Chapter 49: 476-483
Contents
Page 476
York
See page 393.
Gunpowder Creek
The Gunpowder River is a river in Maryland, United States. It is formed by the joining of Big Gunpowder Falls and Little Gunpowder Falls. Big Gunpowder begins in the extreme southern part of Pennsylvania's York County. From there, the "Big Gunpowder" flows in a generally southeast direction through the length of Baltimore County until it reaches Joppatowne where it is joined by the "Little Gunpowder" and the Bird River becoming simply the "Gunpowder River" once it passes the Amtrak train bridge that runs from Chase to Joppa. From WIKI
Page 477
"Ensign Cheer."
Is this Dixon making a sarcastic remark, implying Mason is being pessimistic or discouraging about his Fire-flies plans?
Quartz-scryer
Jonas Everybeet, first on page 442.
Torpedo
See page 426.
The marimba is a musical instrument in the percussion family. Keys or bars (usually made of wood) are struck with mallets to produce musical tones. The keys are arranged as those of a piano, with the accidentals raised vertically and overlapping the natural keys to aid the performer both visually and physically. From WIKI
"Pepinazos"
Anthem of the Expedition. There is a translation on ThomasPynchon.com, that translates this as "Blows", however, I think the translation of "Bangs" is a bit better (as pepinazo is closer to an explosion or loud blast from a cannon, etc). To me, "Blows" brings to mind punches which isnt in line with the word's meaning. I had other translation differences as well. That in mind, the lyrics in English may read something like:
Bangs, never
Hugs, If I
Want, Yes
For real
Listen!-
Let yourself
The Ba-a-nngg--ss!
Is the song a play off of "Tree Hugger"? As the Line progresses, it's Bangs not Hugs? Is it the Ax-men's Banging??? Or maybe the Bangs of guns and cannons? Or maybe this was a tune influenced by the Lightning strikes a number of pages previous?
Page 478
Eyre Coote
Lieutenant-General Sir Eyre Coote, KB (1726 – April 28, 1783), was an Irish soldier who served time in India.
See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eyre_Coote
Page 482
Epsilons usually. Miserable little sort of things. This exchange is a reference to mathematical analysis and the rigorous foundations of the calculus of limits. Typically epsilon denotes an arbitrary positive number which a certain quantity is shown to be smaller than, in order to show that this quantity is in fact zero. This allusion is anachronistic because this idea of a limit first appears only in the writings of Augustin Louis Cauchy in 1821, and was only formally stated by Karl Weierstrass some decades later. Any student of mathematics will no doubt fondly remember having to master the epsilon-delta argument.
