A Bloodsmoor Romance (3 page)

It was surely a touching indication of John Quincy's democratic temperament, and the simple, rural, and unadorn'd nature of his background, that he felt some small revulsion for the display of wealth the Kidde­master brougham—with its glaring coppery finish, and its smart ebony trim, and its handsome fringed hammercloth—represented to the world; and, it may be, for his own reluctant acquiescence to it, in the interests of conjugal peace. (The elegant brougham, adorned with the Kidde­master coat-of-arms on its sides—a demilion rampant, grasping an olive branch—was drawn by four high-stepping, and immaculately groomed, white geldings, with braided and beribboned manes and tails, and “treated” coats and hooves: the coats being whitened, and the hooves more emphatically blackened, by art, so that the noble steeds might offer a yet more dramatic appearance, when glimps'd in public, than they might have done otherwise. Thus John Quincy's father-in-law, the retired Chief Justice Godfrey Kidde­master, indulged himself, in small ways, and harmless manifestations of pride: this desire for a striking
public appearance
being, perhaps, nothing more than an aspect of his Federalist heritage, for we must recall that President Washington himself similarly decreed that his horses be “treated,” with an eye toward exciting admiration amongst the common folk. And I cannot think but that it was a considerable pleasure, for these personages, to gaze upon the Kidde­master carriage as it passed, drawn by the beauteous horses, and swaying with luxuriant grace on its large C-springs—a properly attired Irish driver up front, and an attendant footman, in livery, perched high at the back, as rigidly perfect in posture as a statue.) “I fear we are a spectacle, being, after all, but
Zinns,
” John Quincy quietly observed, “yet I suppose the Kidde­masters must be indulged; and it is, in any case, but a temporary endurance.”

Whereupon his vivacious daughter Malvinia could not resist observing, to anyone who cared to hear: “Alas, dear Father, that it
is
but temporary: and tomorrow, if we venture forth, we shall be obliged to be carried in our own humble surrey, that hardly requires the Zinn coat-of-arms, to be identified as ours.”

 

IT IS NECESSARY,
I believe, for me to interrupt my narrative at this point—the Zinns not yet arrived at the tea, the sky a feckless china blue, the dread abduction many hours hence—in order to quickly sketch a portrait of Mr. John Quincy Zinn, that the reader may become more adequately cognizant of him, in terms of his great value, in the eyes of his daughters, and his slow-growing reputation, in the eyes of the world.

In this year of 1879, John Quincy's fame lay all before him, and he was not yet popularly known by the initials J.Q.Z., as he came to be, in the closing years of the century. Yet, withal, he enjoy'd a considerable respect amongst his fellow inventors, men of science, and philosophers: witness the presence of the gentlemen from the American Philosophical Society, who wished simply to meet with him on an informal basis, and converse with him with an eye toward promoting his candidacy, as a member of their austere organization. (In his old age, what honors will be offered! From the Royal Society of the British Empire, for instance; and from other international organizations, as well as those in the States, that had, for a time, withheld recognition from the modest-temper'd Mr. Zinn.)

A more respectful consideration of our subject, and his myriad achievements, will be offered elsewhere in this history: for I must limn, as clearly as possible, the biographical facts pertaining to this famous American, that his role—both
tragic,
and
triumphant
—will be adequately comprehended. Suffice it to say, for the present, that he rose from a humble rural background, in the mountains of southern Pennsylvania; that he enjoy'd a meteoric rise to prominence, in Philadelphia, in the 1850's, as a consequence of his advanced pedagogical methods, in a rural common school in Mouth-of-Lebanon, Pennsylvania; that he fell most passionately in love with Miss Prudence Kidde­master, the daughter of the distinguished juror Godfrey Kiddemaster (then Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania); that he assiduously courted her, until her virgin heart was won; that they were wed, and came to dwell here in Bloodsmoor, some twenty-three years before that autumn of 1879, with which this narrative begins.

On several acres of particularly scenic land, part wooded, and part meadow, belonging to the Kidde­master estate, the devoted young couple established their residence, enjoying the occupancy of an
eight-sided domicile
of Mr. Zinn's own design, which Mrs. Zinn's munificent father financed. There, in that remarkable dwelling place—known locally as the Octagonal House, and, later, to be avidly written of, by journalists seeking to portray the complexity of Mr. Zinn's genius to their disparate readership—four healthsome, and angelic, infant girls were born; to which bountiful household there was, in 1873, added an additional child, the orphan'd Deirdre Bonner.

Whilst this happy family life blossomed, with very few incursions of ill-fortune, save some three or four miscarriages suffered by Mrs. Zinn, and the common run of illnesses, there was pursued, with marked singleness of purpose, and unswerving dedication, John Quincy Zinn's vocation of
invention,
which the modest gentleman was wont to call mere “tinkering.” (“For only God
invents,
” Mr. Zinn quietly asserted.)

To those readers whose grasp of history is so deficient that the name John Quincy Zinn means very little to them, it will perhaps be of interest to learn that the distinguished inventor George Washington Gale Ferris believed Mr. Zinn to be “one of the most remarkable men of his acquaintance”; and that Mr. Hannibal Goodwin praised his “tireless, questing, resolutely
natural
mind.” That brilliant, albeit somewhat eccentric, Swedish scientist John Ericsson, spoke privately of John Quincy Zinn as an “equal,” as did Ralph Waldo Emerson, on at least one recorded occasion. (It was unfortunate indeed that Mr. Emerson, being of the
poetic,
and not the
mathematical,
genius, could not grasp, and consequently felt the necessity to disparage, certain of Mr. Zinn's most challenging projects—the experimentation with the
perpetual-motion machine,
for instance. Yet, in a much-priz'd letter of 1869, found in the inventor's workshop after his death, Mr. Emerson declared himself an “admirer” of Mr. Zinn, for the “very doggedness of his passion for Truth.”)

A naturally inspired teacher, as informed by Love as by Intellect—a near-divine intelligence—an inventor of rustic, but original, genius—a Saint in his purity, as in his zeal:
so John Quincy Zinn was praised, by divers gentlemen, during his long and productive lifetime. Charles A. Dana lauded Mr. Zinn, whom he had never met, as the single personage “hailing from that Transcendentalist tribe, who had
contributed
something worthwhile to our civilization.” Mr. Samuel Clemens, an enthusiast of invention in general, had naught but admiration for certain of Mr. Zinn's numerous “domestic” items—the automatic hair clippers, for instance, and the rotary toothbrush, the which an embarrassed John Quincy Zinn had no great pride in, and would as soon have forgotten!—these “tinkerer's toys” being, in his censorious eyes, quite contemptible, when set beside his more ambitious projects.

 

IT WAS ONE
of the first questions put to John Quincy Zinn, by the journalist Adam Watkins, in 1887, as to why he had applied for so very few patents; for was it not a common practice, on the part of his fellow inventors, to file their applications with the United States Patent Office, on the slightest pretext? Many of the inventors being sadly deluded, in their estimation of their own originality and genius!

Mr. Zinn's reply to this impertinent query was a simple one, yet not lacking in dignity: “Perhaps, Mr. Watkins, I am somewhat less deluded than my brethren.”

But the question continued to be asked, over the years, not only by inquisitive strangers, but by those relatives and acquaintances who might have been expected to sympathize with Mr. Zinn's Transcendentalist faith, which scorned the mercantile world, and sought to incorporate the Higher Law into the secular life. Alas, it was truly another, and yet more impertinent question, that might have been worded thusly:
Why are you so unlike other men?

There was much triumph in John Quincy Zinn's life; yet, withal, a secret sorrow, in that, apart from a very few exemplary individuals, no one understood him; and certain personages, even within his family, took
delight
in misunderstanding him. What a pity it is, that he had not the opportunity to commune more frequently with his equals—a pity, for instance, that Bloodsmoor was not Concord, Massachusetts, where Mr. Zinn might have dined with Mr. Emerson, Mr. Thoreau, and Mr. Alcott, and where, surely, he would have been a central member of the Transcendentalist Club! A pity, too, that his sensitive nerves were so ill affected by the uproar and clatter of large cities that he abhorred visits even to Philadelphia (one of the more attractive cities, which Mr. Zinn had liked well enough in his young bachelor days); and would never have dreamt of journeying to New York, or Boston. It was his solemn belief that he “swam in the pulsing bloodstream of Nature, Man, and God” without leaving Bloodsmoor, or, indeed, without stepping outside his workshop door; and, in a jesting mood, he liked to say that his pet monkey, Pip, who routinely kept him company during the long workday, was all he required of intellectual companionship.

Yet I cannot restrain myself from observing, with all reverence for my subject, that John Quincy Zinn might have been less lonely, and less susceptible to bemused despair, had he cultivated the friendship of worthy persons and traveled with more ease. But, doubtless, it was as a consequence of his shattering experience in the War Between the States, in which he valiantly participated for the better part of three years, that, once safely home, he vowed to remain, and to work in blessèd solitude, for the remainder of his life.

But others failed to understand; and the rude question
Why?
was asked repeatedly.

Why did John Quincy Zinn, one of the most gifted inventors in our Great Age of Invention (now, alas, an epoch long past), reap so very modest a harvest from his lifelong labor? Why, save at the end of his career, when manufacturers vied for his contracts, did he display such lofty indifference to personal gain? Even as a young, brash, and ostensibly ambitious man, in his mid-twenties, he had declined to insist upon a satisfactory arrangement for the publication of his pedagogical study,
The Spirit of the Future in America,
of 1854; with the shocking result that the erstwhile reputable publishing house of A. T. Plumbe & Sons, of Philadelphia, was to reprint some twelve times in all, but pay to its acclaimed author only $300—the original flat fee for the assignment of all rights. And, though he protested himself a loving and devoted husband to his wife, and a no less loving and devoted father, it was very curious that he could not seem to pay his considerable debts to the Kidde­masters—both his father-in-law, Godfrey Kidde­master, and Great-Aunt Edwina, of whom we shall speak shortly—let alone enjoy some private gain, of his own. Mrs. Zinn, who was to remain loyal to John Quincy for some forty-three years, oft declared, with sombre amusement, or droll resignation, or stoic calm, that she should not mourn the loss of so many patents, and so much abstract wealth, if Mr. Zinn's aptitude for providing for his family in other regards were more reliable; if there were not four—nay,
five
—young ladies, in the Octagonal House, who must be provided with dowries—the protracted munificence of her father being, she believed, near to exhausted. And, too, the maintenance of Mr. Zinn's modest laboratory-workshop, in a crude cabin built by his own hands, fell to Judge Kidde­master as well, as an informal “partner” in the inventor's work.

“The question you are putting to me, Prudence,” Mr. Zinn replied, with gentle dignity, albeit with a melancholy cast of his eye, “is simply thus:
Why are you not like other men?
And it is a question, I am sorry to say, that cannot be answered save by reference to one of our greatest Americans, Benjamin Franklin, who, as you know, might have become a millionaire many times over had he troubled to patent
his
inventions.”

Tho' it may be Mrs. Zinn had heard this rejoinder before from her husband, she did not protest, but stood silent, her stern, handsome, rather strong-boned face slightly coloring; and her hands clasped together. Poor Prudence! For all her anxious displeasure with her husband, and his resolute idealism as to mercantile success, she was, finally, and to her credit, an
excellent wife,
who took her marital vows with utmost seriousness, and would more readily have surrendered her personal distinction as a Kidde­master heiress than fail to love, honor, and obey her stalwart husband. Thus she stood wordless, her gaze meekly lowered, whilst, with closed eyes, and a fond stroking of his fair-hued beard, Mr. Zinn quoted these familiar words of Benjamin Franklin's:
“As we enjoy great advantages from the inventions of others, we should be glad of an opportunity to serve others by any invention of ours; and this we should do, freely and generously.”

 

IT WAS TO
be widely, if quietly, deemed, after the abduction of Miss Deirdre Zinn, that had Mr. Zinn been patient enough to remain at Kidde­master Hall with his womenfolk, in order to accompany them back home in the brougham, the tragedy would not have occurred: but, to his misfortune, the restive inventor, whose imagination, I believe, never truly left the domain of his workshop and his workbench, insisted upon leaving for the Octagonal House
on foot,
as soon as the last guests had departed. With Mrs. Zinn claiming the need to speak with her parents in private, and the girls grateful for another hour's stay at the great house, it was altogether reasonable that John Quincy Zinn might linger to converse with one of the family (for Great-Uncle Vaughan, who had some small interest in Mr. Zinn's “sun-furnace” experimentation, would have greatly enjoyed speaking with him at leisure), or simply to stroll about the wisteria garden, or contemplate the handsome fieldstone wishing well, in the company of his five pretty daughters. But, alas, his nerves had grown so strained, as a consequence of both the ordeal of the formal tea and the ordeal of being impertinently, if courteously,
interrogated
by the Boston visitors, that he felt himself aflame with the desire to escape.