Liberty & Property

Pox Party pgs.240-308

We see just before this section begins that Octavian has run away from Mr. Gitney and is on the loose; there is a poster out that details his character and states that there will be a reward if the boy is returned. Following this is a series of letters mainly between Private Goring and a few others, but mostly in the words of Private Goring.  These letters detail what is going on around the battlefield and Goring specifies an acquaintance of his named Prince, which to be honest took me quite a few letters worth of reading to figure out.

One of my questions that is unclear is which side is Prince (Octavian) on?  I know that the book is titled “Traitor to the Nation,” however I took it as him fighting on the side of the Patriots. So is he going to go on to be a traitor? That part was unclear to me. 

Something interesting to me is how they lured in Octavian at the end of this section of the book.  He had been playing his music for Goring and others in his camp and word soon spread that there was a boy who could play music, and not only simple tunes but famous European tunes that were much more complicated.  Since word traveled fast,  Mr.Turner asked Private Goring about his friend and told him that he would like his friend to come play in a band inside the City Walls. This all happened to be a set up and on page 304 Mr. Sharpe reveals in a letter that, “…I report the return of the fugitive slave-boy Octavian Gitney to the fold of the Novanglian College of Lucidity.” It was all a rouse to get Octavian back to Gitney’s.

Just before this Goring recalls an interaction with Prince and says, “…for the first time… he smiled upon me; for he has finally found his Cause & his Work.” (294). Just before Octavian had been returned he finally showed some emotion, which makes his return all the more melancholy. So, finally I raise the question… Why go through all this trouble for the return of one “slave-boy”?

Kelly R's post, posted by Dr. Renzi on her behalf