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Voyager © Diana Gabaldon 1994

Chapter 50

I Meet a Priest

Attached to two empty casks, Claire finds herself in warm seas with the shadow of Hispaniola in the distance. Lulled to sleep by the pull of the sea, Claire drifts towards the coast, and when she wakes she is safely ashore amid some ugly vegetation, which she assumes to be mangoes. Walking is difficult but Claire realises that she must make her way further into the island, she finds the going tough without water to drink. Finally, and utterly exhausted Claire sleeps, and when she wakes she is shocked to see a man staring back at her. Speaking in French the man asks Claire who she is, and seems as surprised as she is when she introduces herself as a doctor, and asks for water.
The man introduces himself as Lawrence Stern, a naturalist who is making observations on the flora and fauna of the island. Claire seeks his help in finding her way to Jamaica, but first Lawrence Stern offers Claire food, water and dry clothes.
At the top of a hill stands the ruin of a house - “Hacienda de la Fuente”, which is habited by an English priest who Claire likens to St. Francis of Assisi, but who is introduced as Father Fogden, an eccentric character who lives with his sheep, his housekeeper Mamacita and his dog, Ludo. Father Fogden is shocked to discover that Claire is an English woman, but offers her hospitality and eccentric conversation, which ranges from discussion of the flora and fauna of the island, through to Father Fogden’s dismay at the loss of one of his beloved ewes, Arabella, who has been killed and eaten by a group of sailors only that morning.
Claire is entrusted to Mamacita’s care and whilst wary of her attitude, Claire gratefully accepts clean clothing, Father Fogden’s spare robe is better than nothing. Later, finding Father Fogden somewhat the worse for drink, Claire continues her discussion with Lawrence Stern- she is amazed when he asks her if she knows a “Jamie Fraser from Edinburgh”. Admitting that Jamie is her husband, Stern continues with his story of how he met Jamie at a drinking establishment, and rescued a female employee from a large spider –he and Jamie had gone on to have a discussion about spiders and caves. Stern then goes on to explain that there are caves in Hispaniola, and in particular one cave called Abandawe, which is treated with suspicion by the local inhabitants. Superstitious tales are rife with stories of pirates, and wickedness. The story of Mamacita and Father Fogden is no less strange and continues to perpetrate strange fears which keep the villagers away.
After breakfast the next morning Claire questions Father Fogden about the ship he saw recently, she wants to avoid the Porpoise, but is astonished when Father Fogden tells her that the boat is still ashore. Taking her though the undergrowth, Claire wonders if what Father Fogden has said is true but is mightily relieved to see an actual ship, which turns out to be the Artemis –
Seeing Murphy – Claire overjoyed runs towards the shore, and sees Fergus, who is very pleased to see her. Unfortunately the Artemis has suffered some bad luck in a storm, Captain Raines is dead.
Asking after Jamie –Claire is dismayed to hear that he is not with Fergus – and Fergus is equally dismayed to find that Jamie is not with Claire-

“Where is he?”
Fergus shook his head slowly back and forth, like an ox stunned by the slaughterers blow.
“I don’t know”


What do you make of:
• Lawrence Stern
• Father Fogden
• Mamacita, and the story of Ermenegilda
• The superstition surrounding the cave at Abandawe, and the island of Tortuga


Share your thoughts on this strange chapter.

This really is a strange chapter!

Father Fogden is quite a quirky character. Mamacita is pretty creepy.

I like Lawrence Stern and enjoy his fascination with the animals and plants.

And, I thought it was very funny when Claire was so excited to see Murphy that she knocked him over and ended up on top of him until Fergus pulled her off.

A couple of really big coincidences in this chapter:
- Running into Lawrence Stern who had met Jamie in Edinburgh; Jamie mentioned him in an earlier chapter (was it after Ian was confessing and Jamie saw a web in a tree?)
- Having the Artemis beached so close by on the same day Claire arrived in the area. I thought the Porpoise was expected to arrive quite a lot faster than the Artemis, so how did the smaller ship end up there so quickly?

I love DG and these books, but I thought both of these in the same chapter pushed the bounds of belief a bit far. It's one of the things that makes Voyager not one of my favorite books in the series. Which is not to say I don't enjoy a lot of the book, just not as much as some of the others in the series.

Sassenach, I must offer that the vegetation was mangroves, which have a dense network of roots growing out of the water and making travel difficult. Mangoes might have offered the possibility of food for Claire. Sorry.

ABL, I appreciate what you say about the story moving at an unbelievable pace in this chapter. I think that the explanation is that the storm caught the Artemis first and hurled it for a further distance and at a faster pace toward Hispaniola. Maybe because the Porpoise had a broken main mast, it was driven beyond the island and no longer a danger to our fearless crew.

I have wondered about the appearance and reappearance of a number of characters. The justification in my mind is that the world population was much smaller then and the population of noblemen, adventurers, and scientists was even smaller. So, maybe? Yes, Lawrence Stern gave a presentation on arachnids at Edinburgh and met up with Jamie in a brothel. Jamie told Claire about the meeting when he was explaining about spider webs while waiting for young Ian to finish his confession. The webs allowed him to avoid a sticky situation.

Fair to say that Mamacita has gone over the edge with the scandalous departure of her daughter from a marriage in high society and her subsequent death. You would expect that she would hold these events against Father Fogden? Yet, she seems to serve him faithfully while maintaining the memory of her daughter.

BTW - Father Fogden makes his escape from Habana / Havana, Cuba due to a fortuitous attack by the English. This was an historical event and relates to the Lord John adventures. Details would be a spoiler here, I think.

This chapter seems to be full of background information!

I must say that I find Father Fogden to be quite the hilarious character, especially when he is talking about his sheep!!! Poor Arabella!

This was one of the chapters that I wanted to hurry through so that Claire could get back to Jamie!

Does anyone else wonder if we will see Lawrence Stern again? (Oops...can't talk about that here!) How coincidental that Claire just happens to run into an acquaintance of Jamie (Stern) who rescues her. I agree ABL that it was just a bit contrived, and I, too, had trouble keeping all of the ships straight!

Repoman, I wondered why Mamacita stayed with Father Fogden, as well. Maybe she had nowhere else to go. She certainly did not seem terribly happy about being there though, as you mentioned, she does seem to serve Father Fogden faithfully. She was just plain rude to Claire.

Trudy, I think Mamacita's only grip on the world is her daughter's room and clothes (which makes you wonder about her reaction in the near future!). Serving Father Fogden is serving Ermen what-ever-her-name-is?? She does not limit her rudeness to Claire, Notice that she calls Lawrence "the Christ Killer".

Yes, Father Fogden's flock is an interesting play on the usual flock of a clergyman. And Arabella is much beloved because she was a good grazer?

This chapter was a very humorous respite from Claire's troubles on the Porpoise, survival in the swamp and with the storm, and her concern for Jamie.

I agree that the coincidence of meeting Lawrence Stern, who just happens to know Jamie, is a bit of a stretch. However, my slight annoyance over this was more than outweighed by two different pieces in this chapter that just cracked me up:

- Father Fogden, pot smoker! Claire's description of feeling like she was back at a '60s faculty party, as well as the description of the priest's red eyes and the conversation about "hemp" being good for digestion -- just hilarious.
- Stern's description of the scene in the brothel, and Claire checking to make sure that Jamie actually had clothes on, was really priceless.

I love the passion and drama of these books, but in some ways it's these little, humorous touches that make me so devoted to the series.

I think that this is my least favourite chapter in the whole series and even after trying to summarise it - not easy to make sense of it all, maybe we don't need too...LOL
However, I still fell that parts of it were contrived to make the story "fit"......Claire needed a rescuer and she needed a ship - in this case I think Herself had to do some pretty quick thinking to get the Artemis stuck aground with the Porpoise nowhere in sight.....and she had to find a plausible rescuer....hence Lawrence Stern

But I love her writing and forgive her foibles !!

Repoman - thanks for clarifying the mango grove - having never seen mangoes other than in the supermarket I can't visualise what they look like in the wild...

Reading your posts and thinking about this chapter, it almost feels like DG had a short story (or something) in mind there with Father Fogden and Mamacita and the sheep and possibly Lawrence Stern, but ended up tossing it into Voyager in this chapter (well I know Father Fogden will play an important role coming up too). Or something like that. And, then had to tie it in with everything else to make the broader Voyager story work. Well, whatever. I too will forgive her foibles because I love the series in spite of these little blips.

I also agree with what everyone else has written. Love the humor in the series. Thanks for the history lesson in the spoiler thread, repoman. It was a bit complicated, but interesting. Loved the reference to the sheep as his flock. Poor Arabella.

About the mango groves. Having spent a bit of time on St Croix I had some problem with Claire wandering around in a mango grove. These trees grow right up and into the sea. They grow knees that come up from the water. They would be like walking through spikes to get to the actual shore. The actual land could be a ways away. It would not be something you could do without a lot of protection. If you were in them and there was much wave action, you would likely need medical attention. Taking a sea kayak through a grove is not easy. I had to put on my belief suspenders for these couple of chapters. What is with the weird little fish she saw with multiple eyes? I dive so I know what else likely lives in such places. I would not want to be wandering around in my bare feet!

Sassenach, this couldn't have been an easy chapter to summarize! It's been a fun discussion, though!!!

Repoman, good point about Mamacita - she was probably just clinging to whatever she could to keep her daughter's memory alive. I had forgotten about her slur of Lawrence. She certainly wasn't afraid to say what she thought. Very nice about the "flock of a clergyman"- I guess since Father Fogden had been defrocked they were the only ones he could shepherd! A bit sad, but hilarious nonetheless!

Father Fogden and the hemp issue!

I think seeing all these strange things from Claire's point of view made it even funnier!

I'll have to read this chapter again with a kinder eye. I've only just finished reading Voyager this weekend, and this chapter in particular struck me as bizarre and strained my emotional connection with the book, if that makes ANY sense at all.

Interesting perspective on the mango grove and sea life. I didn't give it a second thought when I read about her walking through them.

As far as meeting Stern, DG admits that she writes chapters without thought of flow and then pieces them together into a cohesive story. She could have written this one first, then the one with Jamie and Claire having a conversation outside the church and decided to thread Lawrence Stern into one or both chapters.

I like these offbeat characters like Fr. Fogden and Mamacita especially from Claire's POV. It always makes her look like Alice in Wonderland.

I like that thought. This chapter makes the book (for me) more of a fantasy adventure than a historical fiction.