MDMD(8): Another weather report & S & M & D

[Terrance]

John Bailey wrote:
> 
> Those views of Jamestown don't look so steep. With all that water pouring
> from 'rooftop to rooftop, in and out of windows' it would appear that the
> town was a rollicking staircase of hastily-erected shanties. Those views
> look positively charming, peaceful even. And certainly flat. But there's
> something vertical about the description we get here. We could have just
> read 'lots of buildings, on a hill.' But instead we get all this imagery of
> a flood (another one) of water rushing through a town towards the sea (which
> appears to be higher than the town...?) Gravity, pulling it down, the
> weather, ever a source of mischief towards Our Wet Boys.

Yeah, those views are not quite what Wicks has invented here. It seems
Pynchon is into Dante and Swift at the same time. 
The Island is an odd island (note the descriptions of her in the Virtual
Library). 

Here's an interesting comment.


In endeavouring to account for the appearances which are described, some
conclusions have been adopted which may seem bold and hazardous, though
they were not unwarily admitted, nor without mature reflection. The idea
of torrents of melted and burning matter, forcibly propelled through the
chasms of an island, and congealing into perpendicular cones and
extended beds of rock, may shock the prejudices of our belief, as such
an operation is not within that ordinary course of natural events, which
has fallen under our notice : In like manner, it might appear to us
amazing and
incredible, that vast frozen or ignified masses should traverse our
solar system, in directions contrary to the planetary movements, if
experience had not taught us that there are such bodies as comets.

And a little more Swift: 

At the Center of the Island there is a Chasm about fifty Yards in
Diameter, from
whence the Astronomers descend into a large Dome, which is therefore
called
Flandona Gagnole, or the Astronomer's Cave; situated at the Depth of an
Hundred
Yards beneath the upper Surface of the Adamant. In this Cave are Twenty
Lamps
continually burning, which from the Reflection of the Adamant cast a
strong Light
into every Part. The Place is stored with great Variety of Sextants,
Quadrants,
Telescopes, Astrolabes, and other Astronomical Instruments. But the
greatest
Curiosity, upon which the Fate of the Island depends, is a Loadstone of
a prodigious
Size, in Shape resembling a Weaver's Shuttle. It is in Length six Yards,
and in the
thickest Part at least three Yards over. This Magnet is sustained by a
very strong
Axle of Adamant passing through its Middle, upon which it plays, and is
poized so
exactly that the weakest Hand can turn it. It is hooped round with a
hollow Cylinder
of Adamant, four Foot deep, as many thick, and twelve Yards in Diameter,
placed
horizontally, and supported by Eight Adamantine Feet, each six Yards
high. In the
Middle of the Concave Side there is a Groove Twelve Inches deep, in
which the
Extremities of the Axle are lodged, and turned round as there is
Occasion. 

 The Stone cannot be moved from its Place by any Force, because the Hoop
and its
Feet are one continued Piece with that Body of Adamant which constitutes
the
Bottom of the Island. 

 By means of this Load-stone, the Island is made to rise and fall, and
move from
one Place to another. For, with respect to that Part of the Earth over
which the
Monarch presides, the Stone is endued at one of its Sides with an
attractive Power,
and at the other with a repulsive. Upon placing the Magnet erect with
its attracting
End towards the Earth, the Island descends; but when the repelling
Extremity points
downwards, the Island mounts directly upwards. When the Position of the
Stone is
oblique, the Motion of the Island is so too. For in this Magnet the
Forces always act
in Lines parallel to its Direction.                                  

 By this oblique Motion the Island is conveyed to different Parts of the
Monarch's
Dominions.