CHAPTER XXIV
The Staff of Life in Scotland. – Money is round and flat. – Cheap Restaurants. – Democratic Bill of Fare. – Caution to the Public.– "Parritch!" —The Secret of Scotland's Success. – The National Drink of Scotland. – Scotch and Irish Whiskies. – Whisky a very slow Poison. – Dean Ramsay's best Anecdote.
In Scotland, the staff of life is porridge, pronounced parritch by the natives.
Porridge is served at breakfast in every Scotch home, from the castle to the cottage. It is the first dish at breakfast, or the only one, according to the income.
Porridge is a food which satisfies and strengthens, and which, it seems, is rich in bone-forming matter.
Many a brave young Scotch undergraduate, with rubicund face and meagre purse, breakfasts off a plate of porridge which he prepares for himself, while ces messieurs of Oxford breakfast like princes.
I saw a labourer near Dumfries, who, on his wages of twelve shillings a week, was bringing up a family of eight children, all of them robust and radiant with health, thanks to porridge. The eldest, a fine fellow of eighteen, had carried off a scholarship at Aberdeen University. In England, no professional career would have been open to him.
Few of the lower class English people will condescend to eat porridge; they will have animal food twice a day, if they can get it, and beer or other stimulants. Twenty years of prosperity and high wages have spoiled, ruined the working class in England. Now wages have fallen, or rather work has become scarce, and these people, who never thought of saving anything in the days of their splendour, are plenty of them lacking bread. They are not cured for all that. If you offered them porridge, they would feel insulted. "It is workhouse food," they will tell you.
When the Scotch maidservant receives her wages, she goes and puts part in the Savings Bank, like the French bonne of the provinces. When the English servant takes up hers, she straightway goes and buys a new hat to get photographed in it. Money burns her pockets.
Money is round, say the English, it was meant to roll; money is flat, say the Scotch and the Normans, it was meant to be piled up.
When he is in work, the workman of London, Manchester, Liverpool, Birmingham, will spend three or four shillings a day on his keep; when he is out of work, he stands about the tavern-door and whines for help.
I visited one day, in Aberdeen, a restaurant where a copious repast was being served for the modest sum of two pence a head. The room was full of healthy-looking workmen, tidily dressed and busily doing honour to the porridge and other items on the menu.
The bill of fare for the week was posted up at the door. Here is a copy of it:
"Monday– Porridge, sausage and potato.
"Tuesday– Scotch broth, beef pie.
"Wednesday– Peasoup and ham.
"Thursday– Porridge, sausage and potato.
"Friday– Fish and potato.
"Saturday– Porridge, sausage and potato."
A trifle monotonous, perhaps, this bill of fare, I own; but, at all events, you will admit that for twopence the Aberdeen workman can have a good square meal.
What would the Parisians have given for this fare during the siege!
On the walls, I observed the following notice:
"The public are respectfully requested to pay in advance, so as to avoid mistakes."
"To avoid mistakes!" Thoroughly Scotch this little caution!
I had always seen porridge eaten before the other food. So seeing a worthy fellow ask that his porridge might be brought to him after his sausage and potato, I made bold to ask him the explanation of it.
"Do you take your porridge after your meat?" I enquired.
"Ay, mon," he replied, "it's to chock up the chinks."
Ask a Scotch rustic what he takes for breakfast, and he will answer proudly:
"Parritch, mon!"
And for dinner?
"Parrritch!!"
And for supper?
"Parrrritch!!!"
If he took a fourth meal, he would roll in another r; it is his way of expressing his sentiments.
I like people who roll their r's: there is backbone in them.
Robert Burns, who has sung of the haggis and the whisky of his native land, has only made indirect mention of porridge. He ought to have consecrated to it an ode in several cantos.
Porridge! it is the secret of the Scot's success. Try to compete with a man who can content himself with porridge, when you must have your three or four meals a day and animal food at two of them.
It is porridge that gives a healthy body, cool head, and warm feet;
Porridge promotes the circulation of the blood;
It is porridge that calms the head after the libations of overnight.
It is porridge that keeps the poor man from ending his days in the Union.
It is porridge that helps the son of the humble peasant to aspire to the highest career, in allowing him to live on a scholarship at the University;
It is porridge that makes such men of iron as Livingstone and Gordon;
And, above all, it is porridge that puts the different classes in Scotland on a footing of equality once a day at least, and thus makes of them the most liberal-minded people of Great Britain.
The national drink of Scotland is Scotch whisky.
The Scotch will tell you that Irish whisky is no good; the Irish will tell you that Scotch whisky is simply detestable. I have tasted both, and, having no national prejudice on the point, have no hesitation in saying that there is nothing to choose between them: both are horrible.
Whisky may easily be obtained by dissolving a little soot in brandy. As the coal-smoky taste is much more pronounced in the Scotch whisky than in the Irish, I conclude that, in the latter, the dose is smaller.
They say that of all alcoholic liquors whisky is the least injurious. By "they" must be understood all the good folks who cannot do without this beverage. There must, however, be truth in it, or Scotland and Ireland must have been depopulated long since. And, as we know the Scotch generally live to a good old age, and centenarians are not rare in the Land o' Cakes, if whisky be a poison, it must be a slow one – a very slow one.
The prettiest anecdote, in Dean Ramsay's Reminiscences, relates to whisky, and I cannot refrain from quoting it.
An old Scotch lady had just sent for her gardener to cut the grass on her lawn.
"Cut it short," she said to him; "mind, Donald, an inch at the bottom is worth two at the top."
Always the same way of speaking in moral sentences so common in Scotland.
The work done, the good lady offered Donald a glass of whisky, and proceeded to pour it out, but showed sign of stopping before the top was reached.
"Fill it up, ma'am, fill it up," said the shrewd-witted fellow, "an inch at the top is worth twa at the bottom."
CHAPTER XXV
Hors-d'œuvre. – A Word to the Reader and another to the Critic. – A Man who has a right to be proud. – Why?
Here I pause, dear Reader.
An idea has just come to my head, and for fear it might be lonely there, I will impart it to you without delay.
Now, to come at once to the sense of the matter, will you allow me for once – for once only – to pay myself a compliment that I think I well deserve? It is the word "Ireland," which I have just written in the preceding chapter, that makes me think of addressing sincere congratulations to myself. Forgive me for this little digression, it will relieve me.
I have written two books on England, a third on the relations between England and France, and I shall soon have finished a volume of recollections of Scotland.
How many times I have had to write the words "England" and "Ireland," I could not say; but I affirm that I have not once – no, not once – spoken of "Perfidious Albion" or the "Emerald Isle."
"Indeed!" and "What of that?" you will perhaps exclaim.
Well, whatever you may say, I assure you that if ever a man had a right to feel proud of himself, I have.
More than once have I been tempted, once or twice I have had to make an erasure, but I am the first who has triumphed over the difficulty.
Come, dear Critic, if thou wilt be amiable, here is an occasion. Admit that a Frenchman, who can write fourteen or fifteen hundred pages on the subject of England, without once calling her "Perfidious Albion," is a man who is entitled to thy respect and thy indulgence for the thousand and one shortcomings of which he knows himself to be guilty.
There, I feel better now. Let us now go and see Donald's big touns.
CHAPTER XXVI
Glasgow. – Origin of the Name. – Rapid Growth of the City. – St. Mungo's Injunction to Donald. – James Watt and the Clyde. – George Square. – Exhibition of Sculpture in the open Air. – Royal Exchange. – Wellington again. – Wanted an Umbrella. – The Cathedral. – How it was saved by a Gardener. – The Streets. – Kelvingrove Park. – The University. – The Streets at Night. – The Tartan Shawls a Godsend. – The Populace. – Pity for the poor little Children. – Sunday Lectures in Glasgow. – To the Station, and let us be off.
If, as Shelley has said, "Hell is a city much like London," Glasgow must be very much like the dungeon where Satan shuts up those who do not behave themselves.
The word "Glasgow" is of Celtic origin, and, it appears, means Sombre Valley.
The town has not given the lie to its name.
I have travelled from the south of England to the north of Scotland; I have seen every corner of the great towns, and I do not hesitate to give the palm to Glasgow: it is the dirtiest, blackest, most repulsive-looking nest that it was ever given to man to inhabit.
I am bound to say that the Scotch themselves, so justly proud of their old Scotland, dare not take it upon themselves to defend Glasgow: they give it over to the visitor, not, however, without having added, as a kind of extenuating circumstance:
"There is money in it."
At the time of the Reformation, Glasgow was but an insignificant little town with five thousand inhabitants. At the commencement of this century it contained about eight thousand. To-day it is the most important city of Scotland, a city which holds, including the suburbs, very nearly a million souls, tortured by the passion for wealth or by misery and hunger.
If the importance of the place is recent, the place itself dates back more than thirteen centuries. It was indeed in 560 that Saint Mungo founded a bishopric there, and no doubt, to try the faith of Donald, whom he had just converted to Christianity, he said to him, as he put an umbrella into his hands with strict injunctions never to part with it:
"For thy sins, Donald, here shalt thou dwell."
Glasgow is the home of iron and coal. Coal underground, coal in the air, coal on people's faces, coal everywhere!
There rise thousands of high chimneys, vomiting flames and great clouds of smoke, which settle down on the town and, mixing with the humidity of the streets, form a black, sticky mud that clogs your footsteps. No one thinks of wearing elastic-side boots. They would go home with naked feet if they did. Glasgow people wear carmen's boots, strongly fastened on with leather laces.
I assure you that if you were to fall in the street, you would leave your overcoat behind when you got up.
The neighbourhood of the sea and the Clyde has been, and still is, a source of prosperity and opulence to the town; and here it behoves me to speak of the Scotch energy, which has made of this stream a river capable of giving anchorage to vessels drawing twenty-four feet of water.
In 1769, the illustrious James Watt was directed to examine the river. At that time small craft could scarcely enter the river even at high water. Watt indeed found that, at low tide, the rivulet – for it was nothing else – had but a depth of one foot two inches, and at high tide never more than three feet three inches.
To-day you may see the largest ironclads afloat there. This gigantic enterprise cost no less than £10,300,000.
It was on the Clyde that Henry Bell, in 1812, launched the first steamboat. Since then the banks of the Clyde have been lined with vast shipbuilding yards, which turn out from four to five hundred vessels a year.
Glasgow always had a taste for smoke. Before the war of American Independence, this town had the monopoly of the tobacco commerce. Colossal fortunes were realised over the importation of the Virginian weed in the end of the last century. At present Glasgow trades in coal, machinery, iron goods, printed calico, etc.
The Glasgow man has been influenced by his surroundings. The climate is dull and damp, the man is obstinate and laborious; the ground contains coal and iron for the Clyde to carry to sea, and so the man is a trader.
And, indeed, what is there to be done in Glasgow but work? Out-of-door life is interdicted, so to speak; gaiety is out of the question; everything predisposes to industry and thought. People divide their time between work and prayer, the kirk and the counting-house; such is life in Glasgow.
And now let us take a stroll, or rather let us walk, for a stroll implies pleasure, and I certainly cannot promise you that.
The most striking feature of Glasgow is George Square. It is large, and literally crowded with statues, a regular carnival. It looks as if the Glasgow folks had said: "We must have some statues, but do not, for all that, let us encumber the streets with them; let us keep them out of the way in a place to themselves. If a visitor likes to go and look at them, much good may it do him." At a certain distance the effect is that of a cemetery, or picture to yourself Madame Tussaud's exhibition à la belle étoile.
When I say à la belle étoile, it is but a figure of speech in Glasgow.
In this exhibition of sculpture, I discover Walter Scott, Robert Burns, David Livingstone, James Watt, Prince Albert, Queen Victoria, Thomas Campbell, and Sir Robert Peel. Some are on foot, some on horseback. There are none driving, but there is Scott who, in the centre of this Kensal Green, is perched on the summit of a column eighty feet high. It is enough to make the tallest chimney of the neighbourhood topple over with envy. By dint of a little squeezing, it would be easy to make room for a dozen more statues.
In Queen's Street, quite close to George Square, we find the Royal Exchange – an elegant building in the Corinthian style – in front of which stands an equestrian statue of gigantic dimensions.
It is Wellington – the inevitable, the eternal, the everlasting Wellington.
Oh, what a bore that Wellington is!
This statue was erected at the expense of the town for a sum of £10,000.
Wellington will never know what he has cost his compatriots.
Let us go up George Street, turn to the left by High Street, towards the north-east, and we shall come to the Cathedral, the only one which the fanatic vandalism of the Puritans spared. I was told in Scotland that this is how it escaped. The Puritans had come to Glasgow in 1567 to destroy the Cathedral of Saint Mungo. But a gardener, a practical Scot of the neighbourhood, reasoned with them in the following manner:
"My friends, you are come with the meritorious intention of destroying this temple of popery. But why destroy the edifice? It will cost a mint of money to build such another. Could not you use this one and worship God in it after our own manner?"
The Puritans, who were Scots too, saw the force of the argument and the cathedral was saved.
The edifice is gothic, and very handsome. I recommend especially the crypt, under the choir. The windows are most remarkable.
Around the cathedral is a graveyard containing fine monuments. I read on a tablet, put up in commemoration of the execution of nine covenanters (1666-1684) the following inscription, which shows once more how they forgive in Scotland. Here is the hint to the persecutors:
"They'll know at resurrection day
To murder saints was no sweet play."
Let us return down High Street as far as Argyle Street, the great artery of Glasgow.
After a few minutes' walking, we come to Buchanan Street, the fashionable street of Glasgow – I mean the one which contains the fashionable shops, the Regent Street of this great manufacturing city. The houses are well-built, I do not say tastefully, but solidly. This might be said indeed of the whole town: it is dirty, but substantial. Let us push on to Sanchyhall Street, and there turn to the west. We presently come to the park of Kelvingrove, undulating, well laid out, and surrounded with pretty houses: it is the only part of Glasgow which does not give you cold shivers. Among the well-kept paths, flowerbeds, and ponds, you forget the coal-smoke for awhile. At the end of the park runs the Kelvin, a little stream which you cross to get to Gilmore Hill, on the summit of which stand the buildings of the university. The interior of these buildings is magnificent.
The Bute Hall is one of the finest halls I ever saw: 108 feet long, 75 broad, and 70 high. A splendid library and all the comfortable accessories, which they are careful to supply studious youth with in this country. The university cost more than half-a-million. With the exception of a few other parks – which, however, cannot be compared to those of London – there is nothing more to be seen in Glasgow, and if your business is transacted, go to your hotel, strap your luggage, and be off.
But if you prefer it, we will arm ourselves with umbrellas and return to the streets, and see what kind of people are to be met there.
That which strikes one at a first visit, is that from five in the afternoon almost every respectable-looking person has disappeared, and the town seems given over to the populace. Like the City proper in London, Glasgow is only occupied by the superior classes during business hours. From four to five o'clock there is a general stampede towards the railway stations. The employé, who earns two or three hundred a year, has his villa or cottage in the suburbs. The rich merchant, the engineer, the ironmaster, all these live far from the city.
The streets of Glasgow, from six or seven in the evening, are entirely given up to the manufacturing population – the dirtiest and roughest to be seen anywhere, I should think.
I have seen poverty and vice in Paris, in London, in Dublin, and Brussels, but they are nothing to compare to the spectacle that Glasgow presents. It is the living illustration of some unwritten page of Dante.
"But there is money in Glasgow."
The lower-class women of London do wear a semblance of a toilette: fur mantles in rags, battered, greasy hats with faded flowers, flounced skirts in tatters – an apology for a costume, in short.
But here, there is nothing of all that. No finery, not even a hat. The tartan seems to take the place of all.
The attributions of this tartan are multiple. It is as useful to the women of the lower classes in the great Scotch towns as the reindeer is to the Laplander.
This tartan serves them as a hood when it is cold; as an umbrella when it rains; as a blanket in winter nights; as a mattress in summer ones; as a basket when they go to market; a towel when they do their own and their children's dry-polishing; a cradle for their babies, which they carry either slung over their back, Hottentot fashion, or hanging in front, like the kangaroos. When poverty presses hard, the tartan goes to the pawnbroker's shop, whence it issues in the form of a sixpence or a shilling, according to its value. After living in them they live on them, and so these useful servants pass from external to internal use, and appease the hunger or thirst of their owners for a day or two. A very godsend this tartan, as you see.
A Glasgow police inspector told me that, having one day to make a search at a pawnbroker's in the town, he had found more than fifteen hundred of these shawls on the premises. "Many of those poor borrowers are Irish," he said. Did he say this to pass on to a neighbour that which seemed to him a disgrace to his own country? In any case, it is a fact that there are a great number of Irish in Glasgow.
No doubt poverty, with its accompaniments of shame and vice, exists in all great cities; but here it has a distressing aspect that it presents in no other country. The Arab beggar makes one smile as he majestically drapes around him his picturesque, multicoloured rags; the lazzarone, lying on the quay of Naples under the radiant Italian sky, is a prince compared to the wretch who drags out his existence in the dirty streets or garrets of Glasgow.
"But there is money in Glasgow."
In Paris, the newspapers are sold in shops or pretty kiosks kept by clean, tidy, respectable women. In London and other large English towns, the papers are cried in the streets by low-class men and boys. In Glasgow and Edinburgh the work is done by ragged children, who literally besiege you as you walk the streets: poor little girls half-naked, shivering, and starving, with their feet in the mud, try to earn a few pence to appease their own hunger, or, perhaps, furnish an unnatural parent with the means of getting tipsy. Others have a little stock of matches that they look at with an envious eye, one fancies, as one thinks of Andersen's touching tale.
Oh, pity for the poor little children!
In a country so Christian, so philanthropic, can it be that childhood is abandoned thus? Asylums for the aged are to be seen in plenty, and is not youth still more interesting than age, and must it needs commit some crime before it has the right to enter some house of refuge?
I cannot tell you how sad the sight of those poor little beings, forsaken of God and man, made me feel.
But how shall I describe my feelings when, having drawn the attention of a Scotchman who was with me to one of these pitiful little creatures, I heard him say:
"Do not stop, the immorality of those children is awful."
No, it is not possible; it must be a bad dream, a hideous nightmare.
"It is a fact," said my companion, who knows Glasgow as he knows himself.
"But there is money in it."
It seems incomprehensible that these children should not be reclaimed, still more incomprehensible that no one seeks to do it. The money spent in statues of Wellington would more than suffice, and the Iron Duke would be none the worse off in Paradise.
Yes, this is what may be seen in Glasgow, in that city so pious, that to calm the feelings of some of the inhabitants, the literary and scientific lectures which used to be given to the people on Sunday evenings in Saint Andrew's Hall have had to be discontinued.
Heaven be thanked, Glasgow is not Scotland, and we can go and rejoice our eyes in Edinburgh, Aberdeen, Braemar, and elsewhere, and admire the lakes and the blue mountains.