Mason & Dixon

by Thomas Pynchon

Every young woman for miles around would be there, although Mason adopted a more Scientifick motive, that of wishing to see at first hand, a much-rumored Prodigy, styled “The Octuple Gloucester,”— a giant Cheese, the largest known in the Region, perhaps in the Kingdom. Some considered it an example of Reason run amok,— an unreflective Vicar, worshiping at the wrong Altar, having convinced local Cheesemen to pool their efforts in accomplishing the feat. Scaled up from the dimensions of the classic Single Gloucester, not only in Thickness, but actually octupled in all dimensions, making it more like a 512-fold or Quincentenariduodecuple Gloucester,— running to nearly four tons in weight when green, and even after shrinkage towering ten feet high by the time it emerged from the giant Shed built at the outskirts of town especially for this unprecedented Caseifaction,— the extraordinary Cheese, as it slowly aged, had already provided material for months of public Rumor.