Bruce Alexander - An Experiment in Treason

“Dear God,” said Mr. Donnelly, somewhat intimidated, “are we to have such a great responsibility?”

“Not so great, after all. You need only report as to whether there was or was not a diminishing of the surf in that part of the shore.”

“I see. Well, we can certainly do that.”

“Of course you can. We’ll meet again on the wharf when all is done, and you can make your report. Fair enough?”

“Fair enough.”

Lee offered his hand in the way favored by gentlemen of the colonies, and Mr. Donnelly grasped it and gave it a good firm shake.

“Sir?” said I, hoping to hold him a moment longer. “Mr. Lee, sir?”

“That’s Dr. Lee, if you please.”

“Forgive me, Dr. Lee, but I was wondering, is Dr. Franklin one of the two men on the wharf?”

He turned to look where I pointed.

“The shorter of the two, the stout one,” said I, tr)dng to be helpful.

“I’ll thank you to keep a civil tongue in your head, young man,” said he. “Dr. Franklin is a fine figure of a man, one of athletic capabilities and one most attractive to women.”

“Forgive me, sir. I meant no disrespect.”

With a great harrumph, Doctor Lee stalked off toward the wharf, lea\4ng the two of us staring after him, puzzled and a bit shocked.

“Ah, these colonial fellows,” said Mr. Donnelly. “They are as tetchy and mean-minded as any Scotsman ever I met.”

“Truly, Mr. Donnelly, I meant no ill. ‘

“Of course you did not. And for your information, Jeremy, the shorter of the two men there, he who is indubitably stout, is none other than Benjamin Franklin, I am sure of it. Now, if you will excuse me, I have an announcement to make to the throng gathered behind us.”

And so saying, he turned round and gave notice to the fifty or more who had gathered behind us that we were all to proceed to the point of land some distance ahead from which we might best view … et cetera.

The walk to the point designated by Dr. Lee was well over a mile, most of it along the shoreline on a rough, rock-strewn beach. By the time we reached our destination, a long line of marchers stretched out behind us, yet all eventually collected there on the windward side of the point, and there we all waited for the demonstration to begin.

It was, as we had been told, quite the best place to view these singular proceedings. About the time of our arrival, we saw one among the many ships anchored offshore lowering a boat of considerable size, followed b’ what Mr. Donnelly informed me was a barge: a simple flat-bottomed boat. There were but two men in the barge, while the longboat had a complement aboard. Seamen manned the oars. A line was tossed to the barge and made fast; and in no time the two crafts were off together, the longboat providing the power with its oarsmen, towing the barge at a good rate of speed a quarter of a mile offshore. There was great activity aboard the barge. Two men — was one of them Dr. Lee? — held a large bottle up to the gunwale and from it poured a thick liquid of some sort — presumably oil — in a steady stream over the side.

Something now must be said about the weather. As I said earlier, it was a perfectly common sort of day for that part of the coast in that season. Which is to say, it was windy and damp. For a good part of the time we watched the two smaller vessels make their passage back and forth, a light rain blew in our faces.

And if the beach along which we walked to reach our chosen point of observation was notably littered with rocks of up to medium size, then so also was the beach upon which we had collected to watch the surf for changes. Indeed, there were rocks everywhere — even, I was sure, in great number beneath the water’s surface, as well. I could see two of the largest out from the beach and above the surface, kicking up a great lot of foam as the high water dashed against them.

The wind drove the water straight at the beach, where it broke, spuming and frothing across the sand and rocks. We watched as the waves broke upon the shore, hoping and even expecting that the surf would slack off in the next moment or two. Yet with the best will in the world we would not honestly say that the surf had diminished in the slightest degree. After near half an hour spent thus, at such time as the longboat and the barge ceased plying the monotonous course I have described, we on the shore turned away and began to talk amongst ourselves of the experiment and how it went wrong.

“I know not why I bothered to come this long way to Portsmouth,” said one of those who had railed at Dr. Franklin the night before. “Such a theory seems pure nonsense. Bound to fail.”

“I know why,” said his companion. “So that when he is next praised beyond reason at Lady Richmond’s table, you will have an interesting titbit with which to counter all that Franklin-mania.”

“Ah, will I indeed! All this foolish tittle-tattle of what-will-he-do-next when the fellow is nothing short of a traitor to the crown.”

“He’ll get what he deserves soon enough, and when he does I daresay he’ll …”

The voices of the two detractors faded in the wind as they marched off with the rest whence we had come. We watched them go. Soon we were alone on the beach.

“It’s just as you said,” I remarked to Mr. Donnelly. “They dismiss his science on political grounds. ” I hesitated just a bit, but then did I plunge boldly forward: “But truly, sir, did not the theory he sought to test seem a bit far-fetched to you? After all, taking a page from Pliny! Hardly what one would call modern science.”

“Far-fetched? Perhaps, but perhaps not. I’m a medical doctor who happens also to have some skill as a surgeon. I know little of the other branches of science.”

“Come now, Mr. Donnelly. You know little ?”

“Comparatively so. I do, however, know something of human nature. And what I have observed of Dr. Franklin at a distance tells me that he courts celebrity. There were a good many onlookers here today, perhaps some journalists amongst them. I should not be surprised to see reports of this experiment in the Public Advertiser, the Times, or the Chronicle, perhaps in all three. And you may take my word for it, Jeremy, that experiments are best conducted in private — not to say in secret, for there must be a few witnesses to attest to success or failure. Yet Dr. Franklin was so certain of the outcome of this one that he invited many, and the many invited more. What he did not take into consideration is that there were some present, perhaps most, who wished to see him fail.”

“All for reasons of politics?” I asked.

“No, not at all. It is one of the burdens of celebrity. One of its dangers, that when you are put above the crowd, the element below wishes you to fall down to its level. In other words, to fail.” Then said he with a wink and a nod: “But come along, Jeremy. We ought not to be late to our appointment with Dr. Lee. I fear he might not wait.”

With that, we turned round and headed for the wharf which stood well off in the distance. More than a mile we had walked over rocky sand, yet, oddly, it seemed not so far as before, no doubt because we had the wind to our backs, pushing us along. We reached our goal in good time.

And when we did, we saw the same bumboat as had left the wharf an hour before. Yet on this trip it had but one passenger. I wondered at this but said nothing to Mr. Donnelly. As the boat drew nearer I saw that the single passenger was unmistakably Arthur Lee. I supposed that Dr. Franklin had remained on shipboard, yet I knew not why. Upon arrival, the boatman did not even bother to tie up his raft. We, on the wharf, waved our greeting. Dr. Lee who looked quite out of sorts, held tight to the wharf ladder and shouted up at us.