Slaves." Dixon proposes that they "take something worth twenty pounds" and decides on "a giant Bathing-tub with Feet, Bear Feet in fact, cast at the Lepton Foundry from local Iron." When Mason protests that the thing must weigh half a ton, Dixon reveals that "William Emerson taught things no one else in England knows. Secret techniques of mechanickal Art, rescued from the Library at Alexandria, circa 390 A.D." And to Mason's astonishment, "Dixon seems scarcely to touch the pond'rous Fixture" before one end levitates and the tub is standing "precariously balanced upon a sort of lip or Flange at its other end."

Dixon leaves Mason with the tub while he goes to "reconnoitre," but  soon Mason hears Dixon talking to Lady Lepton in the corridor. "Sighs. Fabric tearing. A merry Squeal." And then music, Handel's "O Ruddier than the Cherry," issuing from "the infamous Musickal Bodice, devis'd by an instrument-maker of London, wherein Quills sewn into its fastening, when this is pull'd apart," play a tune. Mason stands there fuming with the tub while Dixon and the Lady proceed with their dalliance.

But soon someone else appears, fascinated by the tub, which he says is a "quite astonishing Magnet" and "damn' nearly Earth's third Pole." He introduces himself as "Professor Voam, Philosophical Operator, just at present scampering from the King's Authorities." Voam is in possession of a "Torpedo" -- an electric eel, which electrocuted a man in Philadelphia who disregarded warnings not to touch it. Mason is irritated when Voam recognizes him as one of "The Astronomers! Dixon and Mason!" He tries to correct the order of billing, but Voam talks on, pointing out that the tub would be "just the Article to keep Felípe in," Felípe being the Torpedo.

Dixon returns, "emerging coprophagously a-grin from some false Panel in a Wall," and the three of them exit with the tub. In a corridor, Mason is confronted by the slave woman whom Dixon encountered the night before. He recognizes her, but can't believe his eyes. She tells him she was abducted by Malays and sold to the Jesuits, who sent her to a nunnery. "Whence, after my Novitiate, kind Captain D. and I came to our Rapprochement." He admits that he knows who she is -- although the name Austra is not yet mentioned -- but she disappears around a corner.

They enter a room where they find a rifle suspended over the fireplace, and where Wade LeSpark has been resting on a couch. They talk about the rifle, which has an inverted silver five-pointed star on its stock that Mason has seen before, in Lancaster, "upon the Sign of the Dutch Rifle," a tavern. Dixon says they could have taken the rifle instead of the tub, but Mason protests that the silver pentacle means the rifle is cursed. And LeSpark counsels that "taking the Rifle will be far more dangerous, than taking the Tub."

Finally they get the tub outside "where they transfer Tub and Torpedo to a Conestoga Waggon but lately unloaded, with fresh Horses hitch'd up." Only then does Mason ask Dixon, "Did it seem like Austra to you?" And they agree that it couldn't have been. And Voam begins to tell them about the Torpedo, which he says is not an eel but a ray or a skate, native to Surinam, and is also known as "El Peligroso." The professor has been doing a traveling show with the Torpedo, and when they stop at an inn for one, he quickly attracts an audience. He demonstrates the eel's electrical powers by lighting a cigar from the giant spark it produces, but it has a peculiar effect on Mason, who looks directly into the spark and sees "at the heart of the Electrick Fire, beyond color, beyond even Shape, an Aperture into another Dispensation of Space, yea and Time, than what Astronomers and Surveyors are us'd to working with.... Throughout, the Creature in the Tank regarded me with a personal stare, as of a Stranger claiming to know me from some distant, no longer accessible Shore."

Abandoning the Tub, the Professor builds a larger circular Tank, and mounts it upon wheels, so that daily it may be situated directly upon the Line. Felípe then slowly rotates until his head is pointing north. Presently, he has become the camp Compass, as often consulted as the Thermometer or the Clock.

At the end of February they are in Newark when word comes that Maskelyne has been made Astronomer Royal. Mason tries to put on a good face at the news, though for Dixon, "Mason attempting to be chirpy is less easy to bear than Mason in blackest Melancholy." He soon admits that Maskelyne "is unworthy, damn him! to succeed James Bradley." Mason's own aspirations for the post become obvious, and Dixon suggests, "Were I thee, I should make him feel guilty ev'ry change I got. Perhaps he doubts his own Worthiness." Which amuses Mason: "Why bless me, Sir, -- you are a Jesuit, after all. Sinister Alfonso, move aside, -- sheathe that Stiletto, wicked Giuseppe, -- here is the true Italian Art."

In April they begin the West Line and bid farewell to the Harland farm that has been their base of operations. Before they leave, they encounter a stranger named Jonas Everybeet who is fascinated by "the chunk of Rose Quartz where cross the Latitude of the south Edge of Philadelphia, and the Longitude of the Post Mark'd West, -- the single Point to which all work upon the West Line (and its eastward Protraction to the Delaware Short) will finally refer." Everybeet gazes into the crystal and when Mason looks into it he sees a face with "Huge, dark Eyes." Everybeet joins the party as a specialist in magnetic fields, anomalies in which he can discover.

Mason and Dixon are also dogged by a "Body-jobber" named O'Rooty, who specializes in finding workers for the crew, including some Swedish axmen, and a "'Developer,' or Projector of Land-Schemes," whom Dixon suggests they kill. The first day of surveying the West Line is April 5, and in less than a week they have found that the line runs through the house of a Rhys Price, who is away but whose wife has them survey right through the house while she marks the boundary between Pennsylvania and Maryland within it. When her husband shows up, she announces to him that they were married in Pennsylvania, "So from now on, when I am upon this side of the House, I am in Maryland, legally not ;your wife, and no longer subject to your Authority." Advised that he will have to pay taxes to both Pennsylvania and Maryland, Price decides to put; the house on rollers and move it into one state or the other. And since Maryland is downhill and they will no longer be married there, he chooses Maryland.

Now the mechanical duck makes a return, showing up when Mason makes a disparaging remark about it as a "French toy." The duck steals his hat and is persuaded to return it only when Allègre, who seems to have joined the expedition, persuades it. We also have a glimpse of the crew, including Moses Barnes, the overseer of the axmen, and Nathanael McClean, a handsome young man working during his summer break from college in Williamsburg.