Mason & Dixon Read online

  Tho’ ’tis true, that in my own Work I have recourse much more often to the Needle, than to the Stars,— yet, what I lack in Celestial experience, I pray I may counterpend with Diligence and a swift Grasp,— as, clearly, I cannot pretend to your level of Art, Sir, gladly would I adopt, as promptly as benefit from, any suggestions you might direct toward improving the level of my own.

  In this, as in all else,—

  Y’r obd’t s’v’t.

  Jeremiah Dixon.—

  A few months later, when it is no longer necessary to pretend as much as they expected they’d have to, Dixon reveals that, whilst composing this, he had delib’rately refrain’d from Drink. “Went thro’ twenty Revisions, dreaming all the while of the Pint awaiting me down at The Jolly Pitman. Then the Pint after that, of course, and so forth. . . . Growing more desirable with each stricken Phrase, if tha follow me,— ”

  Mason in turn confesses to having nearly thrown the Letter away, having noted its origin in County Durham, and assumed it to be but more of the free provincial advice that it was one of his Tasks to read thro’ in the Astronomer Royal’s behalf, and respond to. “Yet, ’twas so sincere,— I instantly felt sham’d,— unworthy,— that this honest Country soul believ’d me wise.— Ahhrr! bitter Deception. . . .”

  To,— Mr. Jeremiah Dixon

  Bishop Auckland, Co. Durham.

  Sir,—

  I have yours of the 26th Ult. and am much oblig’d for your kind opinion.— Yet I fear, the Doubts may with justice fall more upon your side, for I have never taught anyone, upon any Subject, nor may I prove much skill’d at it. Howbeit,— pray you hesitate not, in asking what you like, as I shall ever try to answer honestly,— if probably not in toto.

  Each of us is to have his own twin Telescope, by Mr. Dollond, fitted with the latest of his marvellous Achromatics,— our Clock by Mr. Ellicott,— and of course the Sector by your Mr. Bird,— none but the best for this Party, I should say!

  Wishing you a journey south as safe as His Ways how strange, may allow, I wait your arrival in a Spirit happily rescu’d by your universally good Name, from all Imps of the Apprehensive,— an Exception most welcome, in the generally uneasy Life of

  y’r obdt. Svt.,

  Charles Mason

  3

  I was not there when they met,— or, not in the usual Way. I later heard from them how they remember’d meeting. I tried to record, in what I then projected as a sort of Spiritual Day-Book, what I could remember of what they said,— tho’ ’twas too often abridg’d by the Day’s Fatigue.

  (“Writing in your sleep, too!” cry the Twins.)

  O children, I even dream’d in those Days,— but only long after the waking Traverse was done.

  Howsobeit,— scarcely have they met, in the Saloon of Mason’s Inn at Portsmouth, than Mason finds himself coming the Old London Hand, before Dixon’s clear Stupefaction with that Town.

  “Eeh! Fellow was spitting at my Shoes . . . ? Another pushing folk one by one into the Gutters, some of them quite dangerous to look at’ . . . ? How can Yese dwell thah’ closely together, Day upon Day, without all growing Murderous?”

  “Oh, one may, if one wishes, find Insult at ev’ry step,— from insolent Stares to mortal Assault, an Orgy of Insult uninterrupted,— yet how does one proceed to call out each offender in turn, or choose among ’em, and in obedience to what code? So, one soon understands it, as yet another Term in the Contract between the City and oneself,— a function of simple Density, ensuring that there never be time enough to acknowledge, let alone to resent, such a mad Variety of offer’d Offense.”

  “Just so,— why, back in Bishop, it might take half the night to find an excuse to clash someone i’ the Face, whilst in London, ’tis the Paradise of the Quarrelsome, for fair . . . ?”

  “You’d appreciate Wapping High Street, then,— and, and Tyburn, of course! put that on your list.”

  “Alluring out there, is it?”

  Mason explains, though without his precise reason for it, that, for the past Year or more, it has been his practice to attend the Friday Hangings at that melancholy place, where he was soon chatting up Hangmen and their ’Prentices, whilst standing them pints at their Local, The Bridport Dagger, acquiring thus a certain grisly intimacy with the Art. Mason has been shov’d about and borne along in riots of sailors attempting to wrest from bands of Medical Students the bodies of Shipmates come to grief ashore, too far from the safety of the Sea,— and he’s had his Purse, as his Person, assaulted by Agents public and private,— yet, “There’s nothing like it, it’s London at its purest,” he cries. “You must come out there with me, soon as we may.”

  Taking it for the joke it must surely be, Dixon laughs, “Ha, ha, ha! Oh, thah’s a bonny one, all right.”

  Mason shrugging, palms up, “I’m serious. Worse than that, I’m sober. A man’s first time in town, he simply can’t miss a hanging. Come, Sir,— what’s the first thing they’ll ask when you get back to County Durham? Eh? ‘Did ye see them rahde the Eeahr at Taahburn?’ ”

  Is it too many nights alone on top of that fam’d Hill in Greenwich? can this man, living in one of the great Cities of Christendom, not know how to behave around people?— Dixon decides to register only annoyance. “Nooah, the first thing they’ll ask is, ‘Did thoo understand ’em the weeay theey talk, down theere . . . ?’ ”

  “Oh, damme, I say, I didn’t mean,— ”

  So Dixon for the second time in two minutes finds himself laughing without the Motrix of honest Mirth,— this time, a Mr. Mason— how-you-do-go-on laugh, sidewise and forbearing, the laugh of a hired Foil. Yet, feeling it his Duty to set them at Ease, he begins, “Well. There’s this Jesuit, this Corsican, and this Chinaman, and they’re all riding in a greeat Cooach, going up to Bath . . . ? and the fourth Passenger is a very proper Englishwoman, who keeps giving them these scandaliz’d Glances . . . ? Finally, able to bear it no longer, the Corsican, being the most hot-headed of the three, bursts out, and here I hope You will excuse my Corsican Accent, he says, “Ey! Lady! Whatta Ye lookin’ ah’?’ And she says,— ”

  Mason has been edging away. “Are you crazy?” he whispers, “— People are staring. Sailors are staring.”

  “Eeh!” Dixon’s nose throbbing redly. “You have heard it, then. Apologies,” reaching to clasp Mason’s arm, a gesture Mason retreats from in a Flinch as free of deliberation as a Sneeze. Dixon withdrawing, broken into a Sweat, “Why aye, it took me weeks of study to fathom that one, but I see You’ve a brisk Brain in Your gourd there, and I’m pleas’d to be working with such as it be . . . ?” Resolutely a-beam, pronouncing the forms of You consciously, as if borrowing them from another Tongue.

  The two are staring, one at the other, each with a greatly mistaken impression,— likewise in some Uncertainty as to how the power may come to be sorted out betwixt ’em. Dixon is a couple of inches taller, sloping more than towering, wearing a red coat of military cut, with brocade and silver buttons, and a matching red three-corner’d Hat with some gaudy North-Road Cockade stuck in it. He will be first to catch the average Eye, often causing future strangers to remember them as Dixon and Mason. But the Uniform accords with neither his Quaker Profession, nor his present Bearing,— a civilian Slouch grown lop-sided, too often observ’d, alas, in Devotees of the Taproom.

  For Dixon’s part, he seems disappointed in Mason,— or so the Astronomer, ever inclined to suspicion, fears. “What is it? What are you looking at? It’s my Wig, isn’t it.”

  “You’re not wearing a Wig . . . ?”

  “Just so! you noted that,— you have been observing me in a strange yet, I must conclude, meaningful way.”

  “Don’t know . . . ? Happen I was expecting someone a bit more . . . odd . . . ?”

  Mason a-squint, “I’m not odd enough for you?”

  “Well it is a peculiar station in
Life, isn’t it? How many Royal Astronomers are there? How many Royal Astronomers’ Assistants are there likely to be? Takes an odd bird to stay up peering at Stars all night in the first place, doesn’t it . . . ? On the other hand, Surveyors are runnin’ about numerous as Bed-bugs, and twice as cheap, with work enough for all certainly in Durham at present, Enclosures all over the County, and North Yorkshire,— eeh! Fences, Hedges, Ditches ordinary and Ha-Ha Style, all to be laid out . . . I could have stay’d home and had m’self a fine Living . . . ?”

  “They did mention a Background in Land-Surveying,” Mason in some Surprize, “but, but that’s it? Hedges? Ha-Has?”

  “Well, actually the Durham Ha-Ha boom subsided a bit after Lord Lambton fell into his, curs’d it, had it fill’d in with coal-spoil. Why, did You think I was another Lens-fellow? O Lord no,— I mean I’ve been taught the lot, Celestial Mechanics, all the weighty lads, Laplace and Kepler, Aristarchus, the other fellow what’s his name,— but that’s all Trigonometry, isn’t it . . . ?”

  “Yet you,—” how shall he put this tactfully? “you have look’d . . . ehm . . . through a . . . ehm . . .”

  Dixon smiles at him encouragingly. “Why aye,— my old Teacher, Mr. Emerson, has a fine Telescope Ah believe the word is, encas’d in Barrel-Staves tho’ it be, and many’s the Evening I’ve admir’d the Phases of Venus, aye those and the Moons of Jupiter too, the Mountains and Craters of our own Moon,— and did You see thah’ latest Eclipse . . . ? canny,— eeh . . . Mr. Bird, as well, has shar’d his Instruments,— being kind enough, in fact, just in this last fortnight, to help me practice my observing and computing skills,— tho’ so mercilessly that I was in some doubt for days, whether we’d parted friends . . . ?”

  Mason, having expected some shambling wild Country Fool, remains amiably puzzl’d before the tidied Dixon here presented,— who, for his own part, having despite talk of Oddity expected but another overdress’d London climber, is amus’d at Mason’s nearly invisible Turn-out, all in Snuffs and Buffs and Grays.

  Mason is nodding glumly. “I must seem an Ass.”

  “If this is as bad as it gets, why I can abide thah’. As long as the Spirits don’t run out.”

  “Nor the Wine.”

  “Wine.” Dixon is now the one squinting. Mason wonders what he’s done this time.” ‘Grape or Grain, but ne’er the Twain,’ as me Great-Uncle George observ’d to me more than once,— ‘Vine with Corn, beware the Morn.’ Of the two sorts of drinking Folk this implies, thah’ is, Grape People and Grain People, You will now inform me of Your membership in the Brotherhood of the, eeh, Grape . . . ? and that You seldom, if ever, touch Ale or Spirits, am I correct?”

  “Happily so, I should imagine, as, given a finite Supply, there’d be more for each of us, it’s like Jack Sprat, isn’t it.”

  “Oh, I’ll drink Wine if I must . . . ?— and now we’re enter’d upon the Topick,— ”

  “— and as we are in Portsmouth, after all,— there cannot lie too distant some Room where each of us may consult what former Vegetation pleases him?”

  Dixon looks outside at the ebbing wintry sunlight. “Nor too early, I guess . . . ?”

  “We’re sailing to the Indies,— Heaven knows what’s available on Board, or out there. It may be our last chance for civiliz’d Drink.”

  “Sooner we start, the better, in thah’ case . . . ?”

  As the day darkens, and the first Flames appear, sometimes reflected as well in Panes of Glass, the sounds of the Stables and the Alleys grow louder, and chimney-smoke perambulates into the Christmastide air. The Room puts on its Evening-Cloak of shifting amber Light, and sinuous Folds of Shadow. Mason and Dixon become aware of a jostling Murmur of Expectancy.

  All at once, out of the Murk, a dozen mirror’d Lanthorns have leapt alight together, as into their Glare now strolls a somewhat dishevel’d Norfolk Terrier, with a raffish Gleam in its eye,— whilst from somewhere less illuminate comes a sprightly Overture upon Horn, Clarinet, and Cello, in time to which the Dog steps back and forth in his bright Ambit.

  Ask me anything you please,

  The Learnèd English Dog am I, well-

  Up on ev’rything from Fleas

  Unto the King’s Mon-og-am-eye,

  Persian Princes, Polish Blintzes,

  Chinamen’s Geo-mancy,—

  Jump-ing Beans or Flying Machines,

  Just as it suits your Fan-cy.

  I quote enough of the Classickal Stuff

  To set your Ears a-throb,

  Work logarith-mick Versèd Sines

  Withal, within me Nob,

  — Only nothing Ministerial, please,

  Or I’m apt to lose m’ Job,

  As, the Learnèd English Dog, to-ni-ight!

  There are the usual Requests. Does the Dog know “Where the Bee Sucks”? What is the Integral of One over (Book) d (Book)? Is he married? Dixon notes how his co-Adjutor-to-be seems fallen into a sort of Magnetickal Stupor, as Mesmerites might term it. More than once, Mason looks ready to leap to his feet and blurt something better kept till later in the Evening. At last the Dog recognizes him, tho’ now he is too key’d up to speak with any Coherence. After allowing him to rattle for a full minute, the Dog sighs deeply. “See me later, out in back.”

  “It shouldn’t take but a moment,” Mason tells Dixon. “I’ll be all right by myself, if there’s something you’d rather be doing. . . .”

  With no appetite for the giant Mutton Chop cooling in front of him, Mason mopishly now wraps it and stows it in his Coat. Looking up, he notes Dixon, mouth cheerfully stuff’d, beaming too tolerantly for his Comfort.

  “No,— not for me,— did you think I was taking it for myself?— ’tis for the Learnèd Dog, rather,— like, I don’t know, perhaps a Bouquet sent to an Actress one admires, a nice Chop can never go too far off the Mark.”

  Starting a beat late, “Why aye, ’tis a . . . a great World, for fair . . . ? and Practices vary, and one Man certainly may not comment upon— ”

  “What . . . are you saying?”

  Dixon ingenuously waving his Joint, eyes round as Pistoles. “No Offense, Sir.” Rolling his Eyes the Moment Mason switches his Stare away, then back a bit late to catch them so much as off-Center.

  “Dixon. Why mayn’t there be Oracles, for us, in our time? Gate-ways to Futurity? That can’t all have died with the ancient Peoples. Isn’t it worth looking ridiculous, at least to investigate this English Dog, for its obvious bearing upon Metempsychosis if nought else,— ”

  There is something else in progress,— something Mason cannot quite confide. Happen he’s lost someone close? and recently enough to matter, aye,— for he’s a way of pitching ever into the Hour, heedless, as Dixon remembers himself, after his father passed on. . . . “I’ll come along, if I may . . . ?”

  “Suture Self, as the Medical Students like to say.”

  They go out a back door, into the innyard. A leafless tree arches in the light of a single Lanthorn set above a taut gathering of card-players, their secret breathing visible for all to try to read, and Wigs, white as the snow on the Roofslates, nodding in and out of the Shadows.

  Sailors, mouths ajar, lope by in the lanes. Sailors in Slouch-Hats, Sailors with Queues, puffing on Pipes, eating Potatoes, some who’ll be going back to the Ship, and some who won’t, from old sea-wretches with too many Explosions in their Lives, to Child-Midshipmen who have yet to hear their first,— passing in and out the Doors of Ale-Drapers, Naval Tailors, Sweet-shops, Gaming-Lairs, upstart Chapels, calling, singing Catches, whistling as if Wind had never paid a Visit, vomiting as the Sea has never caus’d them to.

  “Happen his Dressing-Room’s close by,” Dixon suggests, “— in with the Horses, maybe . . . ?”

  “No one would keep a talking Dog in with Horses, it’d drive them mad inside of a Minute.”


  “Occurs often, does it, where you come from?”

  “Gentlemen,” in a whisper out of a dark corner. “If you’ll keep your voices down, I’ll be with you in a trice.” Slowly into their shifting spill of lantern-light, tongue a-loll, comes the Dog, who pauses to yawn, nods, “Good evening to ye,” and leads them at a trot out of the stables, out of the courtyard, and down the street, pausing now and then for nasal inquiries.

  “Where are we going?” Mason asks.

  “This seems to be all right.” The Learnèd English Dog stops and pisses.

  “This dog,” Mason singing sotto voce, “is causing me ap-pre-hension,— surely creatures of miracle ought not to, I mean, . . . Flying horses? None of them ever— ”

  “The Sphinx . . . ?” adds Dixon.

  “My Thought precisely.”

  “Now, Gents!” ’Tis a sudden, large Son of Neptune, backed by an uncertain number of comparably drunken Shipmates. “You’ve an interest in this Dog here?”

  “Wish’d a word with him only,” Mason’s quick to assure them.

  “Hey! I know you two,— ye’re the ones with all the strange Machinery, sailing in the Seahorse. Well,— ye’re in luck, for we’re all Seahorses here, I’m Fender-Belly Bodine, Captain of the Foretop, and these are my Mates,—” Cheering. “— But you can call me Fender. Now,— our plan, is to snatch this Critter, and for you Gents to then keep it in with your own highly guarded Cargo, out of sight of the Master-at-Arms, until we reach a likely Island,— ”

  “Island . . .” “Snatch . . .” both Surveyors a bit in a daze.

  “I’ve been out more than once to the Indies,— there’s a million islands out there, each more likely than the last, and I tell you a handful of Sailors with their wits about them, and that talking Dog to keep the Savages amused, why, we could be kings.”