"The rose of Lancaster for lack of nurture pales."
--BLACKBURN BARD.
It was early on a fine morning in July when I next set off to see
Preston again; the long-continued rains seemed to be ended, and the
unclouded sun flooded all the landscape with splendour. All nature
rejoiced in the change, and the heart of man was glad. In Clifton
Vale, the white-sleeved mowers were at work among the rich grass,
and the scent of new hay came sweetly through our carriage windows.
In the leafy cloughs and hedges, the small birds were wild with joy,
and every garden sent forth a goodly smell. Along its romantic vale
the glittering Irwell meandered, here, through nooks, "o'erhung wi'
wildwoods, thickening green;" and there, among lush unshaded
pastures; gathering on its way many a mild whispering brook, whose
sunlit waters laced the green land with freakish lines of trembling
gold. To me this ride is always interesting, so many points of
historic interest line the way; but it was doubly delightful on that
glorious July morning. And I never saw Fishergate, in Preston, look
better than it did then. On my arrival there I called upon the
Secretary of the Trinity Ward Relief Committee. In a quiet bye-
street, where there are four pleasant cottages, with little gardens
in front of them, I found him in his studious nook, among books,
relief tickets, and correspondence. We had a few minutes' talk about
the increasing distress of the town; and he gave me a short account
of the workroom which has been opened in Knowsley Street, for the
employment of female factory operatives out of work. This workroom
is managed by a committee of ladies, some of whom are in attendance
every day. The young women are employed upon plain sewing. They have
two days' work a week, at one shilling a day, and the Relief
Committee adds sixpence to this 2s. in each case. Most of them are
merely learning to sew. Many of them prove to be wholly untrained to
this simple domestic accomplishment. The work is not remunerative,
nor is it expected to be so; but the benefit which may grow out of
the teaching which these young women get here--and the evil their
employment here may prevent, cannot be calculated. I find that such
workrooms are established in some of the other towns now suffering
from the depression of trade. Some of these I intend to visit
hereafter. I spent an interesting half-hour with the secretary,
after which I went to see the factory operatives at work upon
Preston Moor.
Preston Moor is a tract of waste land on the western edge of the
town. It belongs to the corporation. A little vale runs through a
great part of this moor, from south-east to north-west; and the
ground was, until lately, altogether uneven. On the town side of the
little dividing vale the land is a light, sandy soil; on the other
side, there is abundance of clay for brickmaking. Upon this moor
there are now fifteen hundred men, chiefly factory operatives, at
work, levelling the land for building purposes, and making a great
main sewer for the drainage of future streets. The men, being almost
all unused to this kind of labour, are paid only one shilling per
day; and the whole scheme has been devised for the employment of
those who are suffering from the present depression of trade. The
work had been going on several months before I saw it, and a great
part of the land was levelled. When I came in sight of the men,
working in scattered gangs that fine morning, there was, as might be
expected, a visible difference between their motions and those of
trained "navvies" engaged upon the same kind of labour. There were
also very great differences of age and physical condition amongst
them--old men and consumptive-looking lads, hardly out of their
teens. They looked hard at me as I walked down the central line, but
they were not anyway uncivil. "What time is 't, maister?" asked a
middle-aged man, with gray hair, as he wiped his forehead. "Hauve-
past ten," said I. "What time says he?" inquired a feeble young
fellow, who was resting upon his barrow. "Hauve-past ten, he says,"
replied the other. "Eh; it's warm!" said the tired lad, lying down
upon his barrow again. One thing I noticed amongst these men, with
very rare exceptions, their apparel, however poor, evinced that
wholesome English love of order and cleanliness which generally
indicates something of self-respect in the wearer--especially among
poor folk. There is something touching in the whiteness of a well-
worn shirt, and the careful patches of a poor man's old fustian
coat.
As I lounged about amongst the men, a mild-eyed policeman came up,
and offered to conduct me to Jackson, the labour-master, who had
gone down to the other end of the moor, to look after the men at
work at the great sewer--a wet clay cutting--the heaviest bit of
work on the ground. We passed some busy brickmakers, all plastered
and splashed with wet clay --of the earth, earthy. Unlike the
factory operatives around them, these men clashed, and kneaded, and
sliced among the clay, as if they were working for a wager. But they
were used to the job, and working piece-work. A little further on,
we came to an unbroken bit of the moor. Here, on a green slope we
saw a poor lad sitting chirruping upon the grass, with a little
cloutful of groundsel for bird meat in his hand, watching another,
who was on his knees, delving for earth-nuts with an old knife.
Lower down the slope there were three other lads plaguing a young
jackass colt; and further off, on the town edge of the moor, several
children from the streets hard by, were wandering about the green
hollow, picking daisies, and playing together in the sunshine. There
are several cotton factories close to the moor, but they were quiet
enough. Whilst I looked about me here, the policeman pointed to the
distance and said, "Jackson's comin' up, I see. Yon's him, wi' th'
white lin' jacket on." Jackson seems to have won the esteem of the
men upon the moor by his judicious management and calm
determination. I have heard that he had a little trouble at first,
through an injurious report spread amongst the men immediately
before he undertook the management. Some person previously employed
upon the ground had "set it eawt that there wur a chap comin' that
would make 'em addle a hauve-a-creawn a day for their shillin'." Of
course this increased the difficulty of his position; but he seems
to have fought handsomely through all that sort of thing. I had met
him for a few minutes once before, so there was no difficulty
between us.
"Well, Jackson," said I, "heaw are yo gettin' on among it?" "Oh,
very well, very well," said he," We'n more men at work than we had,
an' we shall happen have more yet. But we'n getten things into
something like system, an' then tak 'em one with another th' chaps
are willin' enough. You see they're not men that have getten a
livin' by idling aforetime; they're workin' men, but they're strange
to this job, an' one cannot expect 'em to work like trained honds,
no moor than one could expect a lot o' navvies to work weel at
factory wark. Oh, they done middlin', tak 'em one with another." I
now asked him if he had not had some trouble with the men at first.
"Well," said he, "I had at first, an' that's the truth. I remember
th' first day that I came to th' job. As I walked on to th' ground
there was a great lump o' clay coom bang into my earhole th' first
thing; but I walked on, an' took no notice, no moor than if it had
bin a midge flyin' again my face. Well, that kind o' thing took
place, now an' then, for two or three days, but I kept agate o'
never mindin'; till I fund there were some things that I thought
could be managed a deal better in a different way; so I gav' th' men
notice that I would have 'em altered. For instance, now, when I coom
here at first, there was a great shed in yon hollow; an' every
mornin' th' men had to pass through that shed one after another, an'
have their names booked for th' day. The result wur, that after
they'd walked through th' shed, there was many on 'em walked out at
t'other end o' th' moor straight into teawn a-playin' 'em. Well, I
was determined to have that system done away with. An', when th' men
fund that I was gooin' to make these alterations, they growled a
good deal, you may depend, an' two or three on 'em coom up an' spoke
to me abeawt th' matter, while tother stood clustered a bit off.
Well; I was beginnin' to tell 'em plain an' straight-forrud what I
would have done, when one o' these three sheawted out to th' whole
lot, "Here, chaps, come an' gether reawnd th' devil. Let's yer what
he's for!" 'Well,' said I, 'come on, an' you shall yer,' for aw felt
cawmer just then, than I did when it were o'er. There they were,
gethered reawnd me in a minute,--th' whole lot,--I were fair hemmed
in. But I geet atop ov a bit ov a knowe, an' towd 'em a fair tale,--
what I wanted, an' what I would have, an' I put it to 'em whether
they didn't consider it reet. An' I believe they see'd th' thing in
a reet leet, but they said nought about it, but went back to their
wark, lookin' sulky. But I've had very little bother with 'em sin'.
I never see'd a lot o' chaps so altered sin' th' last February, as
they are. At that time no mortal mon hardly could walk through 'em
'beawt havin' a bit o' slack-jaw, or a lump o' clay or summat flung
a-him. But it isn't so, neaw. I consider th' men are doin' very
weel. But, come; yo mun go deawn wi' me a-lookin' at yon main
sewer."