The Rabbit Dream
“Men are stupid. They are so stupid, they will believe this. Everyone will hear about us. And, if you play your part well, Mary, you might even become rich.”
AUGUST 8, 2024
The Rabbit Dream
It is Mary and Elizabeth, two women, very poor, very tired, working out in the fields. It is their last hour of work that day; they are allowed to go home soon. Mary is the most tired of the two, her movements slow but persistent in weeding the many hop plants, making her hands coarse and tough. She is four months pregnant with her third child, and ever since her third round of that loathsome condition started, her strength is diminished, making each day of labour very difficult to bear.
But Mary is used to things being difficult to bear.
Life in Godalming, in 1724, is harsh and miserable, more often than not.
Harsh and miserable, for the poor people, that is. The rich people of Godalming, a town of around two to three thousand souls, live quite comfortably. They live so comfortably that a wealthy woman by the name of the Duchess of Richmond can afford to spend one pound sterling and twelve shillings each for clothes for her servants to please the eyes, and a whole of twelve shillings for a new coat for Cosima, the family’s pet monkey. Cosima is a name that comes from a word found in the Greek language, a word that means order and harmony. When the Duchess of Richmond gazes upon her pet monkey, the pet monkey named Cosima, clad in her brand new and elegant coat, she experiences a feeling of order and harmony.
The women stare, a rabbit, a beautiful rabbit; its body bountiful, meat, fur, nourishment; it must have run away, it must have run away from the rich people’s cages.
Mary Toft earns one penny a day, while labouring out in the fields. If Mary Toft were to buy a coat for a pet monkey, a pet monkey living more comfortably than she does, she would have to labour for 144 days without using her wages for anything else. Only that way, after labouring for 144 days, getting one penny a day, without spending those pennies on anything else, instead saving each and every one, only then would she be able to afford a brand new and elegant coat for a pet monkey, to inspire feelings of order and harmony.
An impossible equation, of course, as impossible as it would have been to bridge the chasm between the rich and the poor in the town of Godalming in 1724.
It is their last hour of work, and just before Elizabeth is about to say that they can call it a day, they see it:
A rabbit, stirring among the bushes, suddenly springing up, leaping away.
The women stare, a rabbit, a beautiful rabbit; its body bountiful, meat, fur, nourishment; it must have run away, it must have run away from the rich people’s cages, and Elizabeth starts to run, like a madwoman, and Mary starts to run also, like a madwoman; if they catch this rabbit, they will have a feast, their bellies will be filled and content for a long time, and the mother — the mother-in-law, she will be so astonished, so grateful, that she will surely be kind to them for a long time, maybe even her hard gaze will turn soft! Oh, how happy she will be, with her daughter and daughter-in-law, if they come home with a whole rabbit! The promise of that happiness, of the matron of the house turning kind and peaceful, almost has a stronger pull on them than the rabbit itself. But the rabbit is quicker; the rabbit is quicker than both of them and Mary is the first one to realize, she slows her steps down, out of breath, but Elizabeth goes on, she goes on until the rabbit is truly out of sight and then she falls over, as if losing all her strength, and then Mary notices that while falling over, she has started crying. Her crying, a quiet crying, and then it suddenly turns into anger, to rage, shaking her body in stifled, violent sobs, and it still goes on, and Mary stays where she is, she looks out across the bines, the many hop bines, and she tries to pretend she doesn’t notice.
When it still goes on, in the end she gets out, she says to the sister-in-law:
‘Beth — Beth, pull yourself together. It was only a rabbit.’
She says that, although knowing full well a rabbit is never just a rabbit.
Not in Godalming.
Instead, one such rabbit is everything that is wrong with Godalming.
That rabbit and its brethren are the cause of much hardship, of Mary’s husband’s declining trade and of the rich people’s wealth.
Because it is like this;
Godalming has good soil. Godalming has the best soil for rabbit farming.
So much so that by 1724, rabbit farms have replaced areas that once were pastures for sheep to produce wool and thus work for the cloth trade. Fields where grains and vegetables could be planted and farmed were replaced also.
The largest rabbit farm in Godalming occupies a site that is nearly 260 acres.
Only the rich people are allowed to have rabbit farms. Only the rich people can afford rabbits, to eat, to use, to take pleasure in for food, comfort, warmth.
Rabbit farms are the dominions of the wealthy people.
Rabbit farms that some rabbits occasionally run away from, eating and destroying any remaining pastures and fields, for the poorer people to use.
Mary Toft lives among the poorest of the poorest. They own no fields, no animals.
Her husband, Joshua Toft, is an unskilled clothworker. The poorest trade of them all, a trade where all work will soon dry up.
And Mary Toft is a seasonal worker, taking any available work along with the women of her circle, any available work, any available work no one else wants to do, in the hop gardens, in the fields, anywhere.
And if anyone sights a rabbit, if a poor person sights a rabbit, aiming to catch it, if the poor person herself is caught doing that, it is a crime harshly punished.
Same goes for fish. If anyone tries to steal fish from the rich people’s ponds, they are prosecuted.
It doesn’t help to confess that one stole the fish to eat it at home with one’s family.
Any fish-stealers are to be prosecuted and punished.
The same goes for rabbit-stealers and rabbit-poachers.
Elizabeth gets a hold of herself finally. She stops sobbing. She collects herself.
Elizabeth and Mary return home to one of the poorest quarters, to the household where the mother and mother-in-law, Ann Toft, reigns.
One Disappointment and One Tragedy
Mary was Mary Denyer once and seventeen years old when she married the equally young Joshua Toft. It was a practical union. Mary came from a family with many children. Joshua came from a family with many children. Mary’s family, the Denyer family, was even more impoverished than the Toft family. For Mary, it was a good union, even when having to leave everything behind and go live with her husband’s family. One year after her marriage, her mother died. When her mother died Mary was truly cut off from her old family, once and for all.
The only mother-like figure in close proximity in her life from then on was to be Ann Toft, the husband’s mother.
✺
That was six years back. On the wedding night Joshua had said:
‘You are not handsome. But then again, I am not handsome either.’
It was true. Joshua was not handsome. He had other qualities. Mary Toft was not handsome. And she had no qualities whatsoever. Instead, people often described her as having a very stupid and sullen temper. Doctors would later describe her as having a fair complexion, a strong and healthy constitution, a small stature and a stupid and sullen temper. They would note that she could neither read nor write. The latter is something literate and educated men like to point out when demonstrating dominance and superiority.
Life and its harshness overwhelmed her at every moment. She went from day to day, merely trying to survive.
But in Mary Toft’s circle no one could read or write. It was no problem. It was not noted. It was just how it was.
For women like Mary Toft, other means of communication were employed.
One might wonder what women like Mary Toft, who can neither read nor write, would do if one day wishing to make an impact, wishing to attempt a change.
A change in circumstances, for example.
A change in one’s wretched conditions, for example.
One might wonder what women like Mary Toft would do if they one day wished to attract attention on a grand scale.
After all, getting a message across, a message to reach many ears and eyes, must be very difficult if one doesn’t know how to read or write.
If one would ever like to communicate outside of one’s own circles, outside of one’s own very poor circles, an endeavour like that might seem impossible, if one doesn’t have the ability to read or write.
But Mary Toft never pondered things like these. She had no ideas. She didn’t wish to change things. Life and its harshness overwhelmed her at every moment. She went from day to day, merely trying to survive.
She married Joshua Toft. They had a daughter, buried in the same year she was born. One had to go on.
And then, soon after, Mary fell pregnant again, bearing a son this time. The son was allowed to live, to grow, to eat. He was one more mouth to feed, the most important mouth to feed, even when food was scarce and work was scarce. But one had to go on.
So Mary Toft simply went on. She never reflected on these things.
In the year of 1724, she had a stillborn daughter. It was gruesome. She was wholly unprepared for it. Joshua grieved the baby. He grieved the unformed baby, too small to live. But his mother, Ann Toft, later said: Perhaps it was for the best.
No addition to the mouths to feed, this time. And Mary went on.
Mary went on, until, in the year of 1726, she became pregnant again. She became pregnant again, but this pregnancy too would end tragically. It would end in a miscarriage. It would overwhelm her one day while working with her fellow women. She was unable to go on, and the women agreed to work during their dinner hour to cover for her so Mary might walk home earlier without all of them losing pay. And so Mary walked home alone, the short journey home from the hop gardens taking a whole two hours that day because of the pain and things coming away.
Not a baby this time. Mary can see no baby.
Mary becomes convinced she had been pregnant with something else. Elizabeth says she must have eaten something bad or become greatly frightened while pregnant, and that is what made her baby so misshapen, so unlike a baby, no baby at all, only parts to be expelled. Ann Toft agrees. Mary must have done something wrong. To Mary it is like a nightmare, until it is finally over. And this time she can’t go on. The blood and the pain follow her, like lingering nightmares, they visit her thoughts and her dreams day and night.
✺
It is the summer of 1726, summer is soon ending, and it is when Mary has just miscarried, and one of the neighbours, a sister to Ann Toft but also a midwife, is just about to go home. Mary is weak and quiet in her bed, and Ann Toft has a thousand thoughts in her head.
She regards the daughter-in-law. She thinks about her son, Joshua.
She thinks about the decline of the clothing trade, soon to rob her son of all opportunities to work. She thinks about the seasonal work that is about to dry up for her daughter and daughter-in-law because of summer ending. She thinks about the upcoming holiday, Michaelmas, when everyone will sell the products of their labour at the local fair.
Ann Toft’s family doesn’t have a lot of products of labour to sell. Not any products, in fact. Joshua’s work doesn’t produce products to sell. Mary’s and Elizabeth’s work, weeding plants in hop gardens, doesn’t produce products to sell.
Ann Toft wants to set the system on fire. That is not how Ann Toft herself would word it in early eighteenth- century England, but that is what she wants to do.
Despite this, the Tofts are not without ideas or industry. They are not without efforts, not without efforts to bring about a change in the poverty, to bring more food to the table.
Her son, Joshua, for example, almost successfully poached some fish, a joint effort with thirty-seven companions, an organized attack, a gathering of dissent, a quiet protest, a protest against the wealthy, the hunger, they went out one night, in their joint effort.
But then they were caught. No fish.
Only a sullen Joshua, finally coming home after being interrogated.
With him, he has a rabbit, freshly dead, that he found out in the fields.
Ann Toft takes the rabbit, cuts it up and finds that it is wholly unfit to eat.
Joshua withdraws to the kitchen and drinks that night. He drinks and drinks. He drinks until he passes out.
Ann Toft clutches what is left of the rabbit. What is left of the rabbit is a disappointment. Ann Toft thinks about the daughter-in-law, put through yet another tragedy.
And because work is soon to dry up for her son, daughter, and daughter-in-law, the healthiest and most able-bodied members of the family, because they have nothing to sell when Michaelmas is coming up, and because all this goes on while the wealthy stay disgustingly wealthy, not wanting for anything in life, while the impoverished Tofts and everyone around them want for near everything, Ann Toft has a diabolical thought.
Ann Toft wants to set the system on fire.
That is not how Ann Toft herself would word it in early eighteenth-century England, but that is what she wants to do.
Because that evening, after the failed fish mission and Mary’s miscarriage, Ann Toft is starting to link things together, things wholly unrelated to each other. Ann Toft links them together now, creating relations between them, relations and paths.
Paths to possibilities.
Paths to new options and new possibilities.
She is considering the new options and new possibilities. Ann Toft is not afraid to think outside the box.
And Ann Toft thinks:
One might as well take one disappointment and one tragedy and put them to good use.
One might as well take the disappointment and the tragedy and use them for one’s own benefit.
One might as well join those two things and attempt a change, finally.
And so, Ann Toft tells her sister, the sister who is also a midwife, to wait. She calls her daughter Elizabeth to them. She talks to Elizabeth and her sister, the midwife, and they listen. They listen, because Ann Toft is the kind of person one always listens to even when disagreeing, even when being frightened of what she suggests. Ann Toft is the oldest one in the room. Ann Toft has a sharp brain and sharp thoughts. Ann Toft is fed up with the state of things. Ann Toft has ideas. Ann Toft is not afraid to think outside the box.
She has ideas she is not afraid to make into reality. She is not afraid to think outside the box. She is not afraid to bring the ideas, the outlandish ideas, into the box.
Ann Toft has faith in her ability to communicate things, to communicate things even without having the ability to read and write.
So she enlists the women, the women who are part of Mary Toft’s everyday life, who accompany her through every daily task, through work, through cooking, through washing, through cleaning, the women Mary Toft always defers to because she has to, because she is the lowest one in that household, lowest and youngest, and not related to anyone by blood, and so she has to do as the others say, each step of the way.
It is a community of women.
One might imagine that such a community of women, where one is never alone, where one shares in all the work and always can rely on an extra pair of hands, could perhaps be cozy and intimate.
It is not cozy and intimate.
Instead, the community of women is fraught and permeated with tensions and hierarchies and privileges, tightly guarded.
Mary Toft has no privileges.
Ann Toft has all the privileges, even in such a household, a household in the town quarters inhabited by the poorest of the poorest.
Her moods and whims rule the household.
Her quality of sleep, levels of hunger, and levels of exhaustion set the tone.
If Ann Toft has an idea, thought, or wish, it is deferred to.
When Ann Toft thinks, wishes or demands something there is nothing else to do but to defer.
And now Ann Toft has linked together things that are usually not linked together.
She has thought outside the box.
Ann Toft has an outlandish idea she wants to make into reality.
And so Ann Toft and her women, bringing with them the rabbit that is a disappointment and unfit to eat, visit Mary Toft in her chamber that night, while Mary Toft is still too weak to rise from bed, to turn Ann Toft’s outlandish idea into reality.
And that night, to Mary Toft, they might as well be witches or torturers.
There is no difference.
The Rabbit Birth
Ann Toft’s sister, the midwife, plays her part well. Ann Toft tells her to call upon the esteemed doctor Mr. Howard, as esteemed a doctor as one can get in the proximity of Godalming. Mr. Howard lives in the town of Guildford. Ann Toft’s sister is to call upon him and, with wide eyes, tell him of strange events.
And to Mary Toft the women say:
‘You only have to do it once. Once is enough.’ They also say:
‘Men are stupid. They are so stupid, they will believe this. Everyone will hear about us. And, if you play your part well, Mary, you might even become rich.’
Ann Toft doesn’t believe the last part. Not really. She is only concerned with sending a message loud and clear.
She is only concerned with having a trump card. Of suddenly having a unique weapon in her hands. Because;
If the poorest of the poorest suddenly find a woman in their midst with the ability to give birth to rabbits;
If the poorest of the poorest suddenly have a resource, an asset, capable of reproducing that most forbidden, most longed for animal, like a miracle;
If the poorest of the poorest suddenly had such an asset, it would spark a revolution.
The wealthy people would lose their heads. Figuratively speaking.
They would lose their heads, because they would have suddenly lost one of their tools of power, just like that.
If one suddenly lost one’s tool of power, just like that, to an opposing side, one would soon be forced to make amends.
To make compromises. To negotiate.
To negotiate, with the poorest of the poorest. To let up, let go, and give way.
To let up, let go, and give way to certain demands, desires, and wishes.
To certain demands, desires, and wishes coming from the poorest of the poorest.
And the poorest of the poorest would suddenly be able to pick and choose.
The poorest of the poorest would suddenly be able to accept and decline.
The poorest of the poorest would be able to negotiate, to demand, to reach agreements, to exercise certain rights.
Certain rights provided by a tool of power, a powerful asset, an asset so powerful it is unheard of.
Historical.
The asset of power is Mary Toft.
The asset of power is Ann Toft’s daughter-in-law.
Ann Toft’s daughter-in-law and her still-open womb after a miscarriage will come in handy now.
Ann Toft is not sentimental regarding those facts. Mary Toft is the lowest of the lowest.
She is the ideal person to use in the way Ann Toft wishes to use her.
To send a message.
A message so loud and clear, it will be impossible to ignore. Even the rich and wealthy will have to listen.
Why, perhaps, even the King!
Ann Toft, and her enlisted women, shiver at the thought. It is a shiver of power and pleasure.
✺
The first rabbit birth doesn’t go as planned. Ann Toft’s sister has yet to return after being sent to fetch Mr. Howard, and Mary is supposed to wait until Mr. Howard arrives. She is supposed to hold things in. But she can’t wait until Mr. Howard arrives and can’t hold things in. She is unable to.
Ann Toft is angry but gathers the parts in a pot. She then hastily calls on a colleague, one Mary Gill. Ann Toft likes to think of her as a colleague. Ann Toft likes to think that because, like her sister, Ann Toft has herself dabbled in midwifery. After twelve children and witnessing several births of neighbouring women, midwifery is a natural thing to dabble in for uneducated women who are very poor. Although Ann Toft never receives papers. She is never recorded anywhere as a midwife. She is an unofficial midwife, from time to time. An informal one, when it suits her.
But Mary Gill is a proper midwife. So, Ann Toft calls on her, so the grand plan won’t fail.
Mary Gill comes and can see Mary Toft is tired and weak. She appears to have just given birth. And then, Ann Toft shows her the pot. She says this is what came away from the daughter-in-law’s body. She says she doesn’t know what to make of it.
Mary Gill doesn’t know what to make of it either. But it looks like parts of a rabbit.
✺
And because the first rabbit birth doesn’t go as planned, and Mr. Howard has still yet to arrive, and Mary Toft can’t wait and can’t hold things in because she is unable to, more women are called upon, more important ones than Mary Gill, to verify that something strange, unheard of and historical is happening.
No one says it’s a rabbit birth. Not yet.
First comes Mrs. Richardson, the silk-stocking-maker’s wife. She stares. She witnesses Mary birth something more, just as strange as the two foreign parts of flesh already in the pot.
And then, Mrs. Mebbin comes, a gentlewoman. Her clothes are fine and her scent is fine. She can’t believe this. Ann Toft, Mary Gill, Elizabeth and Mrs. Richardson all tell her something strange is happening.
No one says it’s a rabbit birth. Not yet.
No one calls Mary Toft a rabbit breeder. Not yet.
Mrs. Mebbin stares at the pot. She stares at Mary. Mary appears to be in pain again. And once again, she can’t wait and she can’t hold things in.
Her body compels her to expel what should not be there.
Mrs. Mebbin comes close. She is not afraid to watch. She is not afraid to get her hands dirty. In fact, she pulls the third rabbit part out herself.
She tosses it in the pot and then she laughs, a great, raw laugh, unlike anything they have ever heard coming from gentlewoman Mrs. Mebbin.
She says:
‘What a joke. What a sick joke.’ And then she leaves.
✺
Mr. Howard comes finally.
Mr. John Howard is a wealthy doctor living in the town of Guildford, a town of fewer social chasms because almost only wealthy people reside there. His life is pleasant enough, more often than not. One might even describe it as quite uneventful. Comfortable and uneventful.
Shortly before being notified of the first rabbit birth, he has been to Godalming to perform a simple procedure on one of its wealthier inhabitants, one High Constable John Chitty. It was a minor surgery on the neck of the man, it went well, and afterwards, Mr. Howard wrote a note so his patient might be temporarily excused from his duties at the local court, until fully healed and functional again. This is the kind of note wealthy people are entitled to when feeling unwell and needing a break from duties that are not physically demanding.
Mr. John Howard has a wife and three children. He owns several books, a small but neat collection of surgical instruments, and even a silver-hilted sword and two pistols. He has things to be proud of, both in life and in possessions.
When one of the ragged Toft women comes clapping at his door, he first thinks it is about an ordinary birth.
She is out of breath and she says it is urgent. She says something strange and unheard of is happening.
Mr. Howard is unwilling at first. He has trouble taking it seriously. And when he realizes the woman in question is a poor woman, the poorest of the poorest, coming all the way from Godalming, he is mystified. He is mystified by the fact that anyone like her would call upon him instead of taking the help of local women or one’s mother-in-law who occasionally dabbles in midwifery.
He says:
‘Ma’am, I strongly doubt you will be able to afford me.’
But Ann Toft’s sister insists. She has to find some way to compel him. She has to set the grand plan in motion, the grand, crazy, desperate plan conjured up by Ann Toft, Ann Toft whom everyone is afraid of.
So, in the end she says:
‘She has given birth to something foreign. We have never seen anything like it. And there is more to come.’
And that is when Mr. Howard feels compelled to come, free of charge.
✺
Mr. Howard arrives. He takes one look at Mary. He takes one look in the pot. And then he says he hopes everyone is joking.
He is becoming quite indignant.
He suddenly finds himself in a situation where one might believe that he has been subjected to a practical joke.
One might believe Mr. Howard, esteemed doctor, an educated man, is having his nose pulled, by several poor, uneducated women.
Mr. Howard can’t abide practical jokes or having his nose pulled.
He is indignant, he is preparing to tell everyone in the room off, in fact, he will scold them in such a loud voice everyone’s ears will ring afterwards, he will unleash the wrath of a slighted educated man on them, all of it.
But just as he is about to do it, to tell them off properly, to tell them off once and for all, Mary Toft appears to be in pain.
Mr. Howard reins in the rage. He tucks it away. He lets the indignant thoughts fold in upon themselves and fall away. He approaches Mary’s bed. He pulls away any sheets protecting modesty.
And so, he witnesses Mary Toft give birth to a rabbit part, a fourth one. Mr. Howard can’t believe it. And seeing that she is not done yet, and because he can’t believe it, he can’t wait and pulls the next part out himself, the fifth one.
There are five rabbit parts, now.
The women want him to put them in the pot but he refuses. He stares at the two rabbit parts he just witnessed being born, for a long time. He then stares at the pot.
He looks at the woman, young, quiet and subdued. She seems sad and sullen. Her face is mute. She soon turns away, as if wishing to turn her back on everyone. He looks at the other women, poor, old, coarse. Their faces rough and tough.
The atmosphere in the room is tense.
There is a tremendous amount of tension in the room. And then, Mr. Howard realizes this can’t be real.
He realizes right away the older women are behind it, all the women, much older than the one in the bed.
Mr. Howard leads a comfortable life. Despite his profession, it is uneventful, more often than not.
Sometimes Mr. Howard’s life is even boring. He is sometimes prone to ennui, even melancholy.
Yes, some days, he can feel a bout of melancholy.
Some days, when no one calls upon him, when he is allowed some time of leisure, at times considerable time of leisure, when he can smoke his pipe, peruse books, and think several thoughts, quite undisturbed by his wife and children because the wife and children respect his need for privacy and need for time alone —
On days like that, despite everything, he is seized by a bout of melancholy.
And while having that bout of melancholy he regards the room, he regards his books, his garden, all fine things, and he thinks:
Is this all there is? Is this all there is to life? And:
Is this how life will always be, from now on?
The women around Mary Toft don’t know the esteemed doctor Mr. John Howard has thoughts like these from time to time. They only know he is an esteemed doctor in the town of Guildford, a town where almost only wealthy people live, and he is the only esteemed doctor they know of, thus making him especially important.
Mr. John Howard being the only esteemed doctor the women around Mary Toft have heard of or know of gives him unfair advantage.
They don’t know Mr. Howard has bouts of melancholy, they don’t know that he sometimes wonders if there really isn’t more to life, they don’t know he has a pale fire in his soul, a pale fire that longs to grow strong, mighty, and hot, to be noticed —
They don’t know all this, and so they don’t know Mr. Howard is the perfect accomplice.
And they don’t know Mr. Howard will soon take matters into his own hands.
They don’t know he soon will upend the grand plan and take it in another direction altogether, a direction to suit his own grand plans.
They don’t know all this.
They are just thrilled the esteemed doctor has come to their doorstep, their poor, sorry, dirty doorstep.
They are thrilled the esteemed doctor will now witness and verify the strange miracle, giving it utmost credibility.
They don’t know the learned men are eager to discover the truth, to show it to the world and take credit for that discovered truth. Lots of credit.
Because despite everything, the women around Mary Toft are not stupid. They were not born yesterday. They know that women like them have no credibility whatsoever. They are poor. They have no names, at least not names anyone can be bothered to remember, because all their names sound the same. There are many Anns, Elizabeths, and Marys. Tons of them. There are Tofts and Finches and Gills. As if the people naming them had no imagination at all. As if the people naming them used the first thing they heard or saw. So people can’t be bothered with remembering names like that. Not really.
And the women around Mary Toft know this.
They know that, to pull the grand plan off, for this case to be believed, fine clothes, fine voices, and fine eyes are needed.
They don’t yet know that fine clothes and fine voices and fine eyes will not be enough.
Fine hands will be required also. The finest. Several of them.
So many of them that Mary Toft in the end will never want to be touched again, never again, not in any way, for the rest of her life.
The women around Mary Toft don’t realize this, because to them, in their poor surroundings, birth and anything relating to it is still a female affair.
They have never heard of a man-midwife.
A man-midwife sounds like a contradiction. A paradox. It sounds ridiculous.
Birth is a female affair.
They don’t think all the stupid men who will believe this will want to touch Mary Toft.
They don’t know something called the advent of empirical science is happening.
They don’t know that a lot of men who call themselves learned and are not stupid at all are frightfully invested in this advent of empirical science.
They don’t know these men are frightfully eager to show the whole world why empirical science is the only path leading to truth.
The true truth. The only truth.
They don’t know that these men, who call themselves learned and are in possession of fine clothes, fine voices, fine eyes, and fine hands can’t abide mystery and superstition and bullshit involving female bodies, female events, and the realms of babes and the enigma of life.
They don’t know these men wish to shed light on it all, to expose it, to discover the truth and then go on to show the world that discovered truth, to show the world, once and for all.
They don’t know the learned men are eager to discover the truth, to show it to the world and take credit for that discovered truth. Lots of credit.
The women around Mary Toft don’t know all this.
They just know that Mr. Howard is an esteemed doctor. The only esteemed doctor they know of.
An esteemed doctor with fine clothes, a fine voice, and fine eyes that will get the rumour machine working. The big one.
That is their hope.
A rumour machine the whole country will listen to. Those are the thoughts.
A rumour machine that will transport the message, loud and clear, even from poor women, the poorest of the poorest, who can neither read nor write.
A message that will allow them to negotiate. A message that will allow them to bargain. To create terms and conditions.
For the first time in their lives, they will be allowed to create terms and conditions. To say:
No, not that. We would like this instead. To say:
This is what we want. Take it or leave it.
Those are the thoughts involved in Ann Toft and the other women’s most ardent dreams and wishes.
A dream and a wish also known as the strong compulsion to want to influence and direct things in one’s own life. And, in eighteenth-century England, one’s own life was intimately linked with the life of one’s community.
To shape one’s own life and the life of one’s community. To make that life more tolerable, at the very least.
✺
And now, they hold their breaths in the room. They wait for Mr. Howard’s reaction.
His response.
Everyone holds their breaths in the room, everyone except Mary, quiet and subdued.
In the end, after a long silence, and a lot of thoughts, and a pale fire that is now suddenly gaining momentum, less pale now, almost strong, Mr. Howard says:
‘I have never seen anything like it. This is unheard of. This is historical.’
This text was excerpted from Mary and the Rabbit Dream (Coach House Books, September 2024)
✺ Published in “Issue 19: Fiction” of The Dial
