The mystery on board the San Dominick slave ship grows as Delano witnesses the unaccountable unease of the sailors on board. Reflecting upon the tense atmosphere of secrecy and conspiracy on the ship in the course of describing a young Spanish sailor, the narrator alludes to the Freemasons, a fraternal organization:
In act of stooping over to spring inboard to the deck, his voluminous, unconfined frock, or shirt, of coarse woollen, much spotted with tar, opened out far down the chest, revealing a soiled under garment of what seemed the finest linen, edged, about the neck, with a narrow blue ribbon, sadly faded and worn. At this moment the young sailor’s eye was again fixed on the whisperers, and Captain Delano thought he observed a lurking significance in it, as if silent signs of some Freemason sort had that instant been interchanged.
Subtle but important clues suggest to Delano that things onboard the Spanish ship are not as they appear. He observes a “young Spanish sailor” who wears beneath his “coarse woolen” shirt a “soiled under garment” made of “what seemed the finest linen,” including lining in blue silk. Delano cannot account for the mismatch between the sailor’s coarse uniform and his fine, expensive underclothes. This same man, Delano notes, is closely observing Benito Cereno as he whispers with Babo and other enslaved individuals, and he feels that there is a “lurking significance” in this gesture, as if he were transmitting “silent signs of some Freemason sort.” Here, Delano alludes to the Freemasons, a fraternal organization that was the subject of many conspiracy theories in early American history due to its secretive nature. His allusion to the Freemasons, then, contributes to the growing sense of secrecy and deception on the ship.
As Delano becomes increasingly suspicious of the situation aboard the San Dominick, he begins to question the story reported to him by Captain Cereno. Reflecting on the mystery of the Spanish captain’s identity, Delano alludes to the Rothschild family, the richest family in the world in the 19th century:
Benito Cereno—Don Benito Cereno—a sounding name. One, too, at that period, not unknown, in the surname, to supercargoes and sea captains trading along the Spanish Main, as belonging to one of the most enterprising and extensive mercantile families in all those provinces; several members of it having titles; a sort of Castilian Rothschild, with a noble brother, or cousin, in every great trading town of South America. The alleged Don Benito was in early manhood, about twenty-nine or thirty. To assume a sort of roving cadetship in the maritime affairs of such a house, what more likely scheme for a young knave of talent and spirit?
Delano wonders if Benito Cereno is truly who he claims to be. The Cerenos, he muses, are a prominent and well-known family from Spain who have made a vast fortune on trade to and from Latin America. They are, he notes, “one of the most enterprising and extensive mercantile families in these provinces,” and even “a sort of Castlilian Rothschild.” Here, Delano alludes to the Rothschilds, a socially and politically prominent banking family in Europe that held, in the 19th century, the largest personal fortune in the world. Though Cereno claims to come from a prestigious and well-respected family, Delano begins to doubt his paternity.
A prominent motif in Benito Cereno is the use of language and imagery drawn from Catholicism and, more specifically, from monasteries and monks. In the predominantly Protestant New England of Melville’s time, these references to Catholicism would highlight the exotic nature of Spain’s colonies in Latin America. These many references to Catholicism also reflect the influence of gothic literature on Melville’s novella, as many gothic novels are set in Catholic environments such as ruined churches and old monasteries. When Captain Delano first observes the Spanish Captain Cereno, he uses language associated with Catholicism:
His mind appeared unstrung, if not still more seriously affected. Shut up in these oaken walls, chained to one dull round of command, whose unconditionality cloyed him, like some hypochondriac abbot he moved slowly about, at times suddenly pausing, starting, or staring, biting his lip, biting his finger-nail, flushing, paling, twitching his beard, with other symptoms of an absent or moody mind.
An abbott is the head of a Catholic monastery. Here, Delano imagines the Spanish captain as a “hypochondriac abbott” who shuffles around a monastery nervously. In Protestant writings of the time, Catholic monasteries are often described as prisons. Here, Delano characterizes Cereno as being “shut up in these oaken walls” in the manner of a monk who is “trapped” in the monastery and forbidden to leave. Elsewhere in the story, he again compares Cereno to a monk-like figure:
His manner upon such occasions was, in its degree, not unlike that which might be supposed to have been his imperial countryman’s, Charles V., just previous to the anchoritish retirement of that monarch from the throne.
First, he compares Cereno to the Spanish King Charles V, who abdicated the throne and then joined a monastery. He describes the King, and Cereno, as “anchoritish,” alluding to the figure of the “anchorite,” a religious recluse largely associated with Catholic monasticism. These various allusions to the Catholic faith foreground the “exotic” Spanish setting of the story but also emphasize the gothic, otherworldy mystery on board the Spanish ship.
