SH05_Revolution Page 24

  Hugh nodded. “You did, your honor.”

  “But, I have the distinct impression that he does not like me.”

  “Perhaps he does not wish to dislike you, your honor. You are, after all, an amiable gentleman, but unfortunately, you are also the Crown.” Hugh paused. “The Crown has done him many a disservice. I can make the same complaint. However, in these times, Jack and I are Amys and Amylion.”

  “There is another tragedy I am presuming you intend to revise the ending of,” remarked the Lieutenant-Governor with a chuckle. “Which of you won’t die in the end?”

  “Neither of us,” answered Hugh with exuberance.

  “And that Indian chap, Mr. Proudlocks,” ventured Fauquier, “he is very well spoken. What is he all about?”

  “He is studying with our resident Solon to become a lawyer, your honor,” said Hugh. “He has uttered more wisdom than I wager you receive from the Board of Trade.”

  To this, the Lieutenant-Governor had nothing to say, but he put a hand on Hugh’s shoulder, and said, “If you are not otherwise engaged with your bride tomorrow afternoon, sir, please come here and we will take a carriage ride over the grounds here. It is quite a lovely tour, even for all the bare trees. I have some important matters to discuss with you.”

  Hugh nodded, and he and Reverdy took their leave.

  * * *

  The next day was bright and cloudless. Hugh and the Lieutenant-Governor rode, not the coach of state, but a less ostentatious landau, the black driver taking them through a back entrance of the Palace yard to a trail that led to Capitol Landing near the York River. The carriage rumbled at a leisurely pace through ranks of bare trees over a narrow road of crushed stone. It was a quiet ride, except for the rattling windows and the crunch of stone beneath wheels and hooves. Hugh was nearly light-headed with happiness. The Lieutenant-Governor was glumly serious, almost morose.

  After preliminary exchanges about the weather, marriage, and the extensive preparations for the holiday season in the Palace, the Lieutenant-Governor took a pamphlet from inside his coat and handed it to Hugh. “That was sent to me by a friend in Maryland, Mr. Kenrick. That, and other seditious claptrap. Do you know this fellow?”

  It was a copy of Daniel Dulany’s Considerations on the Propriety of imposing Taxes in the British Colonies, for the Purpose of raising a Revenue, by Act of Parliament. Hugh smiled and handed it back to Fauquier. “Yes, your honor. Or, rather, I know of him. I own a copy of this very tract. It is widely read. Other tracts are in the works, I understand. Why, I have even heard that our own Mr. Bland here is composing his own fragment on the same subject.”

  “It will not be printed by the foreman of the Gazette, I can assure you of that, sir,” replied the Lieutenant-Governor with uncharacteristic conviction.

  “Then I imagine that Mr. Bland will need to apply to the printer in Maryland, as well. Have you read this tract, your honor?” asked Hugh.

  “Yes, some of it,” answered Fauquier. “’Tis the musing screed of a mere pettifogger, written to justify the ingratitude and actions of blood-thirsty factions.”

  “Hardly a mere pettifogger, your honor,” said Hugh. “Mr. Dulany’s father studied at Gray’s Inn, and the author at the Middle Temple.” He paused and grinned at the disgust on his host’s face. “I do not entirely agree with Mr. Dulany’s arguments in that tract, sir. But he, like many other thoughtful gentlemen, is striving to find a perfect rebuttal to the Crown’s assertions.”

  Fauquier scoffed. “A rebuttal? I did not know one had been invited, or even allowed!”

  Hugh shrugged. “When one is being told what to do by a complete stranger, and required to pay for the privilege of doing it, as well, the stranger may rightly expect a rebuttal of some kind.” He shook his head. “You see, your honor, the ambition now, which was discovered and aroused by our Resolves of last May, is to attain an entelechy of liberty. The present arrangement between the colonies and the mother country is pregnant with that potential, but it also discourages and actively confounds the realization of that ambition.”

  “How so, sir?’

  “To begin with, our trade and commerce are prisoners of the navigation laws. They allow us no freedom to trade on more acceptable terms. As a consequence, the price the colonies must pay is exorbitant and artificial.” Hugh paused. “It is much like compelling a pauper to purchase a set of silver table implements for a lord, and as a consequence obliging the pauper to eat with his fingers, unable to find the coin to purchase even a wooden spoon.”

  “That is too sharp a tale, sir!” objected Fauquier.

  “Is it? You have knowledge of economics, your honor. Would you not agree that the monies paid to many of the industries in Britain, who are the beneficiaries of those laws, would be better spent in other industries, which could swim on their own strengths, instead of relying on Danegeld? These industries would be genuinely profitable, and in no need of the protective shield of compulsory colonial requisition.”

  After a pause, Fauquier cocked his head with interest, but said doubtfully, “It is a novel idea deserving of study.” Then he said, “But, Mr. Kenrick, even granting that what you say is true, why, the idea of the colonies securing a better policy from the mother country — well, look at the parties making all the noise! They are like the juries here and in England, composed of drovers, horse jockeys, innkeepers, retailers, and the like. Hardly students of political scholarship! And they are, I suspect, manipulated by merchants, smugglers, and unhappy clergy. At least, that is the case in Boston, to judge from the terrible descriptions of the ruckus that occurs there regularly.” He paused to shake a finger at Hugh. “Do not deny that the mobility is ranked and ordered, sir! I also have knowledge of your role in a similar affair here, concerning the stamps. I do not believe the good citizens of Queen Anne would have made such a show of unity without direction from above.”

  “Perhaps not, your honor. And I do not deny my role in the affair. But many people not as well schooled as ourselves are like army privates and regular seamen. They need officers to direct their action and skills to the best effect. And, direction or no, they must move themselves, fired by a sense of themselves that no amount of schooling can imbue in any one person.”

  They were silent for a while as the carriage rumbled on. Presently, on the Lieutenant-Governor’s prior instructions, the driver stopped at Capitol Landing. Hugh and Fauquier debouched and strolled along the bank. In the distance they could see the York River and some grayish white spots that were the sails of vessels gliding placidly on it.

  Then Fauquier asked, “Why would they allow themselves to be so directed? I confess I simply do not understand the uproar, sir. Do you?”

  Hugh shrugged. “The people have had a taste of true liberty, your honor. To borrow an analogy from a friend, they are like the prisoners of Plato’s cave, who have seen some light from above and what may be seen with it. They are no longer content to remain chained in the darkness of ignorance and crippled by the palsy of inaction. The Crown, they have realized, no longer needs be a centripetal influence in their lives and minds, nor a justification for their existence.”

  “Centripetal, you say?” countered the Lieutenant-Governor. “Dear sir, I see nothing but the violent centrifugal effects of a people throwing off their allegiances and civility! Anarchy, and destruction, and the extinction of decency!” Fauquier stopped and remarked with a sigh, “You are a man of rational demeanor, sir, a paragon yourself, though of calm logic. I asked to have a word with you with the aim of being reassured that all is not as it seems. But I am not reassured. I agree with you up to a point, about the disturbance those resolves have caused, and will continue to cause. I might even concede the legitimacy of some of your complaints. But I foresee a dire and chaotic future in this dominion, and on all this continent, if passions are not soon reined in.” Then he continued walking along the bank.

  “It needn’t be chaotic, your honor. All the Crown needs do is sever past chains and refrain from f
orging new ones. Such an action would make Great Britain truly great, and would prosper in the bargain.”

  “But so many people, high and low, depend on those…well, what you call chains. From lords to lackeys. From merchants to milkmaids.”

  Again, Hugh shrugged. “Then they, too, can discover true liberty. As for the dependent dross, they will be obliged to find more gainful, honest employment.”

  The Lieutenant-Governor frowned. “That is a leveling notion, sir!” he objected, some color coming to his face. The red contrasted violently with his immaculately white wig. “Altogether radical!”

  “Radical? I concede that,” replied Hugh with a faint smile. He tried to recall that same remark from somewhere in his past, because the same offense had caused it. “Leveling, your honor? Or just?”

  Fauquier stopped again and turned to study his companion. “Well, I expect that, in time, you will produce your own tract, perhaps on that very subject. Please be good enough to send me a copy of it. I will not be shocked by anything you may chance to say in it, and forgive you it. For now, though, enough of this political talk. It is frightening and tiring.” He gestured to the landau. “Let us return to the Palace. I must finish some duties, and,” he added, permitting himself a smile, “you neglect your bride. Will you attend the theater this evening? My secretary saw some of Mr. Hallam’s business last evening, and vouches his troupe is quite as good as any that may be seen in London. I may attend myself.”

  * * *

  Days later, during an afternoon call on Jack Frake at Morland, Hugh reported his private conversation with the Lieutenant-Governor. “He laughed but few times at the theater. I believe that the task of governing a dominion that is in a funk is weighing terribly on him. His loyalty to the Crown clashes with his right reason, paralyzes him, and transforms his soul into mourning blacks.”

  Jack smiled with indifference. “Perhaps he knows that he has seen the funeral of Crown authority here.”

  Hugh nodded in agreement. “He also knows of our actions here in stopping the stamps.”

  “Reverend Acland no doubt wrote him about it.”

  “He will certainly not report that incident to the Board of Trade. Those gentlemen would doubtless blame him for not being conscious of a conspiracy to circumvent his power.”

  They talked of the coming concert at Enderly. Hugh had driven Reverdy to Vishonn’s place and left her there to rehearse with Etáin, James Vishonn, and the Kenny brothers. “They are planning a special program, and Reverdy won’t enlighten me about certain parts of it.”

  “Neither will Etáin tell me,” said Jack with a chuckle.

  “Reverdy says that she and Etáin have planned a special piece to perform in my honor. I wonder what it could be.”

  Jack laughed again. “Etáin claims they are plotting the same for me. I can’t imagine what.”

  * * *

  Chapter 17: The Concert

  When Hugh and Reverdy returned to Meum Hall later that week, they learned that the family merchantman, the Busy, had called on Caxton, and then departed for West Point upriver to unship cargo there. Hugh found a packet of letters and a passel of small boxes of household goods he had ordered from his father months ago. One of the letters was from Dogmael Jones, dated mid-October. One evening, shortly after their return, as a light snow fell on the fields beyond in the gathering dusk outside, Hugh read it to Reverdy and James Brune during a late tea in the supper room. His new wife and her brother had expressed curiosity about the man.

  “My dear friend:

  “The other day I supped with some like-minded members of the House, and in the course of our table talk, one of us employed the epithet ‘the good old cause.’ I confess that I shuddered when it at last passed through my ears and found a contemplative perch on my pate, allowing me to ruminate on its meaning. The Good Old Cause, indeed! As an epithet for the cause of liberty against tyranny, implying in it the legality of armed resistance against tyrants, I wonder anymore that it is even remembered, never mind revered in that vague, dreamlike manner with which people oft recall it, as though liberty were something, they knew not what, slipping inexorably from their grip, they knew not how or why. Well, the cause of liberty is ever fresh, never old, so long as one man, or group of men, possesses an arbitrary power over other men, that power being tyranny or legislative theft.

  “But I must report another memorable supper a few days before, with Dr. Benjamin Franklin and his friend Mr. Richard Jackson, the member for Weymouth and Melcombe Regis, and agent for Massachusetts and Connecticut. Other friends of liberty were also present, including Mr. Richard Price, member for Beaumaris, a voluble opponent of the Stamp Act. My circle of friends and associates in and out of the House grows monthly, so much so that I have informally dubbed it my own Sons of Liberty!

  “Dr. Franklin on this occasion was kind enough to describe for the company a plan of union that he and some of his friends proposed to the Albany Congress some years ago, and which that congress of delegates from seven colonies agreed was a good plan, but which their legislatures rebuffed (as did our own wise men). Dr. Franklin is as newly aware of the disturbances in the colonies as are Lord Rocking-horse and the Board of Trade, and asserts that had his plan of union been adopted by the legislatures and by the Crown, all the recent dangerous fuss could have been avoided. He is for empire, my friend, but his notion of it presumes a penchant for reason and justice, allied with an absence of avarice on the part of Parliament and the Board. His notion of it conflicts, naturally, with that of our debtors and special interests here, who are determined to oblige the colonies to pay for the security of their own servitude.

  “Dr. Franklin is right about many things, but I fear that in this instance he is off the mark. And I believe that he now realizes that the Stamp Act has forged an altogether different form of union among your adopted countrymen. Why, he even related to me a discussion he had with Justice Pratt, in which the latter opined that once the French had been removed from Canada and North America, the colonies would set their caps for independence. The die is cast, he said to us with some sadness, for Mr. Henry’s Resolves from last May — which he agreed with in principle but disapproved of as impolitic and provocative — have set in motion a great machine of logic from which there is no escape. Dr. Franklin’s loyalties are with his countrymen, and he confided over supper that he plans a Roman campaign of letters in the newspapers for at least a lessening of the Crown’s grip on the colonies.’”

  James Brune frowned. “A Roman campaign?” he queried. “What the devil is that?”

  Hugh answered, “He will sign his letters with ancient Roman names, ones that are famously associated with eloquence and liberty.”

  The frown did not leave James Brune’s countenance. “That seems a cowardly ruse,” he commented.

  This time Hugh frowned. “Or prudent,” he said. “I understand that Dr. Franklin is not altogether welcome in London, and is merely tolerated there, because his business lends itself to the Crown’s purposes, which is chiefly to pester the government to convert Pennsylvania from a proprietary to a royal colony. Otherwise, the Grand Caliphs there would not deign to give him the time of day.” He paused, then added with a tinge of anger and impatience, directing his words to James Brune alone, “I had a group of friends who employed aliases and noms de plume in order to freely speak their minds, but they were persecuted nonetheless.”

  “Oh,” said James Brune, with contrite recollection. “Those Pippin fellows.”

  “Yes, those Pippin fellows,” replied Hugh. He gently snapped the page he was reading from, and continued to read Jones’s letter.

  “But on to perhaps more important news. I was fortunate to procure from two assiduous members of my stable of agents duplicate copies of an extraordinary document written by Massachusetts governor Francis Bernard, penned by him before the Stamp Act was debated in the House, and while Mr. Grenville was putting on a show of soliciting the opinions of colonial governments about the practicality of
a stamp impost. It is entitled Principles of Law and Polity, Applied to the Government of the British Colonies in North America. In it, Mr. Bernard very laboriously but thoroughly offers ninety-seven propositions for reforming the colonies.

  “Among them are these: Parliamentary representation for the colonies; but, before that gift is bestowed, a complete reorganization of the colonies, viz., the rewriting of all the charters to correct any contentious vagaries and ambiguities; the abandonment of all elective governorships, replacing them with royally appointed ones in every instance; the establishment of an upper house in each colony, composed exclusively of royally appointed permanent members, and therewith a privileged American nobility, much like the Lords here; and a universal recognition of Parliamentary supremacy by all parties in all matters. All to guarantee revenue and obedience to the Crown.

  “What is ironic about this document is that it was authored by a chap who protests his sympathies for the colonials and their special problems. It is a pretty ship of state that Mr. Bernard proposes be constructed in the Westminster dockyards, and it might have been taken seriously and perhaps even launched with trumpets and royal blessings in the most gracious and magnanimous manner, had not the Stamp Act sent it to the bottom before it even left paper. It contains many infeasibilities, but I shall dwell on only one, that of colonial representation.

  “This act of generosity would be a Greek gift, because you must concede that, even were seats granted to the colonies, and whether or not the North American colonies were reformed from thirteen to ten, as Mr. Bernard proposes, the gentlemen who occupied them would be outnumbered and outfoxed at every turn by as many blocs and parties within the House and ministry as there are keels riding the tide in the Pool of London, all determined to wring blood from colonial stones. Doubtless such political alchemy can be performed, but, as you know, popular magic shows depend on the credulity of a mob for their sustenance and on the peculiar vice of the credulous to believe in and be entertained by such temporal miracles and sleights of hand.