gonzaga3

issue 3, february 2000

an episode from

an introduction to the epic

At the turn of the last century, Gonzaga was a beloved character of children's literature, with fans all over the world. The tale, set in the late eighteenth century, of a pious brewer who wanders the world bringing beer and liquor to the thirsty and fine food to the hungry, was loved by readers of many nations. Indeed, such was the popularity of the story that it began to have a life outside the confines of the written page.

in this episode, titled Stew,
Gonzaga loses his liberty:

Freedom is an ephemeral thing. One minute you're having a jolly time in Seattle looting a Grande Half-Cafe Skinny Latte, and the next you're sitting on the ground with your hands in plastic cuffs and tear-gas in your eye, chanting "the whole world is watching." Or put it this way: One minute you're feeling the ultimate freedom of cool sea air on your naked body as you run along the beach in Sandy Hook NJ, the next you're having tense discussions with a bunch of humorless men about the possibility of having to register as a sex offender.

More and more of today's world is operated as a sort of minimum security prison, whether it¹s the Times Square Millennium celebration, the airport, the mall, school, or indeed minimum security prisons. But for all today's incremental incursions into our liberty, we enjoy a personal freedom, and respect for our physical being unknown by the common person through much of history.

In Gonzaga's era, for instance, the diverse parts of the British Criminal Justice System exacted, under the Bloody Code, the ultimate penalty for a wide range of offences. Unfortunates would dance the hempen jig for such crimes as stealing a pocket-handkerchief, consorting lewdly with doxies, inappropriate unleashing of the hounds, and misuse of cilantro. For lesser offenses criminals would merely be transported to Australia--roughly the equivalent of Mars in today's miles.

Nonetheless British Justice acquired a worldwide reputation for being scrupulously fair and humane, partly because the order in which really terrible things could happen to you was rigorously maintained, and partly because defendants were provided with ice water and breath mints during their trials.

We re-join Gonzaga in the clutches of the British judiciary, charged with the crime of playing football.

I woke up to find myself being administered cold water by a bucket to my face and, indeed, to my whole person. This was complemented by a light fist-massage of my admittedly stiff shoulders. I looked around and saw that I was surrounded by a group of the most repugnant faces I had seen since my sojourn in hell. Corpulent, eyes bloodshot, hard, teeth in disarray, some with scars that opened up their faces like second and third mouths. They were all worthy of note. There was a hearty stench of vomit, of strong drink, of the various bodily elixirs, of tobacco, and of tooth-decay, but as this tended to decline as I was dowsed, I cannot wholly ascribe its presence to the gentlemen in question.

It appeared that I was the center of attention.

"Who put you up to it, then, you footy despicable?" brayed the largest, the cleanest and, it seemed to me, the most prominent of them, an individual whom I came to know as Bob Cromby, the captain of the garrison.

"E's a Frog, Captain, I can tell it from 'is breff, all garlicky 'e pongs." This from a weasel of a corporal called Pryce. When I call him a weasel, I will have you know that I use the term advisedly—nay, I will present the facts of my case and you may then judge for yourself.

If a man were to stand before you with a chin that scarcely troubled to protrude beyond his Adam's apple, leaving his few remaining upper teeth entirely without support; with eyes the size and color of sun-dried currants, separated from each other by less than the width of an Irish street-urchin's littlest finger; whose hair—for he wears no wig—lies dark and oily upon his naked scalp, congealed into individual strands that sweep back to the nape of his filthy neck; whose sharp little nose pulls, as it were, the rest of his face forward ... but I trust that I have made my case. What else but a weasel? I shall not mention his ears, although others were usually not so discreet.

The captain thoughtfully stroked his chin, leaving a soot-smutch on the right side of his jaw. "A frog, Jack-ears? Damme if I've ever clapped my eyes on a Frog the size of this hulky rogue. Nay, he'll be no Frog. I make him a Dutchman at the least—perhaps even a Saxon, or one of yon Bohemian coves. What says he? Does he answer to the King's English?"

"'E jabbered to me in 'is damned 'eathen codswallop, Captain, but I could not make 'eads nor tails of hit." This was a flat lie, for the events of that morning had left me too far gone to even open my mouth, let alone form sounds.

"Is that so? You, prisoner, what do you say for yourself?" I attempted to open my mouth, in vain. The blood spilled by those vulgar dentists-at-law had so congealed inside me that it sealed my lips like the buttons on a moneylender's purse.

"Right, then. If he's not one of ours, then it's the chates for him."

"'E'll be dancin' on nuffing afore you can mumble a sparrow, sir."

It dawned on me that perhaps now was the time to rally my powers of speech, before these ruffians strung me up by the neck until I was dead. "Excuse me, Captain," I sputtered forth in an English that—thanks to many an hour of pensive dicing with Percy Ramfiddle—was nearly flawless; "excuse me, but I wish that you would reconsider your decision."

"Bugger! 'E's one of ours, sir!"

Captain Cromby took this news in stride. "One of ours, are you, scamp? Well, why the devil didn't you say so?"

Before I could frame a suitable reply, he pulled a tattered volume from the patch-pocket of his coat, opened it seemingly at random, and began reciting:

"Whereas a traitorous and detestable conspiracy has been formed for subverting the existing laws and constitution and for introducing a system of anarchy and confusion: therefore every person or persons that are or shall be in prison within the kingdom or possessions of Great Britain at or upon the day on which this act shall receive his Majesty's royal assent, may be detained in safe custody without bail or mainprise until it shall be convenient to try any such persons before a duly and properly constituted court of law for the crimes for which they have been apprehended."

"Sir," I began, hoping to soften the heart of this Englishmen, with an appeal to sentimentality, "As a child I had a small dog, who in the absence of human companions was my only friend. The nights were cold, and as I had no bed covers..."

"Excellent," said Captain Cromby, "he admits to sodomy with a dog. Picket him and see what else he will confess to." I was horrified, but before I could protest eager hands grabbed me and dragged me from the room.

Picketing is a field punishment of the British Army, and is not designed as a torture, which the English claim to have no truck with in any case, as they consider it papist*. They would sooner whip a man, which is merely a punishment, than torture him.

However, in the Terra Australis, far from the mother country, such niceties are not always observed. I was pushed, dragged, and pummeled into a small cell, which, strangely, had a large, barred window facing a yard. A ragged group of convicts and dogs soon gathered.

My great toe was lodged upon a sharp piece of wood, while the opposite wrist was suspended in a pulley and the other hand and foot were lashed together. They did not abuse me easily. It took seven men to raise me on the pulley, and twice their poor hempen ropes snapped, sending me crashing to the floor.

For all that, the pain was horrid. My arm was nearly pulled from my socket and a sharp jolt shot up from my toe. Soon cramp set in, sending wracking spasms through my musculature. All the while they peppered me with ridiculous questions. With the courage the Lord and the prodigious amount I had lately drunk gave me, I did not discredit myself too much. I told them little more than my name, the names of all my acquaintances, where they could be found, the amount of variance between their actual and taxed incomes, and an ancient recipe for strawberry brandy.

The next day I was brought in chains in front of the Captain, to be formally charged. He read from a printed list, which I later discovered had been distributed throughout Botany Bay, at the charge of one happenny. Later versions of the pamphlet were sold in London, often for as much as a penny, and a version is still in circulation.

"Wereas you Gonzaga, late of Perekop, now under the jurisdiction of His Royal Highness George of the Kingdom of Great Britain and diverse royal lands are charged with the following felonious acts: Whereas you did foment mutiny among the prisoners of Botany Bay; whereas you did assault and injure six of His Majesties soldiers, to wit, Privates Martin Greathop, Norbert Pentallistar, Scrum Mandate, John Happyfate, Corporal Bodywaite and the Leftenants Coldstairs and Cholmoldnely; whereas you did operate and maintain an illegal still; whereas you did provide sustenance and succor to the enemies of the King; whereas on diverse occasions you defrauded Theophilus Smith a Crown subject and his family by selling him short measures; whereas you did remove with the intent to consume a sheep and several lambs from the boat of a Luther Greb; whereas you did bugger diverse livestock and had frequent unlawful carnal knowledge of diverse female prisoners; whereas you did operate a disorderly house, for purposes of material thrif; and whereas said house offered, besides women of maturity, both boys and girls, of various ages and races, and of diverse abilities.

Further, whereas you have speculated on the true genealogy of our Savior Jesus Christ, and gathered diverse subjects of the realm together, in order to advance several hypotheses on this subject; whereas you have publicly lusted after the Holy Mother of Christ, and expressed amorous intent with respect to both the King and the Queen, at various times; whereas you have violated laws relating to the segregation of the races, partaken in a variety of ceremonies of questionable relationship to the Sacrament, and have upon occasion, confessed to be of mixed blood; whereas over and above these universally detestable crimes, you did willfully and with malice aforethought conspire to bring the Good Name of the British people into ridicule and disrepute by engaging diverse and sundry of His Majesty's subjects in a contest or tourney whose results you had privately and covertly guaranteed in advance by the unlawful adulteration of certain liquors with certain herbs of known emetic effect. Therefore--"

This last charge was a bit much. "I won that match fair!"

"Shut yer bone-box," quoth the weasel, and clapped me across the jaw with a live rat that he happened to be fondling.

"Nothing to add, your Honor."

"--Therefore ... oh rot. Mr. Gonzaga, you understand that we do not have the authority to try you for these crimes, and so you are to be taken to England for your trial. As you will no doubt plead benefit of the clergy, you will likely be transported. A fate you clearly deserve."

"Couldn't I stay here?"

"Silence," whined the weasel, but the Captain held up his hand, and said in a voice that was almost gentle, were it not for the undertone of violence, "That would hardly be fair. You, not being British, don't understand the British system of Justice. It's blind. Blind but fair, which is more than I can say for my father, who also couldn't see well. He didn't need to see to whip me. But British justice is glorious, and it's glorious that you, a foreigner and criminal, have a right to a fair trial. In England. If you stayed here, we wouldn't have any right to keep you here.

"To make sure you stay here we must send you to England. Very well, Pryce, put more chains on him and take him H.M.S. Calvary. Give this writ of passage to Captain Cloute." At this my guards threw me into the bottom of a boat and a crew of convicts rowed me out to one of the ships riding at anchor in the harbor. <

Episodes from "The Travels of Father Gonzaga" were translated from the language of the Sami peoples on a Reindeer farm near Mexico, Maine, by Marcus Boon, Nicholas Noyes, and David Wondrich.

Marcus Boon is working on a history of drug use by writers and lives in Brooklyn, NY.

Nicholas Noyes recently contributed to The Amok 5th Dispatch: Sourcebook of the Extremes of Information, and is currently taking tea and dreaming of the Arctic north. Mr. Noyes also wrote the short story "Wild Surmise" in this issue.

David Wondrich is a Senior Research Fellow at the North Gowanus Institute for Cranial Distempers, where he resides.

gonzaga@start.com.au

Michael Evert is an artist living in New York.