The Sot-Weed Factor

by John Barth

  “Thus we harassed old Copley, who scarce knew what was happening till the following February, when the Lords Commissioners charged Blackistone with graft. Then, too late, he saw our plot, and in the spring of last year arrested Carroll, Sir Thomas himself, Edward Randolph, and a host of others, among whom was Peter Sayer of Talbot, the man I was disguised as in Ben Bragg’s bookshop. Sir Thomas was jailed, as was Carroll, and impeached into the bargain; Randolph was arrested on the Eastern Shore of Virginia by the Somerset County sheriff, but ere he could get him out of Accomac I sent word of’t to Edmund Andros in Williamsburg, who’d been a drinking-friend of Randolph’s since the old days in Boston, and Andros fetched him home for safety.”

  “E’en so, thy cause was damaged, was it not?” asked Ebenezer.

  “My cause?” Burlingame smiled. “ ’Tis thine as well, is’t not, since we work for the same employer? Let us say instead our cause was discommoded for a time; we knew well old Copley couldn’t hold such men for long, but we wanted them out of prison, not alone for their own comfort but for fear John Coode might turn up in their absence and gain ground with Copley. As’t happened our fears were empty, for both the Governor and his wife died in September—methinks they ne’er acclimatized to Maryland. His death suggested to me a wondrous mischief—”

  “Great Heavens, Henry, thou’rt a plotting Coode thyself!”

  “You recall I said Lord Baltimore had made Andros commander-in-chief of the Province, and his commission gave him full authority in the event of Nicholson’s death and Copley’s absence. It struck me now that albeit ’twas Copley dead and Nicholson absent, I could work a grand confusion anyhow, and so I went posthaste to Williamsburg to take the news to Andros and persuade him his commission was in force. He was inclined to doubt it, but he knew me for an agent of Lord Baltimore; what’s more, though he made no mention of’t, he was not averse to stealing Nicholson’s thunder, as’t were, by rescuing law and order in Maryland, for he himself had felt the pricks of following Nicholson in Virginia. To be brief, he marched into St. Mary’s City, demanded the government of Maryland, dissolved the Assembly, suspended Blackistone, turned Lawrence loose, and took him with his party back to Williamsburg, leaving the Province in the charge of an amiable nobody named Greenberry. ’Twas his design to return again this spring and make Lawrence president of the Council, but whether he hath done it I’ve yet to learn.

  “I could see no immediate employment for myself in the Province after this, and so I crossed come January here to London. I arrived not two weeks past, and learned to my dismay that neither Nicholson nor Baltimore hath the Assembly Journal in his possession for fear of Coode’s agents. Instead, Lord Baltimore declares, he hath broken it into three portions for safekeeping and deposited the several portions privily in Maryland, whence I had just come! I begged of him the trustees’ names, but he was loath to discover them—not Nicholson himself, it seems, knew more than I on the matter. But a few days past he said he had a mission for me of such importance he could trust it to no other soul; and I replied, surely I was not worthy of such trust, if he dared not name me the keepers of the Journal. Whereat he smiled and said I had him fair; the pieces of the Journal, he confessed, were in the hands of sundry loyal persons of the surname Smith, for reasons I’d no need to ask, and he told me their names in greatest confidence. I thanked him and declared I was ready for whatever work he gave me, and he said a young man had called on him that afternoon that was a poet, and he had charged him to write a work in praise of Maryland and the proprietorship—the which, he believed, if nobly done, might profit more than ten intrigues to win him back the Province.”

  “ ’Sheart, what a marvelous small world!” Ebenezer cried. “And how pleased I am to find he sets such store by poetry. But prithee what work was’t in this connection, that warranted such concession on his part?”

  “He enquired of me, whether I knew the poet Ebenezer Cooke? My heart leaped, for I’d had no word of you or Anna these seven years, but I answered merely I had heard mention of a poet by that name. Then he told me of your visit and proposal, and his commission, and said I should accompany you to Maryland—for that you’d ne’er before been out of England—and act both as your guide and your protector. I leave it to you to imagine with what readiness I took on the task, and straightway sought you out!”

  Now the earlier portions of this long narrative had elicited from Ebenezer such a number of ah’s, marry’s, ’sheart’s, and b’m’faith’s that he had come during this last to sit for the most part wordlessly, mouth agape and brows a-pucker in a sort of permanent i’God! as one amazement tripped on another’s heels. At the end he was moved enough to embrace Burlingame unashamedly—and had, he found, to add bad breath to the host of alterations worked on his friend by this seven-year adventure: it was no doubt a product of the teeth gone carious.

  “Ah God,” he cried, “if Anna but knew all you’ve told me! Wherefore this role as Peter Sayer, Henry? Why did you not at least reveal yourself in London ere we left, that she might share my joy at finding you?”

  Burlingame sighed, and after a moment replied, “I am wont to go by names other than my own, either borrowed or invented, for sundry reasons stemming from my work. ’Twould do no good for Coode to know my name nor e’en that I exist. What’s more, I can confound him and his agents: I posed as Sayer in Bragg’s, for instance, and forged his name, merely because Coode thinks the man’s in Plymouth with the fleet. In like manner I’ve pretended to be both friends and enemies of Baltimore, to advance his cause. Once, I shall confess, that time on Perry Browne’s ship Bailey, I posed as Coode himself to the poor dolt Ben Ricaud, to intercept those letters. The truth is, Eben, no man save Richard Hill, Lord Baltimore, and yourself hath known my name since 1687, when first I commenced to play the game of governments; and the game itself hath made such changes in me, that none who knew me erst would know me now, nor do I mean them to. ’Tis better they think me lost.”

  “Yet surely Anna—”

  “ ’Tis but thy first enquiry I’ve replied to,” Burlingame interrupted, raising his forefinger. “For the second, do not forget that many are bound from London for the fleet—Coode’s men as well as ours, and haply Coode himself. ’Twould have been foolish, even perilous, to shed my mask in that place. Moreover, there was no time: I scarce caught up with you ere you left, and mark how long I’ve been discovering myself to you. The fleet had sailed without us.”

  “Aye, that’s true,” Ebenezer admitted.

  “What’s more”—Burlingame laughed—“I’d not yet made my own mind up, whether ’twere wise e’en you should know the truth.”

  “What! Think you I’d e’er betray thy trust? And could you thus callously deprive me of my only friend? You injure me!”

  “As to the first, ’twas just to answer it I posed as Sayer and queried you—the years change any man. Ben Bragg had said thou’rt but an opportunist; nor was your servant more persuaded of your motive, for all he admired you. Again, how could I know your sentiments towards Burlingame? The tale you told to Peter Sayer was your bond; when I had heard it, I revealed myself at once, but had you sung a different tune, ’tis Peter Sayer had been your guide, not Burlingame.”

  “Enough. I am convinced and cannot tell my joy. Yet your relation shames me for my tearfulness and sloth, as doth your wisdom my poor talent. Thou’rt a Virgil worth a better Dante.”

  “Oh la,” Burlingame scoffed, “you’ve wit enough, and ear. Besides, the Province is no Hell or Purgatorio, but just a piece o’ the great world like England—with the difference, haply, that the soil is vast and new where the sot-weed hath not drained it. What’s more, the reins and checks are few and weak; good plants and weeds alike grow tall. Do but recall, if the people there seem strange and rough: a man content with Europe scarce would cross the ocean. The plain fact is, the greatest part are castaways from Europe, or the sons of castaways: rebels, failures, jailbirds and adventurers. Cast such seed on such soil, ’twere fond to seek a crop
of dons and courtiers!”

  “Yet you speak as one who loves the place,” said Ebenezer, “and that alone, for me, is warrant I shall too.”

  Burlingame shrugged. “Haply so, haply no. There is a freedom there that’s both a blessing and a curse. ’Tis more than just political and religious liberty—they come and go from one year to the next. ’Tis philosophic liberty I speak of, that comes from want of history. It makes every man an orphan like myself, that freedom, and can as well demoralize as elevate. But no more: I see the masts and spires of Plymouth yonder. You’ll know the Province soon enough and how it strikes you!”

  Even as Burlingame spoke the smell of the sea blew into the carriage, stirring Ebenezer to the depths of his being, and when a short while later he saw it for the first time, spread out before him to the far horizon, he shivered twice or thrice all over and came near to passing water.

  8

  The Laureate Indites a Quatrain and Fouls His Breeches

  “REMEMBER,” BURLINGAME SAID as the carriage rolled into Plymouth, “I am not Henry Burlingame, nor Peter Sayer either, for the real Sayer’s somewhere on the fleet. You’d best not give me any name at all, I think, till I see how lays the land.”

  Accordingly, as soon as their chests and trunks were put down they inquired after the Poseidon at the wharves and were told it had already joined the fleet.

  “What!” cried Ebenezer. “Then we have missed it after all!”

  “Nay,” Burlingame smiled, “ ’tis not unusual. The fleet assembles yonder in the Downs off The Lizard; you can see’t from here on a clear day.”

  Inquiring further he found a shallop doing ferry-service between the Downs and the harbor, and arranged for passage aboard it in the afternoon.

  “We’d as well take one last meal ashore,” he explained to Ebenezer. “Moreover I must change clothing, for I’ve resolved to pose as your servant—What was his name?”

  “Bertrand,” Ebenezer murmured. “But must you be a servant?”

  “Aye, or else invent an entire gentleman as your companion. As Bertrand I can pass unnoticed in your company and hear more news as well of your fellow travelers.”

  So saying he led the way across the street from the wharves to a tavern advertising itself by two capital letter Cs, face to face and interlocking, the figure surmounted by a three-lobed crown.

  “Here’s the King o’ the Seas,” said Burlingame. “I know it of old. ’Twas here I got my first wee clap, while still a hand on Captain Salmon’s ship. A bony Welsh tart gave it me, that had made the best of my inexperience to charge me a clean girl’s price, and by the time the fraud came clear I was many a day’s sail from Plymouth, bound for Lisbon. The clap soon left me, but I ne’er forgot the wench. When in Lisbon I found a vessel bound for Plymouth and made enquiries amongst the crew, till at length I hit upon a one-eyed Portugee that was like to perish of a miserable clap from Africa, beside which our English sort was but a fleabite. This frightful wight I gave my fine new quadrant to, that Captain Salmon had bought me to practice navigation with, on condition he share his clap with the Welsh whore at the King o’ the Seas directly he made port. But no man e’er died of the food here.”

  It being midmorning, the tavern was deserted except for a young serving maid scrubbing the flagstone floor. She was short and plump, coarse-haired and befreckled, but her eyes had a merry light and her nose a pertness. Leaving Ebenezer to select a table, Burlingame approached her familiarly and engaged her in conversation which, though spoken in voices too low for Ebenezer to hear distinctly, soon had her laughing and wagging a finger.

  “The duckling swore she’d naught but fish in the larder,” he said when presently he returned, “but when I told her ’twas a laureate she was feeding, that could lay the place low with Hudibrastics, she agreed to stay your pen with roast of beef. ’Twill be here anon.”

  “You twit me,” Ebenezer said modestly.

  Burlingame shrugged. “Methinks I’ll change costume the while it’s fixing.”

  “But our baggage is on the wharf.”

  “No matter. Scotch cloth to silk is oft a life-time’s journey, but silk to Scotch cloth can be traversed in a minute.” He went again to the serving maid, who smiled at his approach, and spoke softly to her, at the same time pinching her smartly. She squealed and, one hand on her hip, pointed laughing to a door beside the fireplace. Burlingame then took her arm as though to lead her along with him; when she drew back he whispered seriously in her ear and whispered again when she gasped and shook her head. She glanced towards Ebenezer, who blushed at once and feigned preoccupation with the set of his cravat; Burlingame whispered a third message that turned her bright eyes coyly, and left the room through the indicated door. The girl lingered for two minutes in the room. Then she took another sharp look at Ebenezer, sniffed, and flounced through the same door.

  Though he was not a little embarrassed by the small drama, the poet was pleased enough to be alone for a short while, not only to ponder the wondrous adventures of his friend, but also to take stock of his own position.

  “I have been so occupied gaping and gasping at Henry,” said he to himself, “I have near forgot who I am, and what business I’m embarked upon. Not a line have I writ since London, nor thought at all of logging my journey.”

  He forthwith spread before him on the table his double-entry ledger, open to that page whereon was transcribed the first quatrain of his official career, and fetching quill and ink from a stand on the wall next the serving-bar, considered what should grace the facing-page.

  “I can say naught whate’er of my journey hither, in the Marylandiad,” he reflected, “for I saw but little of’t. Moreover, ’twere fitter I commenced the poem from Plymouth, where most who sail to Maryland take their leave of Albion’s rocks; ’twill pitch the reader straightway on his voyage.” Pursuing farther this line of thought, he resolved to write his epic Maryiandiad in the form of an imaginary voyage, thinking thereby to discover to the reader the delights of the Province with the same freshness and surprise wherewith they would discover themselves to the voyager-poet. It was with pleasure and a kind of awe, therefore, that he recalled the name of his ship.

  “Poseidon!” he thought. “It bodes well, i’faith! A very Virgil for companion, and the Earth-Shaker himself for ferry-master to this Elysium!”

  And turning the happy figure some minutes in his mind, at length he wrote:

  Let Ocean roar his damn’dest Gale:

  Our Planks shan’t leak; our Masts shan’t fail.

  With great Poseidon at our Side

  He seemeth neither wild nor wide.

  At the foot he appended E.C., Gent, Pt & Lt of Md, and beamed with satisfaction. While he was thus engaged, two men came into the tavern and noisily closed the door. They were sailors, by the look of them—but not ordinary seamen—and like enough for twins in manner and appearance: both were short and heavy, red-nosed, squint-eyed, and black-whiskered, and wore their natural hair; both were dressed in black breeches and coats, and sported twin-peaked hats of the same color. Each wore a brace of pistols at his right, stuck down through his sash, and a cutlass at his left, and carried besides a heavy black cane.

  “Thou’rt my guest for beer, Captain Scurry,” growled one.

  “Nay, Captain Slye,” growled the other, “for thou’rt mine.”

  With that, still standing, they both commenced to bang their sticks upon a table for service. “Beer!” one cried, and “Beer!” cried the other, and they glowered, scowled, and grumbled when their cries brought no response. So fearsome was their aspect, and fierce their manner, Ebenezer decided they were pirate captains, but he had not the courage to flee the room.

  “Beer!” they called again, and again smote the table with their sticks to no avail. Ebenezer buried himself in his notebook, spread out before him on the table, and prayed they’d take no notice of his presence.

  “ ’Tis my suspicion, Captain Slye,” one of them said, “that we must serve ourselves or seek
our man with dry throats.”

  “Then let us draw our beer and have done with’t, Captain Scurry,” replied the other. “The rascal can’t be far away. I shall draw two steins, and haply he’ll come in ere we’ve drunk ’em off.”

  “Haply, haply,” the first allowed. “But ’tis I shall draw the steins, for thou’rt my guest.”

  “The devil on’t!” cried the second. “ ’Twas I spake first, and thou’rt my guest, God damn ye!”

  “I’ll see thee first in Hell,” said Number One. “The treat is mine.”

  “Mine!” said Number Two, more threateningly.

  “Thine in a pig’s arse!”

  “I shall draw thy beer, Captain Slye,” said Number Two, fetching out a pistol, “or draw thy blood.”

  “And I thine,” said Number One, doing likewise, “else thou’rt a banquet for the worms.”

  “Gentlemen, gentlemen!” Ebenezer cried, “In Heav’n’s name hold thy fire!”

  Instantly he regretted his words. The two men turned to glare at him, still pointing pistols at each other, and their expressions grew menacing.

  “ ’Tis none of my affair,” he said hastily, for they began moving toward him. “Not the least of my affair, I grant that. What I meant to say was, ’twould be an honor and a pleasure to me to buy for both of you, and draw as well, if you’ll but show me how. Nay, no matter, I’ll wager I can do’t right off, with no instruction, for many’s the time in Locket’s I’ve seen it done. Aye,” he went on, backing away from them, “there’s naught of skill or secret to’t but this, to edge the glass against the tap if the keg be wild and let the beer slide gently in; or be’t flat, allow the stream some space to fall ere’t fill the glass, that striking harder ’twill foam the more—”