Quicksilver Reading CompanionDaniel Waterhouse observes the chaotic final days of the Stuart Restoration as the court gathers for the death of a king and the uncertain succession of his Catholic brother.
“the previous twelve years” — Stephenson’s annotation: “The account of English history 1673-1685 given in this and following pages is faithful in its general outlines to what really happened, but many of the names mentioned, viz., Daniel Waterhouse, John Comstock, Thomas More Anglesey, Knott and Gomer Bolstrood, Upnor, Sheerness, Roger Comstock and Sir Richard Apthorp, are fictional characters. Events such as the Popish Plot, the urban renewal project around St. James’s and Piccadilly, Exclusion, the founding of the Whigs, etc. really happened.”
“watching King Charles II die at Whitehall Palace” — The death of Charles II in February 1685 was a pivotal moment in English history, ending a reign defined by religious tension and scientific advancement while triggering a crisis over his Catholic successor.
“pursuing his quest for the Philosophic Mercury” — In alchemy, Philosophic Mercury was the essential, “living” essence of elemental mercury believed to be the key to the Philosopher’s Stone and the transmutation of base metals into gold.
“occult studies of the Book of Revelation and the Temple of Solomon” — Isaac Newton spent more time on apocalypticism and biblical chronology than on physics, believing the dimensions of Solomon’s Temple contained a mathematical blueprint of the universe.
“attempted to indict Nell Gwyn as a prostitute” — Nell Gwyn was a celebrated actress and the most beloved mistress of Charles II; as a “Protestant whore,” she was a popular folk hero compared to the King’s Catholic French mistresses. Stephenson’s annotation: “In real life Shaftesbury was a member of Charles II’s CABAL who eventually got on the King’s wrong side and indicted Nell Gwyn and fled to Holland where he died. All of these things are also said of Knott Bolstrood in the book.”
“commenced hanging Catholics for being part of a supposed Popish Plot” — The Popish Plot was a fabricated conspiracy cooked up by Titus Oates in 1678, alleging a Jesuit plan to murder the King, which triggered a national wave of anti-Catholic executions.
“the Spanish Netherlands” — This Hapsburg-controlled territory, roughly modern-day Belgium, served as a perpetual Spanish Netherlands buffer zone and battlefield between the expansionist France of Louis XIV and the Dutch Republic.
“William of Orange” — The Dutch Stadtholder and nephew of James II, William III was the primary defender of Protestantism in Europe and would eventually seize the English throne in the Glorious Revolution.
“the Duke of Monmouth (who was Protestant) had been encouraged to parade around” — As the eldest illegitimate son of Charles II, Monmouth became the figurehead for those who wanted a Protestant heir instead of the King’s Catholic brother.
“exclude James (and every other Catholic) from the throne” — The Exclusion Crisis (1679–1681) was a bitter political struggle where Parliament attempted to pass legislation legally barring James from the succession.
“whipped up by Sir Roger L’Estrange” — A fierce Tory pamphleteer and press censor, Roger L’Estrange used his office to harass Whig printers and discredit the witnesses of the Popish Plot.
“these Whigs (as L’Estrange libelled them) had voted for Exclusion” — The terms Whigs and Tories originated as insults during this era; the Whig Party favored parliamentary supremacy and the exclusion of Catholic monarchs.
“involved in a Rye House Plot to put Monmouth on the throne” — The Rye House Plot was a 1683 Whig conspiracy to ambush and assassinate Charles II and James; its failure led to the execution of several high-ranking opposition leaders.
“Thirteen hundred Quakers, Barkers, and other Dissenters” — Dissenters were Protestants, such as Quakers, who refused to follow the Church of England’s liturgy and faced heavy fines or imprisonment under the Restoration’s “Clarendon Code.”
“brevis demonstratio erroris craig” — From the original wiki (stuntz): “Brevis Demonstratio Erroris Memorabilis Cartesii et Aliorum Circa Legem Naturae (“Brief Demonstration of the Memorable Error of Descartes and Others About the Law of Nature”) - Leibniz’s first public challenge to Cartesian mechanics.
Encyclopædia Britannica: … Leibniz’ noted Meditationes de Cognitione, Veritate et Ideis (Reflections on Knowledge, Truth, and Ideas) appeared at this time and defined his theory of knowledge: things are not seen in God as Nicolas Malebranche suggested but rather there is an analogy, a strict relation, between God’s ideas and man’s, an identity between God…”
“the boat that carried the chirurgeons” — In the 17th century, chirurgeons (surgeons) were considered manual craftsmen—often associated with barbers—and were distinct from the university-educated physicians who diagnosed internal ailments.
“the night in 1670 when he’d come to Whitehall in Pepys’s carriage” — Naval administrator Samuel Pepys kept a shorthand diary that remains the most vital primary source for the daily life, scandals, and politics of Restoration London.
“the only witness had been Cromwell’s severed head” — After the monarchy was restored, the body of Oliver Cromwell was exhumed and posthumously executed; his head was displayed on a spike at Westminster Hall for over twenty years.
“Whitehall Palace was, in the end, a House: the house of a Family” — The primary residence of the monarchs, Whitehall Palace was a massive, sprawling labyrinth of over 1,500 rooms before it was destroyed by fire in 1698.
“the subject of Humours. It all began with an apoplectical fit” — Humorism was the prevailing medical theory that health depended on the balance of four fluids: blood, phlegm, yellow bile, and black bile.
“the Doctor found a vein—the King bade farewell to a pint or two” — Bloodletting was the standard treatment to reduce an “excess” of the blood humor; Charles II was subjected to massive blood loss and cupping during his final illness, likely hastening his death.
“my full authority as Secretary of the Royal Society” — Founded in 1660, the Royal Society was the world’s first formal scientific institution, dedicated to “experimental philosophy” and the rejection of ancient dogma.
“diagnosed a fever. They gave him a royal dose of the Elixir Proprietalis LeFebure.” — The Elixir Proprietalis was a famous alchemical medicine made of myrrh, aloes, and saffron; the “LeFebure” version was prepared by the King’s own chemist, Nicaise Le Febure.
“Enoch Root made phosphorus from horse urine?” — The discovery of phosphorus occurred in 1669 when Hennig Brand boiled down vast quantities of urine; the resulting substance’s eerie glow made it a sensation among natural philosophers.
“Hooke, or maybe Leibniz.” — Robert Hooke was the brilliant, cantankerous curator of experiments for the Royal Society, while Gottfried Wilhelm von Leibniz was his German counterpart who co-invented calculus.
“Recently Leibniz has been refining his system of metaphysics” — Leibniz developed the Monadology, a theory that the universe is composed of infinite, simple substances called “monads,” each reflecting the entire cosmos from its own perspective.
“Hooke peering through his Microscope or Newton through his Reflecting Telescope” — These scientific instruments transformed the era; Hooke’s microscope revealed the cellular world, while Newton’s telescope used mirrors to avoid the color distortion of glass lenses.
“Dr. Leibniz has been saying some very rude things about Descartes lately” — Leibniz’s 1686 paper, Brevis Demonstratio, was a direct attack on the physics of René Descartes, arguing that Descartes had miscalculated the laws of motion and force.
“between Jesuits on the one hand, and Puritans on t’other” — The religious conflict in England pitted the Jesuits, feared as agents of Catholic absolutism, against the Puritans, who sought to strip the church of all “popish” ritual.
“directly beneath where Charles I had had his head lopped off” — Charles I was executed in 1649 on a scaffold built outside the Banqueting House at Whitehall, an event that traumatized the nation and led to the temporary abolition of the monarchy.
“fled over the sea to Geneva, which was a hornets’ nest of Calvinists” — During the reign of “Bloody” Mary I, Protestant exiles fled to Geneva to study Calvinism, returning later to form the radical backbone of the English Reformation.
“Devil’s Wind that had swept over England on the day Cromwell had died” — The Great Storm of 1658 coincided with Cromwell’s death; Royalists claimed the devil had come for his soul, while supporters saw it as nature mourning a great leader.
“feversham” — Stephenson’s annotation: “Feversham is real; he is too strange a character to invent.”
“John Churchill’s regiment of Guards” — John Churchill, the future Duke of Marlborough, was a brilliant soldier who began his career as a favorite of James II before eventually betraying him for William of Orange.
“Syphilis, Sive Morbvs Gallicvs” — This syphilis poem by Girolamo Fracastoro was translated by Nahum Tate in 1686; it famously gave the “French disease” its modern name.
“The Natural Philosopher who has been so impertinent as to quarrel with the King in the matter of Father Francis” — The Father Francis Affair was a 1687 standoff where Newton led Cambridge University in refusing the King’s demand to grant a degree to a Catholic monk.
“Elizabeth (the Winter Queen)” — Elizabeth Stuart was the daughter of James I; her brief reign in Bohemia and her Protestant descendants provided the genealogical link for the future Hanoverian succession.
“flooding half of Holland to keep the French out” — During the “Year of Disaster” (1672), the Dutch utilized the Water Line, a series of intentional dike breaches that turned the heart of Holland into an island to stop the French army.
“Freedom of Conscience is the King’s byword” — James II issued the Declaration of Indulgence to grant freedom of conscience to Catholics and Dissenters, though many suspected it was a ruse to eventually re-establish Catholicism.
“It was Jeffreys. His beautiful eyes, now trapped in a bloated and ruddy face” — Judge Jeffreys was the infamous “Hanging Judge” who presided over the Bloody Assizes, executing hundreds of rebels with legendary cruelty.
“Mary Beatrice d’Este, a.k.a. Mary of Modena” — The second wife of James II, Mary of Modena was a devout Catholic whose eventual birth of a male heir triggered the revolution that toppled the Stuart dynasty.
“working his way through the closing stanzas of the rite of extreme unction” — Extreme unction is the Catholic sacrament for the dying; Charles II’s secret deathbed conversion to Catholicism was a final, shocking act of defiance against his Protestant subjects.
Original annotations by: stephenson, stuntz, quillman