John Barth - The Sot-Weed Factor

"No less," beamed the priest. He then raised his index finger beside the forefinger and, in succession, rocked an invisible child in his arms and displayed the crucifix, unequivocally representing the Son. Raising next his ring finger beside the other two, he lay for a moment prostrate on the ground with closed eyes and then, fixing his gaze on the ceiling, rose slowly to his feet, meanwhile flapping his arms like wings to suggest the Ascension and thus the Holy Ghost.

"Marvelous!" the poet applauded.

"Was't past his powers to do the Virgin Birth?" Burlingame inquired.

Father Smith was not at all ruffled. "Faith moveth mountains," he declared. "How can we doubt his prowess in any article of doctrine, when such a subtle mystery as the Unity of the Trinity he dispenses with so lucidly as this?" Holding forth the same three fingers as before, he alternately spread and closed them.

"Bravo!"

"Of course," he said, " 'twas an entire waste of wit, for not a heathen in the house knew what he meant. Methinks they must have rolled about in mirth, and when the poor priest wearied they would prod him with a stick to set him pantomiming farther."

"Surely your informant could not tell you such details," Burlingame said skeptically. "All these things took place before his birth."

"He could not, nor did he need to," Smith replied. "All salvages are much alike, be they Indian, Turk, or unredeemed English, and I know the ways of salvages. For this reason I shall speak henceforth from the martyr's point of view, as't were, adding what I can surmise to the things Charley Mattassin told me. 'Twill make a better tale than otherwise, and do no violence to what scanty facts we have."

He returned to the table and poured a fourth round of Jerez.

"Let us say the young men mock him for some hours, aping his gestures and tormenting him with sticks. They become quite curious about the color of his skin: one grasps the priest's hand in his own, chattering to his companions as he compares the hue; another slaps the flesh of his stomach and points to Father FitzMaurice's cassock, wondering whether the stranger hath the same outlandish color from head to foot. The rest deride this notion, to the great indignation of the curious one; he lifts up his muskrat loincloth and voices a second conjecture, so fantastical to his brothers that their eyes brim o'er with glee. They fall to wagering — four, five strings of wompompeag - and at length deprive Father FitzMaurice of his weathered clothes, for proof. Ecce homo! There he stands, all miserable and a-shiver; his belly is as white as the belly of a rockfish, and though his parts have lain as idle as a Book of Common Prayer in the Vatican, he boasts in sooth a full set nonetheless. The challenger stalks off with his winnings, and the young Tayac, who is not above thirty years of age, gives commands to end the sport."

"Ah, now, prithee, wait a moment!" Burlingame protested "This is made up from the whole cloth!"

"Say, from the Holy Cloth," rejoined the imperturbable Smith, widening his blue eyes at the jest.

"I for one prefer't thus," Ebenezer declared impatiently to his friend. "Let him flesh his bony facts into a tale."

Burlingame shrugged and turned back to the fire.

"The women then bring forth the evening meal," the priest went on. "To Father FitzMaurice, cowering naked on his grass mat in the corner, it seems interminable, but anon 'tis done; the women remain, tobacco is passed round, and a general carouse ensues. The priest looks on, abashed but curious, for albeit he is a Jesuit, he is a man as well, and plans moreover to write a treatise on the practices of the salvage if his life is spared. His presence is for the nonce ignored, and as they disport in their error he wrings his wits to hit upon a means of speaking with them, so to initiate the business of conversion.

"The hour arrives when the young Tayac addresses certain words to all the group, sundry of whom turn round to regard the priest. Two hoary, painted elders leave the hut to fetch back a carven pole, some ten feet long, that bears a skunk pelt at the bottom and a crudely mounted muskrat on the top. All present genuflect before it, and its bearers hold it forth toward Father FitzMaurice. The Tayac points his finger at the muskrat and speaks certain gibberish, whose imperious tone hath need of no translation: 'tis a call for similar obsequies from the priest.

"Father FitzMaurice deems the moment opportune. His nakedness forgot, he springs to his feet and shakes his head to signify refusal. Then he once more holds aloft his crucifix, nods his head in vigorous affirmation, and makes a motion as though to fling the idol down. The Tayac now grows wroth; he repeats the same command in louder tones, and the other folk are still. But Father FitzMaurice stands firm: he raises a finger to indicate that the figure on the crucifix is the true and only God, and goes so far as to spit upon the sacred staff. At once the Tayac strikes him down; the idol-bearers place the butt of their pole upon the back of his neck to pin him fast to the dirt, and the Tayac pronounces a solemn incantation, whereto the others shout assent."

"Unhappy wretch!" sighed Ebenezer. "I fear his martyrdom is at hand."

"Not yet," the priest declared. "Now the hut is cleared at once, and Father FitzMaurice is left trembling in the dirt. Anon a dozen salvage maidens enter, all bedaubed with puccoon paint; they spread their mats about the floor and to all appearances make ready for the night. ."

" 'Tis no mystery what will ensue," Burlingame remarked, "if these Nanticokes are like some other Indians."

But Ebenezer, who knew nothing of such matters, implored Father Smith to go on with the tale.

"Father FitzMaurice is abashed tenfold at the presence of the maidens," said the priest, "more especially as he seems the subject of a colloquy among them, carried on in mirthful whispers. He makes a mental note, for his treatise, that salvage maids all share a common chamber, and.rejoices when at last the fire burns out and he can clothe his shame with darkness.

"But his solitude doth not live long: he hath told not more than three Ave Marias ere an Indian wench, perfumed with grease of bear and covered no more than an Adamite, flings herself upon him and bites him in the neck!"

"I'God!" cried Ebenezer.

"The good man struggles, but the maid hath strength, and besides, his foot is tethered. She lays hands upon the candle of the Carnal Mass, and mirabile, the more she trims it, the greater doth it wax! Father FitzMaurice scarce can conjure up his Latin, yet so bent is he on making at least one convert ere he dies, he stammers out a blessing. For reply the heathen licks his ear, whereupon Father FitzMaurice sets to saying Paternosters with all haste, more concerned now with the preservation of his own grace than the institution of his ward's. But no sooner is he thus engaged than zut! she caps his candle with the snuffer priests must shun, that so far from putting out the fire, only fuels it to a greater heat and brilliance. In sum, where he hath hoped to win a convert, 'tis Father FitzMaurice finds himself converted, in less time than it wants to write a syllogism — and baptized, catechized, received, and given orders into the bargain!"

Burlingame smiled at the Laureate's absorption in the tale. "Doth that strike you closely, Eben?"

"Barbarous!" the poet said with feeling. "To fall so from his vows by no fault of his own! What misery must his noble soul have suffered!"

"Nay, sir," Father Smith declared, "you forget he is the stuff of saints, and a Jesuit as well."

Ebenezer protested that he did not understand.

"He explores the pros and contras of his case," the priest explained, "and adduces four good arguments to ease his suffering conscience. To begin with, 'tis e'er the wont of prudent missionaries to wink their eyes, at the outset, at any curious customs of the folk they would convert. In the second place, he is promoting the rapport 'twixt him and the heathen that must be established ere conversion can commence. Third, 'tis to his ultimate good he sins, as is shown past cavil by holy precedent: had not the illustrious Augustine, for example, essayed the manifold refinements of the flesh, the better to know and appreciate virtue? And finally, lest these have an air of casuistry, he is tethered and pinioned from head to foot and hath therefore no choice or culpability in the matter. In fine, so far from wailing o'er his plight, he comes to see in it the hand of Providence and joins in the labor with a will. If his harvest be commensurate to his tilling of the ground, so he reflects, he might well be raised to a bishoprie by Rome!