MD3PAD 292-294

[Toby G Levy]

        After the meeting with the Boundary line Commissioners, Dixon
points out to Mason that they are natural subjects for effigies to be
used by rent payers.

        Mason and Dixon have trouble sleeping in noisy Philadelphia,
which Mason declares is much worse than London. While Dixon snores,
Mason lays awake recalling a galloping song from an opera he attended in
London just before he left for America. The opera, apparently made up by
Pynchon, is named "The Rebel Weaver" and was a kind of Romeo and Juliet
story set amidst the conflict between weavers and clothiers.

        Mason and Dixon both lie in bed wearing the clothes they have
worn all day. They are afraid of being bitten by the bugs which appear
to be everywhere.

vw#69: quotidian - Everyday; commonplace.

        Mason gives up trying to sleep and goes to Orchard Tavern.
Before he gets drunk he learns a great deal of Pennsylvania politics,
which is a struggle between religious groups: Quakers, Anglicans,
Presbyterians and German Pietists. Mason has a hard time following the
explanation of the way the groups interrelate.

        Suddenly it is announced that Benjamin Franklin is about to give
a demonstration of the Leyden-Jar, which is described in the hyperarts
Mason & Dixon alpha as

"an electrical condenser consisting of a glass jar coated inside and
outside with metal foil and having the inner coating connected to a
conducting rod passed through the insulating stopper."

        Franklin, dressed as Death complete with a sgythe, gets a group
to hold hands and then makes a connection to the battery which
discharges after giving all a shock punctuated by flashes of light.

        A thunderstorm can be heard outside and the tavern owner rushes
to close the windows.

Toby