Abbildungen der Seite
PDF
EPUB

I agree with you,' said Bailie Liddel, stirring in his tumbler a fresh supply of whisky and water. It is like Deacon Dowie's speech at the meeting about the choking-up of the sivers and the overflowing of the gutters, which had to be cut short, sir, without ceremony, or we would have been nailed to the spot listening to him all night.'

In the mean time, Mr Herdman had disappeared, and, by way of varying the amusement, explored his way, we do not curiously inquire how, to Mrs Wildgoose's sanctum in the upper regions. Whether he went with or without a guide, we cannot precisely tell; but he returned in a short time as a personation of the lady of the mansion, dressed in her crimson chintz gown, her mantle of grass-green gros-de-Naples lined with rose pink, her purple velvet bonnet and feather, with blond lappets, and all proper appliances, and a solitary bunch of brown, dried-up, frizzled hair stuck out upon the middle of his brow, like the curled locks on a bull's forehead. Tall as Mrs Wildgoose was herself, her habiliments did not reach below the middle of the leg of this gigantic masquerader. His dark complexion, however, was on a par with the lady's olive visage.

stern of a little brig, and carrying all away before it.
And the ill-fated young lady had her gauze skirt and
petticoat of glazed cotton torn from her waist, and the
facings of dirty corsets and partial glimpses of dusky
under-garments, were thereby disclosed to the com-
pany, to their infinite entertainment and delight."

DR CHANNING ON HARD WORK.
THE following striking thoughts occur in a new
brochure of the famous Boston preacher, entitled,
"Lectures on the Elevation of the Labouring Portion
of the Community," of which a neat and cheap reprint
has been issued in this country.*

Man owes

this idea. It tends to increase the amount of manual toil, at the very time that it renders this toil less favourable to the culture of the mind. The division of labour, which distinguishes civilised from savage life, and to which we owe chiefly the perfection of the arts, tends to dwarf the intellectual powers, by confining the activity of the individual to a narrow range, to a few details, perhaps to the heading of pins, the pointing of nails, or the tying together of broken strings; so that, while the savage has his faculties sharpened by various occupations, and by exposure to various perils, the civilised man treads a monotonous, stupifying round of unthinking toil. This cannot, must not, always be. Variety of action, corresponding to the variety of human powers, and fitted to develope all, is the most important element of human civilisation. It should be the aim of philanthropists. In proportion as Christianity shall spread the spirit of brotherhood, there will and must be a more equal distribution of toils and means of improvement. That system of labour which saps the health, and shortens life, and famishes intellect, needs, and must receive, great modification. Still, labour in due proportion is an important part of our present toil. It is the condition of all outward comforts and improvements, whilst, at the same time, it conspires with higher means and influences in ministering to the vigour and growth of the soul. Let us not fight against it. We need this admonition, because at the present moment there is a general disposition to shun labour; and this ought to be regarded as a bad sign of our times. The city is thronged with adventurers from the country, and the liberal professions are overstocked, in the hope of escaping the primeval sentence of living by the sweat of the brow; and to this crowding of men into trade we owe not only the neglect of agriculture, but, what far worse, the demoralisation of the community. It generates excessive competition, which of necessity generates fraud. Trade is turned to gambling; and a spirit of mad speculation exposes public and private interests to a disastrous instability. It is, then, no part of the philanthropy which would elevate the labouring body, to exempt them from manual toil. In truth, a wise philanthropy would, if possible, persuade all men of all conditions to mix up a measure of this toil with their other pursuits. The body as well as the mind needs vigorous exertion, and even the studious would be happier were they trained to labour as well as thought. Let us learn to regard manual toil as the true discipline of a man. Not a few of the wisest, grandest spirits, have toiled at the work-bench and the plough."

I can be at no loss here among such a variety,' | replied the bailie, casting his eye across the long table, still amply furnished with eatables, and then glancing along the other table, which offered a no less promising spectacle in the drinking department. 'But,' continued the magistrate of the Canongate, 'I think a thimbleful of a raw dram first will be the best thing to keep off the cold.' And, accordingly, the gentleman helped himself to a thimbleful, that is, a thistleful of brandy, and afterwards to a draught of porter; for he was hoarse with his oratory at the meeting he had just left, and he pronounced speaking to be drouthy work,' and he proceeded to stay his stomach with a slice of the salt round, a leg of a turkey, a 'tasting' of the lamb pie, some veal croquets, a few custards, and a "By the elevation of the labourer I do not undercouple of jellies. Afterwards, by way of amusement, stand that he is to be raised above the need of labour. he nibbled at a tart and a cheese-cake or two, and I do not expect a series of improvements, by which then entered upon the occupation deliberately of mix- he is to be released from his daily work. Still more, ing a rummer of hot punch to keep all these ingre- I have no desire to dismiss him from his workshop dients in good agreement in his stomach. And while and farm, to take the spade and axe from his hand, he was engaged in the consuming of this potation, and to make his life a long holiday. I have faith in Miss Macgeggins of the Catholic Chapel, and the other labour, and I see the goodness of God in placing us musical geniuses of the party, were preparing to sing; in a world where labour alone can keep us alive. I and each in succession, and sometimes two or more at would not change, if I could, our subjection to physical a time, squalled to the audience, till Lieutenant Dar-laws, our exposure to hunger and cold, and the necesling, who abominated music himself, referred it to the sity of constant conflicts with the material world. I company if it were not true that too much of any thing would not, if I could, so temper the elements that was good for nothing? they should infuse into us only grateful sensations, that they should make vegetation so exuberant as to anticipate every want, and the minerals so ductile as to offer no resistance to our strength or skill. Such a world would make a contemptible race. his growth, his energy, chiefly to that striving of the will, that conflict with difficulty, which we call Effort. Easy, pleasant work does not make robust minds, does not give men a consciousness of their powers, does not train them to endurance, to perseverance, to steady force of will, that force without which all other acquisitions avail nothing. Manual labour is a school, in which men are placed to get energy of purpose and character, a vastly more important endowment than all the learning of all other schools. They are placed, indeed, under hard masters, physical sufferings and wants, the power of fearful elements, and the vicissitudes of all human things; but these stern teachers do a work which no compassionate indulgent friend could do for us; and true wisdom will bless Providence for their sharp ministry. I have great faith in hard work. The material world does much for the mind by its beauty and order; but it does more for our minds by the pains it inflicts, by its obstinate resistance, which nothing but patient toil can overcome; by its vast forces, which nothing but unremitting skill and effort can turn to our use; by its perils, which demand continual vigilance; and by its tendencies to decay. I believe that difficulties are more important to the human mind than what we call assistances. Work we all must, if we mean to bring out and perfect our nature. Even if we do not work with the hands, we must undergo equivalent toil in some other direction. No business or study which does not present obstacles, tasking to the full the intellect and the will, is worthy of a man. In science, he who does not grapple with hard questions, who does not concentrate his whole intellect in vigorous attention, who does not aim to penetrate what at first repels him, will never attain to mental force. The uses of toil reach beyond the present world. The capacity of steady, earnest labour is, I apprehend, one of our great preparations for another state of being. When I see the vast amount of toil required of men, I feel that it must have important connections with their future existence; and that he who has met this discipline manfully, has laid one essential foundation of improvement, exertion, and happiness, in the world to come. You will here see that to me labour has great dignity. It is not merely the grand instrument Glasgow Free Press (newspaper). by which the earth is overspread with fruitfulness and beauty, and the ocean subdued, and matter wrought into innumerable forms for comfort and ornament. It has a far higher function, which is, to give force to the will, efficiency, courage, the capacity of endurance and of persevering devotion to far-reaching plans. Alas, for the man who has not learned to work! He is a poor creature. He does not know himself. He depends on others, with no capacity of making returns for the support they give; and let him not fancy that he has a monopoly of enjoyment. Ease, rest, owes its deliciousness to toil; and no toil is so burdensome as the rest of him who has nothing to task and quicken his powers.

"I am most happy to have the pleasure of seeing you in my house on this occasion, and hope soon to have another opportunity of having you all to partake of my hospitality,' said Mr Herdman, addressing the company in a soft, mimic tone, so perfectly resembling the voice of Mrs Wildgoose, that the likeness was irresistible. The whole company were in a roar of laughter. The tears started from the eyes of Captain Stark and Bailie Liddel, while the huge female figure paraded about where it could find a footing, and complimented the guests all round, and made such antics and ludicrous movements, that peal succeeded peal of tremendous merriment; and the grotesque figure began to caper in a pas seul upon the floor, and the circle opened up to make room for its evolutions, and, to the infinite astonishment and delight of the beholders, it mounted upon the table where the liquors were, and footed it most nimbly among all the bottles, and glasses, and drinking apparatus, and committed not the slightest damage; then down he came with all the agility of a child, and recommenced his steps upon the carpet, and Gollochar came forward as a partner, and the two hooked their arms together, and reeled, and wheeled, and waltzed, and uttered alternately at intervals the most terrific and astounding yells; and some of the rest of the company, inspired by the example, got upon their legs, and joined in the dance, while the circle widened to give them room, and the lookers-on crowded near the walls, or mounted on chairs, to save their toes from being trod upon.

Music was not missed, for it could not have been heard amid the clamour, and the roaring, and the laughter.

They waltzed, and reeled, and wheeled about, tugging and dragging at one another, with such hearty good will, that cries of 'Oh, dear! What do you mean? Mrs Wildgoose, will you settle Mr Fork? 'Mrs Wildgoose, will you speak to Mr Gowanlock and a variety of such like exclamations and invocations, uttered by shrill female pipes, were heard above the other din.

A MOTHER.
There's music in a mother's voice,

More sweet than breezes sighing;
There's kindness in a mother's glance,
Too pure for ever dying.
There's love within a mother's breast,
So deep, 'tis still o'erflowing,
And care for those she calls her own,
That's ever, ever growing.
There's anguish in a mother's tear
When farewell fondly taking,
That so the heart of pity moves,
It scarcely keeps from breaking.
And when a mother kneels to Heaven,
And for her child is praying,
Oh, who can half the fervour tell,
That burns in all she's saying?
A mother! how her tender arts
Can soothe the breast of sadness,
And through the gloom of life once more
Bid shine the sun of gladness.

A mother! when, like evening's star,
Her course has ceased before us,
From brighter worlds regards us still,
And watches fondly o'er us.

WAR.

The following sarcastic recommendations are given by Dr Benjamin Rush, an eminent American physician and philanthropist, who died about thirty years ago:"In order to impress more deeply the minds of the citizens of the United States with the blessings of peace, by contrasting them with the evils of war, let the following inscription be painted on the sign which is placed over the door of the war-office at Washington, namely:An office for butchering the human species. A widow-and-orphan-making oflice.

A broken-bone-making office.

A wooden-leg-making office.

An office for creating public and private vices.
An office for creating public debt.
An office for creating famine.

An office for creating pestilential diseases.
An office for creating poverty, and for the destruction
of liberty and national happiness.

The wreck and devastation of the ornamental, and some portion of the useful, part of the ladies' dresses, fully justified their giving vent to those thrilling complaints. The Miss Blythes' wreaths of artificial roses were torn remorselessly from their heads, and trampled under foot. The Miss Brocks' greasy, filthy-scented ringlets, met with the same unhappy fate, together with bracelets, handkerchiefs, and scarfs, and dirty, tattered, battered, damp gloves, without number. Miss Bendy's comb of polished horn, was dashed to the ground. Miss Macgeggins' towering ornamental comb of pearl paste, with cruel gilt teeth, was driven into her skull, and while she was suffering from this inhuman infliction, which was the unnatural result of certain kind familiarities of Mr Gowanlock, Mr Herd-happily our present civilisation is far from realising | LONDON: Published, with permission of the proprietors, by W.S man's gigantic form came sweeping past behind her, like a man-of-war in a storm coming drive against the

I do not, then, desire to release the labourer from toil. This is not the elevation to be sought for him. Manual labour is a great good; but in so saying, I must be understood to speak of labour in its just proportions. In excess it does great harm. It is not a good, when made the sole work of life. It must be In the lobby, let there be painted representations of joined with higher means of improvement, or it de- the common instruments of death; also, human skulls, grades instead of exalting. Man has a various nature, broken bones, hospitals crowded with sick and wounded which requires a variety of occupation and discipline soldiers, villages on fire, skips sinking in the ocean, rivers for its growth. Study, meditation, society, and relaxa-dyed with blood, and extensive plains without a tree or tion, should be mixed up with his physical toils. He fence, or any other object but the ruins of deserted has intellect, heart, imagination, taste, as well as bones and muscles; and he is grievously wronged, when compelled to exclusive drudgery for bodily subsistence. Life should be an alternation of employments, so diversified as to call the whole man into action. Un

*Glasgow, James Hedderwick and Son.

farm-houses.

Above this group of woful figures, let the following blood:words be inserted in red characters, to represent human NATIONAL GLORY!"

ORR, Paternoster Row; and sold by all booksellers and new men.-Printed by Bradbury and Evans, Whitefriars

[graphic]

CONDUCTED BY WILLIAM AND ROBERT CHAMBERS, EDITORS OF "CHAMBERS'S INFORMATION FOR THE PEOPLE,"

"CHAMBERS'S EDUCATIONAL COURSE," &c.

NUMBER 438.

PICTURE OF THE INDIGENT CLASS OF
A LITTLE TOWN.

MUCH as has been written on the subject of the
poor, the public has never yet had presented to it
any thing like an express picture of the actual con-
dition of the indigent class in any one spot of the
earth. Even that most faithful depicter of the humble,
Crabbe, did not profess to describe the poor, the whole
poor, and nothing but the poor, of one place: in all
probability, he assembled features and cases from
various districts, and grouped them into one picture;
at least, we have no certain assurance that he did not
do so. It lately occurred to us, in consequence of the
discussions which have been taking place respecting
the management of the poor in Scotland, that, if some
well-defined district were pitched upon, and an accu-
rate estimate formed of the amount of poverty in that
district, the result might be of such a novel and in-
teresting nature as to gratify the entire circle of our
readers, at the same time that it might throw some
light on a question which has, at the present moment,
a peculiar importance within a narrower field. We
therefore proceeded to a small town, with which we
happened to be well acquainted, and set about making
the necessary inquiries, the result of which we now
propose to lay before the world. The name of this
town, and its geographical situation, further than that
it is in Scotland, are not necessary to the question: we
conceal them, because it would be indelicate towards
private parties to disclose them. The public, how.
ever, have the guarantee of any credit for veracity
which we may have established with them, that the
general description of the place, and all the particulars
of its indigent class now to be given, are set forth
truly.

This town is expressly and thoroughly a rural one. The district of which it is the centre, consists of arable and pastoral farms, and is almost as isolated by a bounding range of mountains as was the valley of Rasselas. There are no manufacturing establishments within many miles. The town, which contains about two thousand inhabitants, depends entirely on the supply of articles of necessity to its well-defined little district, and on the rural labour of its own humblest class; or, if there be any exception worth speaking of from this general description, it lies in two boarding academies, attended by boys from a distance, and in the existence of a few weavers who obtain work from Glasgow. It is common to describe such places as dull and more than ordinarily poor, and it may on that account be objected to as a fair specimen of the country at large. But, though it may be poorer than most manufacturing towns, we see nothing to prevent us from considering it as a fair specimen of the towns in purely rural districts. It possesses all the orders of society which a rural district gives occasion for in a town population, and all the residuum of poor which naturally falls from such a system of things. If not deriving wealth from manufactures, neither does it gather to itself, as most manufacturing towns do, the miserable of distant districts. In point of fact, however, it must derive wealth from manufactures in an indirect manner; for the produce of the district must be sold at higher rates than would otherwise be the case, in consequence of there being manufacturing customers for it.

The population of this town is just about 2000: a small rural tract, forming part of the same parish, may contain 600 more; but with these we have little to do. The town contains the usual variety of traders, some of whom have a tolerably good business, while others are in a very small way. There are two or three clergymen, and two or three medical men; a

SATURDAY, JUNE 20, 1840.

few legal practitioners in the sheriff court; a very
few families living independently of trade; a con-
siderable number of the ordinary artificers, as black-
smiths, tailors, shoemakers, &c.; and also a consider
able number of labourers, of both sexes. Society,
both in the town and its neighbourhood, is remarkable
for the permanency of its forms. It has not for a
long period been much richer or poorer than it now is.
The gains of trade and the wages of labour are re-
markably equable. A considerable number of persons
have a little property, but few have much wealth.
Traders are the fathers of traders, artificers of ar-
tificers, and labourers of labourers, with compara-
tively few exceptions. Some young men of the middle
class emigrate to more active scenes, but few others
do so; and thus from generation to generation little
change of any kind takes place.

From what we had formerly known of the town,
we were prepared to find, on careful inquiry, a consi-
derable number of indigent persons; but the real
number found, and the degree of indigence which cha-
racterised them, were far beyond what we had expected.
Our attention was first directed to those who receive
relief from the poor's funds of the parish, through
the hands of the kirk-session.* The number of
entries on the roll kept by this body during 1839,
was 42. Four related to individuals residing at a
distance, but having claims on this parish, leaving
38 resident paupers. Of these, 24 were females, 10
males, and 4 were children. In only 18 of the cases
can the party be said to be single or solitary in the
other 20, the party is either plural, or at least connected
with other parties, who are wholly or partially depen-
dent on the aid granted. The real number of pauper
children, exclusive of some others who only receive
gratuitous education, is 9. The whole sum expended
weekly on the 38 resident paupers was L.3, 6s. 3d.,
being at the rate of 1s. 94d. to each. By careful
inquiry we obtained correct memoranda of the con-
dition of all the persons on the poor's-roll, in order
that the public may judge how far the sum given to
each is adequate or suitable.

PRICE THREE HALFPENCE.

who has a paralytic and bed-rid wife, but who has 2s. weekly from other sources. The fourth is a middleaged man, once an artisan, but now stone-blind, and who has a little girl, his daughter, living with him: he keeps a mangle, but is little employed, in conscquence of his being less able to give aid in arranging; the clothes than the females who are engaged in the same business. The utmost this man will make by his business is a shilling a-week, and that only in the summer months. His wife has found it necessary to separate from him, and go to service at a distance.

Ten persons have 2s. weekly. This seems to be the largest allowance given to an old man or woman who is past work and lives alone. In some instances there are dependent persons, as a sister, a wife, or a husband, also old; but in these cases one of the parties is able to work a little, so that 28. is judged sufficient for both. In one case we find two sisters, one of them weak in mind; and when we made minute inquiry, we found that both pursue a system of almost open begging, 60 that probably the parish allowance does not furnish one-third part of their support. Another of these two-shilling pensioners furnishes a curious illustration of the working of the Scottish parochial system. The party was a widow with four children. In consideration of her family, she had at first 3s. weekly. Unfortunately, however, this poor woman became the mother of another infant; in consideration of which delinquency, her allowance was instantly reduced to 2s. Thus, instead of four children with three shillings, she had now five children with only two shillings.

Ten have 1s. 6d. weekly, being generally individuals either not quite disabled, or who live with relatives able to work a little, or who have relatives able to contribute something towards their support. In one instance, we found a woman living with a sister, both of them old, but neither quite worn out. The parish pensioner now and then earns a sixpence by some light labour for a weaver; the other can trim a garden, or keep an infant for a neighbour. Sixpence a-week being required for the rent of their humble dwelling, they have only one shilling certain. Their whole earnings may, on the average, be as much, or perhaps a little more. Oatmeal and potatoes are the staple of their food, but occasionally a neighbour will send them a bowl of barley broth. Thus they live, never from one year to another tasting the slightest comfort suitable to their years and infirmities. Another of these eighteen-pence pensioners is an old widow, who has had a large family, all of whom are now at a distance from her, but unable to give her any aid. Too feeble for any regular work, she is only able to sell some very trifling articles, by which she may realise occasionally a few pence. Other resources, besides mendicancy, she has none. A third of this class is a young woman so much deformed as to be unable to work, though healthy. She lives with a mother who works a little in the fields.

The largest sum given to any resident pauper in our list is 4s. a-week; and there is but one case of so large an aliment. It is for an old woman of imbecile mind, who, being unable to take any care of herself, and having no relations on whom she could depend, boarded and lodged with a poor family. The sum here given is probably the lowest at which the session could induce any family to take charge of such a person. Below this case, the largest weekly sum given is 2s. 6d., of which there are four cases. All of these are of a certain pretty well-defined character. One is a middleaged insane female, who lives with a mother and sister, the latter of whom is a field-labourer. Here, we believe, it is presumed that the earnings of the sister should do a little for the pauper. Another case is that of a very infirm old widow, who has another old but rather less infirm woman living with her, by whose Of pensioners at 1s. a-week there are eight, generally aid she makes a little by selling coal in small quanti-persons of much the same order as the last, but with ties. Here there are, in reality, two paupers; but, resources one degree better. One, for instance, is so then, the coal business is presumed to do something stout as to be able to sell laces and other little wares for both. Half-a-crown a-week is therefore judged in a basket throughout the country: she generally, on sufficient; but in reality it is not, and these two poor getting her 2s. once a-fortnight, proceeds immediately women would be in great wretchedness but for the to convert it into a stock for the ensuing fortnight's kindness of a benevolent lady in the neighbourhood, sale. A second is an old farm-servant, who is partly and occasional aid from other quarters. The third of supported by his children. A third is a widow, who the half-crown pensioners is an old reduced shopkeeper, can spin a little. A fourth is an old single woman, who, having a second bed in her little chamber, gets something for its use from a person nearly as poor as herself. Amongst our notes on this class, we find another highly characteristic trait of the administration of the poor's funds in Scotland. It relates to

* A body composed of the established minister and a few elders (lay officers of the church). In every parish there is such a body, forming the first, or lowest, of the ecclesiastical courts of Scotland, and possessing the management of the poor's funds.

an aged widow, who is bed-rid from paralysis. She had the misfortune to have a daughter of bad character, whose son, an idle young man, hung about his grandmother's house. So, because of the daughter's character, which she could not help, and because she would not drive her grandchild from her house, she was restricted to an allowance of 1s. weekly, the half of which would probably be required for her

house-rent. The authorities have since relented a little, and she has now 1s. 6d. weekly.

Of the only two remaining adult paupers, one has 28. 3d. and another 6d. weekly, the latter pensioner being a female who only asked so much in order to pay her house-rent. We now come to the cases of children. We find that four orphans, who live with an elder sister, who is able to work in the fields, get 3s. 6d. weekly. One deserted illegitimate child, who is boarded with a poor family, is allowed 2s. weekly, such being the stated allowance in cases of the kind. Another deserted child, who lives with a grandfather and grandmother, who are very poor persons, gets only Is., which is also the stated sum when the infant resides with relatives. In both cases the parish allows clothes and education. Several other children receive only education from the parish, and it may be remarked that, on this point, there is no want of liberality. A pauper child receives an amount of schooling equal to that received by any of the humbler class of children in the parish.

| less than one hundred and eighty-seven, representing
about five hundred individuals!*

If there were no poor in the town besides those supplied from the parochial funds, there would be little occasion for remark, except as to the smallness of the parish allowances. Thirty-eight resident and four non-resident cases of pauperism in a town of 2000 inhabitants, would give about one pauper for eleven non-pauper families ;* but the poor-roll, in reality, exhibits but a small portion of the poor of this town. There is a much larger number of householders, many of whom are in circumstances equally, while others are in a condition only a little less, necessitous. By inquiry and investigation we have ascertained the actual circumstances of nearly the whole of these parties. It appears, in the first place, that there is a class in great or very frequently recurring necessity, amounting to 63; namely, 22 widows, 17 single women, 4 deserted wives, or women whose husbands at least are unable to do any thing for their support, and 20 men. Nearly the whole of these are aged persons, who have been industrious in their days of strength and health, but are now able only in some instances to work a little at some light labour, while in many other cases the ability to work is entirely gone. Some will have a daughter who works in the fields, and thereby realises tenpence a-day in summer, the main stay of the family. Others will have a small allowance, from some person little richer than themselves, for keeping a natural child. Some, bed-rid and | altogether helpless, trust almost entirely to private charity. One or two deal in coal, here an expensive article, which the poor generally buy in a stone at a time. We find, in our notes respecting these sixty-three parties, that only in 13, or one-fifth of the instances, was it ascertained that children grown up and settled at a distance, or any other relations, gave any kind of aid. This is a point on which much misapprehension exists. In that rank of life, children, when they grow up, and go into the world, generally hurry into engagements which preclude the possibility of aiding a sick or aged parent. The girls are less apt to do so than the young men ; and it is remarkable that there is considerably greater appearance in these memoranda of poor persons being relieved or supported by daughters than by sons. In none of the cases here adverted to, does the parent find constant shelter in the house of a child. They are all householders on their own account, with only in some instances a daughter remaining to exert herself for the benefit of her parent. It is a remarkable and affecting circumstance, that, in more than one instanee, the daughter, thus proving a stay and succour to her mother, is one who originally came as a child of shame.

We have now enumerated 38 resident paupers, and 63 of a class in nearly, if not quite, equal destitution. But these are still not all. We find that in this town there are 86 other householders in very indigent circumstances. The parties in this third class generally possess such a degree of health and strength as fits them for work. Some do work accordingly, when work is to be procured. Others might do well but for intemperato habits. All of them are occasionally in a destitute situation, particularly during the winter season. All of them, as well as most of those in the two former classes, were applicants at a soup-kitchen which was set up during the long-prevailing severe weather at the beginning of 1838. All of them were also applicants for relief from a committee of gentlemen appointed in January 1839, to superintend the distribution of about L.80, which had been collected for the purpose of affording some succour to the poor and unemployed at that season. Thus the total number of poor householders in this town, in 1839, was not

* From returns, and calculations upon these returns, it appears that the number of individuas in a family in the parish is 4: consequently that there are 470 families in the tow...

[ocr errors]

|

sources.

Judging from the memoranda in our possession, we cannot doubt that fully a third part of these families live in great part independently of eleemosynary aid, and only ask assistance under particular exigencies. Still the fact remains broad and palpable, that a fourth part of the population of this rural town are not, from the comfort of their circumstances, or the delicacy of their feelings, abore accepting of occasional charity from public We feel the force of this fact more keenly when we examine the amount of charity doled out in 1839. This charity, it may be remarked, was given in the form of meal and coal; and the distributions took place between the 16th January and the 23d February, a space of nearly six weeks. The exact sum expended on meal appears, from the account kept by the distributing committee, to have been L.54, 16s.; the exact sum spent on coal was L.18, 5s. 2d., being L.73, 1s. 2d. in all, the remainder having been devoted otherwise. Now, this gives to each family, at each time, only about 28. 1d. in meal, and rather less than 9d. in coal ;+ a very small supply for a family during three weeks, and which we cannot suppose that any but very necessitous families would have condescended to accept.

It seems wonderful how so great a number of permanent and occasional paupers should find support in a town so small, of such limited resources, and which, moreover, is infested as much as any other place by vagrant poor. The conviction of our own mind is, that in general the support which these unfortunates do obtain, is very far below what nature requires. One or two slender meals of porridge or of potatoes, with occasionally a little tea, or a bowl of thin broth, form the diet of a day with most of them. It appears a system of protracted starvation. At all times, but more particularly in severe seasons, a large part of the aliment of the indigent class is contributed by neighbours a little better off than themselves. In this town, fortunately, the poor live near the rich. Accordingly, there is no person in tolerably comfortable circumstances who has not a set of dependants planted closely around him. Never does any such person boil a pot of broth, without sending several basins of the mess to as many of these people. Every family which uses tea, has some appointed old man or woman, who comes, after the meal is over, to get the leaves which have already given out the penult of their tincture, in order to go through the mockery of infusing them again, and parading the result with a little barley bread on a poor stool, in front of a fire which appears as if it might safely be held in the palm of one's hand. A great number of women in middle age are employed in field labour, which lasts only during the milder seasons of the year. They get 10d. per day, which barely suffices to support and clothe them during the time when they have work. In winter, accordingly, when there is no work, these women have no resource but charity. But for the broth pots of their neighbours, they would starve outright. Theirs is a well-defined case of occasional pauperism; but the parish does scarcely any thing for them. Of the condition of permanent and extreme indigence to which others are doomed, those who live in the world's more bustling walks can form scarcely any idea. It has hitherto been supposed peculiar to great towns, that there should be hordes of poor people who, when they rise, know not where the food of the day is to come from. But this is a common case in our little rural town also. Some of these people scarcely ever see white money. About two years ago, a gentleman sent a small sum to be distributed in weekly sixpences amongst a certain number of poor persons; several of the recipients of this bounty, on the money being put into their hands, said, with tears of thankfulness in their eyes, that they had not had a sixpence in their possession for several years before-a fact quite credible, when we consider how much of the charity of the place is in the form of food. On a similar occasion, a lady, after leaving a little dole with an old widow, having paused in the passage, overheard the poor creature saying in joyful accents to her cat, her sole companion, “ Pussy, pussy, we're rich to-night, lass; Ire got a shilling. It is wonderful, considering the slender circumstances in which so many people live, that the mortality of the place is not greater than it is. Amongst these regular or occasional paupers, there is a surprising number of aged persons. Wo can only ascribe the protraction of their lives to the healthiness of the place, their early robust habits, and their exemption from excesses of all kinds. They seem weak in muscle, and thin in blood, and often have severe chronic ailments, such as cancer, ulcers, and palsy; but they are remarkably free from acute diseases, which, after all, are the most fatal to life. It is sad, however, to think of so many weakly and bedrid old people so inadequately supplied with those necessaries which are perhaps at no time so necessary, and those comforts which are at no time so comforting, as when life is waning to its close.

* It may be remarked, that we have seen not only the poor
roll, but the lists drawn up by the committees of both 1838 and
of the particular condition of every one of the applicants. These
1839, and have obtained copies of these, together with memoranda
various documents have served as materials for the present paper.
It is to be observed that only 174 families were supplied. The
remainder of the 187 were rejected as "unworthy," by which

terin, we regret to say, it is not so much meant that the parties
were unentitled to relief in point of indigence, as that they were

persons of bad character-moral repute being always an important

element in the consideration of a poor man's claim in Scotland.

|

The decent good behaviour of the great bulk of the extremely poor is very remarkable. Intemperance appears the cause of indigence in only a few cases amongst the families of secondary necessity; in the cases of first necessity, it may almost be described as unknown. In these cases, poverty is simply the natural and unavoidable consequence of surviving the period during which labour gave an independent support. The gains of the parties in those better days having been barely enough to support them, they could lay aside nothing for old age. Their children, generally farm-servants, labourers, or artisans, on scanty wages, having enough ado to support their own young families, can do nothing, or the nearest thing to nothing, for the generation passing away. Pauperism, in such circumstances, is inevitable, if life lasts. These poor persons are, therefore, in general marked by all the virtues which most prominently attach to Scottish humble life. A pious sentiment of resignation and contentment is almost universal. A lady who goes much amongst them as an emissary of a benevolent society of persons of her own sex, to distribute food and clothing where most pressingly required, spoke warmly to us of their quiet virtues, the modesty of their expectations, and their spirit of righteous self-denial. She reports, that often, in the course of her monthly rounds, when she calls on a person whom she knows to be very poor, and asks if any thing be needed, the answer will be, "Nothing this time, ma'am ;" and the individual will perhaps point to some neighbour who she is sure is in need. There is great scrupulousness as to debt. When one of the eighteen-pence paupers of the parish died in January last, it was found that her rent was paid up till Whitsunday. Another assured us in last April that she had her rent paid up to Lam

mas.

It is common for the parish paupers to allow the kirk-treasurer to retain as much of their allowance in his hands as pays their rent. A grocer, one day conversing with the above-mentioned lady respecting a certain poor woman who lived near by, said he should be glad to give her a little credit now and then, as he was satisfied of her honesty. The lady reported the offer to the poor woman, who, however, declined it, saying that she had once been owing more than two shillings before, and had been so distressed about it, that she resolved never to "take on" any more. Our informant also mentioned an instance of the benevolence of the poor to the poor. An old woman who had long been in miserable circumstances, having at length had a pension of five pounds left her by a relation, immediately began to exercise charity out of that little pittance, giving away, for instance, her tea-leaves regularly to a poorer neighbour. So true is Wordsworth's remark

"The poorest poor

Long for some moments in a weary life,

When they can know and feel that they have been
Themselves the fathers and the dealers out
Of some small blessings."

Well, surely, might one of such a spirit "sit by her fire
and build her hope in heaven."

in Scotland, under a system of management which Such is the state of the poor in a small rural town keep down pauperism, and in contrast with which the has been often represented as peculiarly calculated to English system is believed to be only a monstrous abuse. Out of 101 cases of extreme necessity, an outneeded to support bare existence, is extended to only 38. door pension, at an average less than half of what is There are other eighty-six cases of less or occasional necessity, to which no parochial relief is extended. For bidden to dream of any thing approaching to a legal title to relief from the holders of the property and the realisers of the profits of the earth, the poor, thus enormous in number, are nevertheless the habitual or occasional pensioners of their more comfortable neighbours. Considerably more than a third—indeed nearly two-fifths of the families in the town, are so far pauperised as to be willing to come forward for a share of what may comparatively be spoken of as a small private charity. It is at the same time found, that only in a few cases out of those described as of great necessity, do the relatives of the parties afford any degree of succour. Surely there must be some strange misunderstanding respecting a system under which

such results can be found.

which may be said to rest at the base of the system. One misconception is very obvious, and it is one It takes the form of a dogma that, if the poor are not supplied at all, or at least supplied very scantily, there will be the fewer poor. We might fairly ask, after stating the above facts, if the parish under our notice affords any practical proof of the soundness of this dogma. If we say that, by refusing to admit paupers the present writer that we only affirm an identical on the parish roll, we repress pauperism, it appears to proposition; but if we suppose that we extinguish poverty and suffering by repressing that, its outward and visible sign, the argument is as hollow as it is heartless. We have seen that, although the paupers of a small town may be kept below one-twentieth of the population, the destitution of the people may so independence, that one-fourth of them may be obliged, increase and multiply, and so break down their boasted and may be willing, to apply for and subsist on charitable assistance when they can get it; just as we know that in Ireland, where up to this time there have been no paupers, the portion of the population regularly dependent, during great part of the year, on the charity of the rest, has been not less than one-fourth of the whole.

But we would also put it to the consciences of men, if such a dogma be, in existing circumstances, either humane or just. In this community, a large portion of the people are constantly engaged, during their better years, in labours which tend to the comfort and enrichment of the rest.* For their labour they get only such wages as barely maintain them, leaving no means of providing for old age. Their inevitable fate, therefore, is to fall into helpless penury. Such persons may be said to be in the same circumstances with soldiers, who, having only such pay as suffices to give them immediate support, require to be pensioned in their latter years. What great hordes of old discharged soldiers would be if left unpensioned, these labourers are, without a legal claim to relief. How strange would it seem to hear the dogma announced that, if old soldiers were left pensionless, or endowed with only some mockery of a pension, there would be the fewer old soldiers! Yet the doctrine respecting the poor of the labouring class is exactly the same. It is a doctrine, accordingly, which would reflect burning disgrace upon those who announce it, if it were not that they are utterly blind to its real character.

We have only to notice, in conclusion, a notion very prevalent in the town in question, namely, that many poor people come into it in their old days from the country around. On careful examination, we found this to be the case to a small extent, but not so much as seriously to affect the question. Even, however, allowing for a moment that the country parishes are thus spared at the expense of the town, does it not add just one other inequitable feature to the present system?

A STORY OF THE SEVENTEENTH
CENTURY.

IN the beginning of the seventeenth century, or, to be
more particular, in the year 1616, a shipwreck took
place on the coast of Suffolk, before the eyes of a
number of the assembled inhabitants of the district
where it happened. The evening on which the bark
came in sight was a stormy one, and its crew struggled
long to avoid the half-seen breakers, or sunken rocks,
which threatened them with evident destruction. Most
gallantly indeed did the poor mariners struggle, and
so long as the light was good they were successful.
But the dusk of evening came on, and then the hope
of their escape was awfully lessened. By degrees, the
bark and its inmates disappeared from the strain-
ing gaze of those on shore. The last glimpse which
the latter had of the ill-fated vessel, showed the deck
crowded with passengers and crew, whose outstretched
hands pled strongly though silently for help. Help
could not be given, though the unfortunates received
the warmest sympathy of those who saw them. Even
after all was enveloped in gloom at sea, the people on
land remained on the same spot, listening with horror
to the howling of the storm, and expecting every mo-
ment to hear the sound mingled up with the "cry of
some strong swimmer in his agony."

"that on

"Can nothing be done?" said a voice in the crowd, the first which had spoken aloud for some time. Every body turned round to the spot whence it came, the people of the place knowing that the sounds came from a stranger's lips. "Can nothing be done?" repeated the same person; "I will give a reward- -a large reward for every life that is saved." An old fisherman took it upon him to reply. "Do you think," said he, roughly, 66. we would have stood idle this half hour, if we could have done any thing to save them? No; I think I know the coast as well as any man hereabouts, or any where else, and I know that no boat could have crossed the black rocks—unless bottom upwards." A murmur of assent was heard from all around. "You think, then," said the first speaker, after a panse, these rocks the vessel will perish?" "Too likely, your honour," returned the fisher, whom the light yet permitted to see that his interrogator was a gentleman; "if the ship was once within these rocks, something might be done. But within them it never will be. What between the sand and the rocks, there is hardly sea-way for a herring-barrel to pass inside." "But, my good friend, there is a chance-a slight one perhaps and you may at least have your boats on the alert." "Please God," replied the man, quietly, "I will be on the look-out. We may save some lives. But it will be a full hour ere the moon rises, and till then nothing can be done by man." "Thanks, thanks," cried the stranger, gratified and assured by the firm though quiet tones of the speaker; "I will reward all-all," he continued more quietly, "who will oblige me by receiving it."

In an hour the moon began to give a glimmering light, sufficient to permit the people ashore to glance over the face of the deep to a short distance. Nothing was visible there. A blank expression passed over the faces of the assembled band. But the old fisherman roused them to exertion, and a fishing-boat was put to sea in the little cove formed inside of the rocks alluded to. The wind was not so high as formerly, yet high enough to make the short excursion proposed *It may be mentioned, that the poor's funds of this parish are chiefly supplied by what is called a voluntary assessment of the land-proprietors, the remainder being derived from the church collections, and other sources. The annual produce of the land of the parish is estimated at L.22,540, and the annual sum contributed for the poor in this manner is about L. 222, or one per cent.

a matter of danger to the three or four hardy men
whom the old fisherman chose to take with him. We
shall not attempt to paint the anxiety which followed
the starting of the boat, the whole course of which the
light did not permit to be seen from land. It returned
at length, and with an ominous proof of the doom
which had befallen the ship. It brought the body of
a man!

now are, before the conquest of England by the Normans. You must certainly be conscious, sir, of pos sessing an honourable pedigree to think of such a proposal as this."

Theodore's heart sank within him as Mr Balls spoke. "I am conscious," he replied, "of an honourable descent, and I do not come thus before you without the means of proving it, although I must avouch The exertions of the stranger already mentioned candidly, and at once, that there are some things conwere instantly devoted to the resuscitation of this nected with myself which I cannot disclose. I will victim of the deep. He had the insensible body car- satisfy you, by the testimonials of those whose word ried to the old fisherman's cottage, and there used all ought not to be doubted, that my name is an honourpossible means to restore the vital spark. His atten- able one, but that name it is not in my power to reveal." tions were rewarded with success. Ere the morning Mr Balls gazed at the speaker with a look of surprise. light dawned, the castaway, a youth of noble appear-"I might have taken a fictitious name, and have ance, was seated by the fire of the fisher's hut, able to deceived you, but I prefer to admit that there are converse with the stranger, and to thank him for his imperative reasons for withholding my name from all care. These thanks were expressed in good English, but one person.” “And who may that person be?" though with some peculiarities showing that English said Mr Balls, with an ominous sneer. Theodore was not the native tongue of the speaker. observed the look, and did not immediately reply. From the recovered youth it was learned that the "Surely the person to whom you allude," continued vessel, which was an Italian merchantman, had struck Mr Balls, " must be the head of that house with which soon after the night fell, and had gone to pieces in a you seek to connect yourself?" The young stranger quarter of an hour afterwards. He himself had swum answered, "No, sir; I am bound by a solemn engagefor the shore, but had exhausted his powers and lost ment to reveal my name only to her whe becomes the all consciousness before being taken up. The proofs sharer of it with me." That is to say, that my of his statement were made in part visible by the day- daughter is to wed with one who dare not disclose his light. Several corses were driven on shore, others name to the world? Can the cause of this be a were picked up by boats, and the remains of the little creditable one? Impossible!" Theodore's heart was bark of Italy were cast on land by inches. The wreck too deeply interested in the matter to permit him to had been an entire and terrible one. take offence at the words of Mr Balls, especially as his reason told him they were founded on a natural feeling. He therefore pressed the father of Mary to look at the letters from Italy, to which he had referred. The other consented, as much from curiosity as from any other motive. The letters were from two Italian noblemen, and were written evidently according to a form dictated by Theodore. The writers stated, that they knew the family of Theodore to be of high distinction, and his birth to be honourable, though there family from the world at large. They also referred to were important reasons for concealing his name and his possession of considerable property, and mentioned other circumstances of a favourable nature.

Some time after this lamentable affair, the recovered youth was established as an inmate of the rectory of Hadleigh, the incumbent of which, Mr Petre, had been his preserver on the night of the wreck. The young stranger gave himself the simple name of Theodore, and seemed averse to further inquiry into his name or affairs. But he was so gentle in manners, so intelligent, and so accomplished, that he became as a beloved son to the good pastor. "I was a lonely has given me a son in pity. You will not part from man," said the rector to him repeatedly, "but heaven me, Theodore? I have enough for both." The young stranger replied with warmth to Mr Petre's kindness, but repeatedly mentioned, that he required no pecuniary support that he would receive means enough to render him independent of all such aid, on corresponding with his friends in Italy.

Mr Petre introduced his new friend to all whom he himself knew, and among others to the family of Mr Balls, one of the principal proprietors of the neighbourhood. This gentleman was of an ancient local house, and proud of his descent from a follower of the Saxon Harold at the battle of Hastings. He had a large family, the eldest of whom was his daughter Mary, a young lady possessed of great personal attractions, and a heart gentle and susceptible. The stranger, so noble in appearance and elegant in manners, made ere long a deep impression on her affections, which was fully reciprocated by the object of her regard. But he was modest and unassuming, and so well knew the difficulties which his position as an unknown cast away involved him in, that, but for an accidental peril which the young lady sustained in his presence, from the unmanageableness of her riding palfrey, the secret might have remained for ever locked up in the recess of his own heart. The danger of the mistress of his affections, however, called forth a passionate outburst of love. It was heard, and responded to, ere the parties concerned could think of aught else.

[ocr errors]

The lovers met, and met again. "This must not
be," said Theodore at length, on one of these occasions;
your father, dearest Mary, must be told all. And
yet I fear"- "Fear!" replied the young lady,
"what have we to fear you must be our equal in
birth," and she glanced with a look of pride on her
lover's manly and dignified form. "Birth equal in
birth!" cried he, and for the first time Mary beheld
something like pride, or even haughtiness, on his
countenance. But it soon passed away, and he said,
"I am the equal of your father in birth, but circum-
stances exist which compel me to be so far silent on
that point. I have sworn an oath, that to none but
the wife of my bosom will I reveal my name and origin."
Mary became thoughtful at these words, and her lover
saw a blush gather slowly on her downcast cheeks.
He read its signification as clearly as if it had been
told in words." No, Mary," cried he, "the honour
of my mother was as untainted as thine own--as pure
as the heaven that overlooks us! But mine has been
a strange doom. The welfare of others called from
me the oath I have spoken of, and it must be kept.
I shall satisfy your father for ere long I shall have
the means-that I am of good and honourable birth,
and of means perhaps equal to his own; but my name
and family, I have said, must be made known to thee
alone-if, indeed, I ever have the happiness to call
thee mine."

Theodore did not address himself to Mr Balls until
he had communicated with his friends in Italy, and
received such credentials as he trusted would remove
any objections that the father of Mary might enter-
taín. Lovers look through a magnifying glass at all
the circumstances favourable to their wish, but apply
a diminishing one to all obstacles and difficulties in
their way. So it was in the present case.
Balls was applied to by Theodore, he started at the
When Mr
proposal. "My daughter, sir !" cried he; "my daugh-
ter is of an ancient and honourable family. The Balls
family possessed this house and property, where we

[ocr errors]

We do not wish to lengthen our story. Mr Balls declared, that if the register of baptism of the young stranger were presented to him along with these documents, and he were permitted to show the whole to his family and friends, he would be satisfied. This decision he adhered to, and neither the entreaties of Theodore, nor the tears of his daughter, could move him to alter it. On the other hand, Theodore firmly though sadly declared, that such a proposal could never be acceded to by him.

The consequence was, that the young stranger's visits to the house of his mistress were peremptorily forbidden, although Mr Petre, whose confidence in his guest's honour and integrity was unshaken, joined his entreaties to those of the lovers to bring matters to a favourable close. But all was in vain. Can we wonder at the issue? Theodore and the object of his love met in secret, and, finally, they were privately married. The direct reason of this rash step was the confident hope entertained by Mary, that, if intrusted with the secret of Theodore, she might, by the strength of her testimony, reconcile her father to their union. She did learn her husband's secret, and such was its nature, in her eyes at least, that it only augmented her love, and increased her pride in him a thousand-fold. But this did not save her from the violent anger of her father, when her marriage was disclosed. "Oh! believe me, dear father," she exclaimed, with tears, "he is one of whom you ought, in every respect, to feel proud!" "Proud!" cried the irritated father, "proud of a nameless wanderer!--my family proud of an union with such as he!" "Yes," returned the daughter, "you will one day be proud of Theodore, and repent of your unkindness." "If you desire me to do so, unfold at once this vile mystery! If not, begone from these walls, and follow the vagrant you have chosen !"

In the little village of Llandulph, in Cornwall, the pair who form the main personages of our story lived for many years after their union, beloved by all around them. They were happy in their mutual affection, though the continued anger of the lady's father threw a frequent damp over the enjoyments of the wife, who made many fruitless appeals for a reconciliation. At length Mary wrote that her husband was ill, and, to increase the evil, had been made so chiefly by the cessation of his wonted communications from Italy. She and her family were now in want. Mr Balls turned a deaf ear to this new appeal from his daughter. To a second of the same nature, he proved equally cold. A third communication, after a considerable interval of time, informed him that his daughter was a broken-hearted widow, her husband having sunk under the pressure of want and its attendant distresses. A portion of the same letter led Mr Balls to go to Cornwall.

The following inscription, engraven on a brass tablet affixed to a mural monument in the chancel of Llandulph church, and still to be seen there by visiters, will show what Mr Balls learnt on his arrival there.

"Here lyeth the body of Theodoro Paleologus, of Pesanio in Italy, descended from the Imperial line of of Camilio, the son of Prosper, the son of Theodoro, the last Christian Emperors of Greece, being the son the son of John, the son of Thomas, the second brother to Constantine Paleologus the eighth of that name, and last of the line that reigned in Constantinople

until subdued by the Turks, who married with Mary the daughter of William Balls of Hadleigh in Suffolk, gent.; * and departed this life at Clyfton, the 21st of January 1636." Persecuted by Pope Paul V. and his successor Gregory XV., who hated the Greek line, Theodore Paleologus would have perished in Italy, had not the interference of a powerful friend procured permission for him to retire to England, upon condition of his taking an oath never to divulge his name, that those attached to the imperial house might remain ignorant of the existence of its representative. "Father," said the widow of the last Paleologus, "I said you would one day repent."

The English squire, whose ancestor had been at the battle of Hastings, did indeed think with sorrowful regret of his conduct to the last of the Cæsars of the

East!

[ocr errors]

A CHAPTER ON THUMBS. Say, where's the mighty Thumb, our sword and buckler? Though 'gainst us men and giants league with gods, Yet Thumb alone is equal to more odds."

[ocr errors]

If two bargaining parties respectively licked or wetted | alike. Some are elegantly curved at the point, while their thumbs, and joined the one with the other, the others are straight as a rush. Some can bend back engagement was held to be firm and binding. Decrees till they touch the wrist, while others cannot be even are yet extant in the Scottish records, prior to the slightly inclined in that direction without the greatest institution of the College of Justice, sustaining sales pain. On the other hand, some can be curiously bent inwards at the base, while others are fixed there as a upon summonses of thumb-licking, the fact of that ceremony having been gone through at the time of bar- rock. There are many other and intermediate variegaining being first established by legal testimony. ties. These characters of thumbs are not unimportant, but the reverse. We believe that it will be almost Indeed, in markets and every place of sale, this custom was prevalent but a few years ago among farmers, universally found that all the cleverest and handiest tradesmen, and almost all parties engaged in traffic. carpenters, and, in short, the best tradesmen of every The wet thumb was a token of rectitude of intention class that make much use of the hands, have thumbs seldom falsified, and the man who could break his curved outwards, and capable of bending back at the word, after confirming it by that sign, would have point. This is decidedly the mechanic's thumb, and been regarded as one whom oaths could not bind. the cause obviously is, that the prehension of instruments is greatly facilitated by flexibility of the upper Another old practice, honourable to the same member, has now become altogether extinct. It is al- portion of the member. This sort of thumb being by luded to by Falstaff, when he says, "A plague of far the strongest variety, is not less advantageous to sighing and grief! it blows a man up like a bladder. surgeons. They often require great power and flexiWhen I was about thy years, Hal, I was not an eagle's bility in the upper part of the anti-digit. We recoltalon in the waist; I could have crept into an alder- lect on one occasion witnessing the amputation of a man's thumb-ring." Such an article was actually worn boy's limb, where the assisting surgeon, whose duty it by these great civic functionaries in past times, as an was to apply the tourniquet (for stopping the flow of especial badge of office and token of high place, and blood in the arteries), on being asked to do so, merely also, no doubt, as a sign of the respect entertained for applied his thumb over the seat of the great vessel of the leg, and, by its pressure, checked the course of Thumb. the blood effectually. This digital strength rendered the use of screw and bandage totally unnecessary. In other cases, the same qualities were often equally useful to the same distinguished surgeon, and it would be well, indeed, if every operator possessed such

This quotation from Shakspeare has brought to mind, that on various occasions he exhibits a due sense of the value of the member under consideration. Knowing that upon the helm rests the safety of the ship, that upon the pilot's hand depends the right guidance of the helm, and that the pilot's hand were skill-less and powerless without the thumb, he makes his revengeful wierd-sister say,

"Here I have a pilot's thumb,

Wrecked as homeward he did come,"

FIELDING, it is but fair to admit, did not intend these words to bear the sense which is sought to be extracted from them here. They occur in his famous burlesque opera, and refer to the son of Gaffer Thumb, the renowned Tommy, whose fate it was to be for a time, as the story tells us, an inmate of the stomach of "a huge red cow, larger than the largest size." But the eulogy of the motto is not less applicable to Thumb, the finger, digit, or rather anti-digit, for so it may be termed from its position and uses. This member is somewhat neglected and undervalued at the present as if the possession of that potent member gave her day. The ancients, however, evinced a deeper and the power of misleading and "tempest-tossing" the juster sense of its value. "The Greeks," says Mon- bark of the unfortunate "master o' the Tiger," whose taigne, “called it anticheir, as who should say, another chesnut-munching wife had roused the witch's anger. hand." In like manner, the appellation by which the The mighty poet seems even to hint that the thumb is an organ of still greater value among the spiritual member was known among the Romans, displayed a people than among men, and endowed with foresight thorough consciousness of its importance. They termed and a peculiar degree of consciousness. How else are we to interpret the exclamation of one of the wierd it pollex, a word derived from the verb pollere, to bear sway, to excel; thus indicating both its general excellence and its special superiority over the other component parts of the hand. In many additional respects the Romans exhibited in their customs their signal esteem for this important member. The thumb, in the brilliant days of Rome, had life and death at its command. A single movement of the organ, a slight inflexion of its joints one way or another, was the signal of fate to thousands-the forerunner of destruction, or the donor of a new lease of existence. Those acquainted with the customs of the Romans will be aware that we allude to the practice pursued by them at their gladiatorial shows, of deciding whether the unfortunate slaves who then and there hacked and

slashed one another for the amusement of their masters, should be allowed to survive the combat or not, by turning the thumb up or down. If a gladiator, after fighting bravely either with man or beast, was at last worsted and put at his opponent's mercy, the spectators sometimes interposed to save his life by elevating their hands and turning their thumbs downwards and inwards, and their fiat, thus expressed, was all-powerful to save. If they were displeased, however, with the conduct of any particular gladiator, they almost uniformly condemned him to death by elevating their thumbs, and bending them outwards, and the poor wretch was dispatched accordingly by the weapon of his adversary, or, if that adversary chanced to be a wild beast, was left to perish beneath its fangs, unpitied and unaided. It is in allusion to this practice of the populace at their great spectacles that Juvenal

[blocks in formation]

neous causes.

The thumb was an equally influential and respected member among many of the other nations of antiquity, whom these polished and merciful Romans called barbarians. Tacitus, for example, tells us that certain barbarian kings, when they desired to make a peculiarly firm and lasting compact with any neighbour, were in the habit of joining their right hand with his, and twisting each other's thumbs, or tying them together by a cord; and when, by force of pressure, the Blushing blood appeared in the tips, they pricked these with some sharp instrument, and mutually sucked them. This action was intended, no doubt, as a striking emblem of their desire to secure a lasting peace, by extracting the hot and fiery blood from that important member by which alone their hands and arms were made powerful either for offence or for defence. Something like the same mode of making compacts has been practised among all the Celtic and Gothic tribes; and in our own Scotland the custom is scarcely yet extinct. Allan Ramsay, in one of his songs, says,

Though kith and kin and a' should revile thee,
There's my thumb, I'll ne'er beguile thee."

sisters?

"By the pricking of my thumbs,

Something wicked this way comes."

It is, upon the whole, scarcely a matter for regret, that the thumb should not possess in this gross world qualities so high as these. The pricking might be annoyingly frequent.

who were selected as torturers knew well how much a In the times of the persecution in Scotland, those man could be injured through his thumbs. Old General Dalzell brought thumbikins into use in torturing the poor Covenanters. This instrument consisted of two separate and parallel horizontal bars, with a handled screw above, which moved the upper bar towards the lower one, and crushed the unfortunate anti-digits that might be placed between. The pain given by this instrument was so excruciating, that those who bore all other torments failed to bear this. One victim, by name William Spence, was crushed and maimed by the bootikins, or boots for torturing the legs, and was also kept from sleep for eight or nine successive nights. But he continued firm, till his "tormentors (says Bishop Burnet) grew weary of managing this: so a third species (of torture) was invented; little screws of steel were made use of, that screwed the thumbs with so exquisite a torment, that he sank under it." He "desired time, and he would tell all." Principal Carstares was also tortured by the thumbikins, and the very pair which crushed his thumb-bones, and caused his arms to swell to the shoulder, are still preserved. When Carstares was introduced to King William after the revolution of 1688, the monarch is reported to have inquired about the thumbikins. "I will show them to you," said the principal, "the next time I have the honour to wait upon your majesty." Carstares, who had got the instrument from the new Privy-Council of Scotland, was as good as his word. "I must try them," said the king; "I must put in my thumbs here.-Now, principal, turn the screw. Oh, not so gently-another turn-another;-stop! stop! no more-no more!—another turn, I am afraid, would make me confess any thing!" And such was precisely the result in cases of torture. The poor sufferers confessed any thing. It is to be hoped that the thumb will never be elevated to the same unlucky pre-eminence, which brought into existence such an article as the thumbikins.

A more commendable employment of this member in past times was that which gave origin to the phrase, "Rule of thumb." It was once a common enough practice in Scotland to measure objects in a rough way by calculating a thumb's-breadth as an inch. Of course no great accuracy could attend this sort of mensuration, and our more precise times apply the phrase jestingly to every case of rude or careless computation. There was a sort of fine assurance of prevalent honesty, however, about the old practice, though it certainly laid buyers too much at the mercy of wily pedlars. Besides, there is a vast difference in the breadth of different thumbs. In other points, also, they vary most materially. The truth is, that thumb e decided and well-marked characters, as mucks heads, faces, or any other portions of the animal frame. Scarcely any two thumbs are precisely

thumbs.

But it is in war, in the art military, that the thumb assumes its true, its highest importance. The thumb makes the soldier; there can be no doubt of that. If there be dubitation on the point in the mind of any one, a cloud of witnesses may be called up to dispel it. Augustus Cæsar is said to have confiscated the estate of a Roman knight who had cut off the thumbs of his two sons to save them from war, and, before that era, the senate put a man named Caius Valienus into prison for life, on account of un-thumbing his left hand with the same view. These cases show at how early a period people acquired a sense of the value of this member in war, but at a later era of the Roman history the same thing was still more fully demonstrated. Laws were issued by successive emperors to prevent thumb-mutilation, yet the practice had become so common in the time of Theodosius, and still with the same view of escaping military service, that the word poltroon (pollice truncus-mutilated in the thumb), then found its origin as a synonyme for coward. The member has not lost its consequence in modern warfare, as any one who takes up Marshall's work on the Enlisting of Soldiers may at once see. In the British army, soldiers have been repeatedly found to cut off their thumbs, or blow them off with fire-arms, to procure discharges and pensions. Very recently, when a regiment was about to embark at Cork for the West Indies, four of the men presented themselves at one time with their thumbs minus a joint. "There was an instance (says the author just mentioned) of voluntary mutilation in the -th regiment not long ago. A soldier attempted to mutilate a thumb, but his courage failed him, and the operation was effectually concluded by his wife. Another soldier, who was at the time quartered in the Dublin depôt barracks, alleged that in consequence of falling forwards upon a fractured glass bottle lying at the bottom of the barrack stair, he had the thumb nearly amputated;" but the cut was discovered to have been made from the back of the hand, and the soldier was found in a lie, and punished. One dragoon swore that his horse had bit off his thumb, but his sword was found bloody, and the trick discovered. Sometimes parties have been known to chop off the forefinger, and sometimes the whole hand, but the thumb is the member most frequently mutilated to produce a disability for war. What an idea this gives us of the paramount importance of the organ! To thumbs we may ascribe the most glorious victories, as well as the most desolating wars of oppression. Without thumbs we should have had no heroes.

Strange as it may appear, thumbs are also essential helps to oratory. The most successful legal speaker of the present day, now a lord and a judge, as well as many other noted orators, show how much they depend upon the thumb for aid during their addresses, by perpetually tapping it with the forefinger of the opposite hand. At every tap, no doubt, the thumb gives out an unseen stream of eloquence, electrical, perhaps, in its nature, and of course the more calculated to affect the audience. Another curious and more mysterious use of the thumb is seen in the action of applying it to the tip of the nose, and spreading out the hand from it in a horizontal line. Unquestionably, there is some valuable signification couched under this movement, in which the thumb plays so distinguished a part; but this meaning is usually hidden under some incomprehensible words with which the gesture is accompanied. Talking of the nose, snuffers (we mean snuffing mortals, not candle-polling machines) could not carry on their pleasant amusement for an instant, but for the member we at present delight to honour.

"Betwixt his finger and his thumb he held
A pouncet-box, which ever and anon
He gave his nose."

Thumbs, therefore, have a vital influence, we see, on an important branch of commerce-the tobacco trade.

« ZurückWeiter »