LIVERPOOL CONTINUED.—IRISH BEGGARS.—CONDITION OF LABOURERS.—COST
OF LIVING.—PRICES.—BATH HOUSE.—QUARANTINE.—THE DOCKS.—STREET
SCENE.—“COMING YANKEE” OVER NONSENSE.—ARTISTIC BEGGING.
[Sidenote: _BEGGARS.—PLACARD._]
I have learned nothing reliable about the price of labour here; the
Irish emigration keeps it lower in Liverpool than elsewhere. This
reminds me of beggars, and of a placard posted everywhere about the
streets to-day. The beggars are not very frequent, and are mostly poor,
pitiable, sickly women, carrying half-naked babies. The placard is
as follows:—“The SELECT VESTRY inform their fellow-citizens, that in
consequence of the extremely low price of passage from Ireland—4_d._ (8
cts.), great numbers are coming here apparently with no other object
than to beg. They earnestly desire that nothing should be given them.”
As a specimen, they mention the following: an Irish woman, pretending
to be a widow, was taken up, who had obtained 3_s._ 2_d._ (80 cts.) in
an hour and a half after her arrival. Her husband was found already in
custody.
The people all seem to be enjoying life more, or else to be much more
miserable than in America.[3] The labourers seem haggard and stupid,
and all with whom I have talked, say a poor man can hardly live here.
There is a strong anti-free-trade growling among them, and they
complain much of the repeal of the Navigation Laws, asserting that
American ships are now getting business that was formerly in the hands
of the English alone, and so American sailors do the labour in the
docks which was formerly given to the stevedores and working-men of the
town.
[3] I was surprised to find this remark in my first letter from
Liverpool, for it is the precise counterpart of my impression on
landing again in the United States, after six months absence in Europe.
I observe lately, that the Earl of Carlisle has said something of
similar import. I do believe the people of the United States have less
of pleasure and less of actual suffering than any other in the world.
Hopefulness, but hope ever unsatisfied, is marked in every American’s
face. In contrast with Germany, it is particularly evident that most of
us know but little of the virtuous pleasure God has fitted us to enjoy
in this world.
[Sidenote: _PRICES.—BATHING.—DOCKS._]
Clothing, shoes, &c., and rents, are a good deal cheaper than in New
York, and common articles of food but little higher. I have obtained
the following, as specimens of prices for a few ordinary necessaries of
life (1st of June):
_Beef_, _mutton_, and _pork_, fine, 12½ cts. a pound; _lamb_, 16 cts.;
_veal_, 10 cts.
_Salmon_, 33 cts. a pound; _fresh butter_, 27 cts.; _potatoes_, 31 cts.
a peck.
_Fowls_, 75 cts. a pair; _rabbits_, 50 cts. a pair; _pigeons_, 37 cts.
each.
_Best Ohio flour_ (“superfine”), $6.25 a barrel.
_Bread_, 2½ cts. a pound, or a loaf of 12 lbs., 30 cts.
_Bread_ of best quality, 3 cts. per lb., or loaf of 12 lbs., 35 cts.
Sugar is higher, and tropical fruits, pine-apples, oranges, &c., are
sold by the hucksters for more money than in New York.
_Gas._—The town is well lighted by gas, and it is much used in private
houses—much more generally than in New York. Price $1.12 per 1000 feet.
_Water._—Water is conveyed through the town and to the shipping in
tubes, through which I believe it is forced by steam-engines by several
companies. The manner in which they are remunerated I did not learn.
_Bathing._—There is a very large and elegant bath-house (covering
half an acre), built of stone, by the corporation, at an expense of
$177,000. It is fitted with suitable accommodations for all classes of
bathers, at various prices. There is a public bath (45 by 27 feet) for
gentlemen, and another for ladies. The water is all filtered, and the
cold baths have a constant fresh supply and outflow. A steam-engine is
employed for pumping, etc. From what I saw, I should suppose the use of
this establishment was _fashionable_. There are also floating baths in
the river, as at New York; and beach-bathing and sea-swimming can be
enjoyed at a few minutes’ distance, by ferry, from the town.
_Quarantine._—There are no buildings or ground employed for quarantine,
but a number of large hulks are moored in the bay for this purpose.
Quarantine vessels are anchored near them, and keep a yellow flag
flying. It is a great many years since a vessel has been quarantined
here, however, the medical men being generally agreed that such
precaution is useless, or effective of more harm than good.
* * * * *
We have not made a business of sight seeing, and I want to give you
the general aspect of the town, rather than show up the lions. The
Liverpool docks, however, are so extensive, and so different from any
thing we have of the kind in America, that you will wish me to give a
few particulars of them.
_The Docks_ are immense basins, enclosed from the river, or dug out
from the bank, walled up on all sides by masonry, and protected on the
outside, from the sea, by solid stone piers or quays. In these quays
are gates or locks, through which, at high-water, vessels enter or
leave. When the water has slightly fallen they are closed, and the
water being retained, the ships are left securely floating at a height
convenient for removing their cargoes. The docks are all enclosed
by high brick walls, but between these and the water there is room
enough for passing of carts, and for the temporary protection of goods
under wooden sheds, as they are hoisted out, and before they can be
removed. The streets about the docks are mostly lined with very large
and strong fire-proof warehouses. The quay outside the docks is broad
enough to afford a wide terrace upon the river, which is called the
Marine Parade, and is much resorted to as a promenade. Stone stairs at
intervals descend to the bottom of the river, and there are similar
ones within the docks to give access to small boats. There are buoys
and life-preservers lashed to the rails of the bridges, and small
houses, occasionally furnished with instruments and remedies, for the
resuscitation of drowning persons.
There are graving docks in which the depth of water can be regulated at
pleasure, for the inspection and repair of the bottoms of vessels; and
there are large basins for coasters, to which there are no gates, and
in which the tide rises and falls, leaving them in the mud at the ebb.
The large docks are connected with each other, and with the graving
docks, by canals, so a vessel can go from one to another at any time of
tide, and without going into the river.
[Sidenote: _LIVERPOOL.—DOCKS._]
But you have yet no idea of the spaciousness and grandeur of the docks.
Some of them enclose within their walls ten or twelve acres, half of
which, or more, is occupied by vessels. The twelve now completed (there
are more building) extend along in front of the town uninterrupted
by buildings for more than two miles, or further than from Whitehall
Stairs to Corlear’s Hook, in New York. On the other side of the river,
a considerably larger extent of docks is laid out and constructing. A
basin for coasters, which covers over sixteen acres, and in which there
is twelve feet at low water, is just completed there.
Each dock has its own dock-master, custom-house superintendant, and
police force. The police is the most perfect imaginable. It is composed
of intelligent and well-instructed young men, most courteous and
obliging, at the same time prompt and efficient. It quite surprised
me to see our fierce captains submit like lambs to have their orders
countermanded by them.
There are three docks for the convenience of steamers alone. The
American steamers, I suppose, are too large to go into them, for they
are lying in the stream.
The docks were built by the town, and besides the wonderful increase
of its commerce which they have effected, the direct revenue from them
gives a large interest on their cost. The charges are more moderate
than at other British ports, and this has, no doubt, greatly helped to
draw their commerce here. This is the principal ground, for instance,
of the selection of Liverpool in preference to Bristol as the port of
departure for transatlantic steamers. The foreign commerce of Liverpool
is the most valuable of any town in the world. Its immense business
is probably owing to its being the best port in the vicinity of the
thickest manufacturing district of England. It is not naturally a good
harbour, but a very exposed and inconvenient one. The port charges at
Bristol have been lately greatly reduced, and are now lower than those
of Liverpool, or any other port in the United Kingdom. The amount paid
by vessels for dockage has in some years been $1,000,000, and the whole
is expended by the corporation in improvements of the town and for
public purposes.
The small steam craft do not usually go into the docks, but land
passengers on the quays outside. The ferry-boats, of which there are
half a dozen lines crossing the Mersey, all come to one large floating
wharf, from which the ascent to the quays is made easy at all times of
tide, by a sufficiently long, hinged bridge.
There is a Sailor’s Home now building here, which will certainly be
a noble record of the justice and liberality of the merchants of the
port to their humble associates on the sea. It is situated in an open
public place, not far from the Custom House and City Hall. It is
built of stone, in the Elizabethan Gothic style, and was considered
a design worthy of giving Prince Albert honour in the laying of its
corner-stone. It is already a stately edifice.
There are chapels for seamen in several (possibly in all) of the
docks.[4]
[4] The laws of the port require, That for three hours at high water,
there shall be an efficient person on the deck of every vessel in the
docks or basins: That the anchor shall be in-board, jib-boom run in,
&c.: That no article of freight shall be allowed to remain on the
dock-quays for more than forty-eight hours [penalty, $1.25 an hour]:
That no light or fire shall be allowed [without special permission] on
any vessel in the docks or basins at any time. This last regulation
prevents cooking on board, and makes it necessary for the crews to live
on shore. The consequent customs are very inconvenient, expensive, and
demoralising to the seamen.
* * * * *
_Later._ We have left Liverpool, and while breathing this delicious
fragrance of hawthorn and clover, it is hard to think back to the
stirring dusty town, but I will try for a few minutes to do so, and
then bring you with me (I wish I could!) out into the country.
A great deal that interested us at Liverpool I must omit to tell
you of. I should like to introduce you to some of the agreeable
acquaintances we met there, but in what we saw of social life there,
there was hardly any thing to distinguish it from America. We were
much pleased with some of the public gardens and pleasure-grounds that
we visited, and when we return here I may give you some account of
them. I meant to have said a little more about the style of building
in the newer and extending parts of the city; it did not differ much,
however, from what you might see at home, in some of the suburbs of
Boston for instance.
[Sidenote: _COMPARATIVE STREET-POVERTY._]
It would be more strange to you to see long, narrow streets, full from
one end to the other, of the poorest-looking people you ever saw, women
and children only, the men being off at work, I suppose, sitting,
lounging, leaning on the door-steps and side-walks, smoking, knitting,
and chatting; the boys playing ball in the street, or marbles on the
flagging; no break in the line of tall, dreary houses, but strings
of clothes hung across from opposite second-story windows to dry;
all dwellings, except a few cellar, beer, or junk shops. You can see
nothing like such a dead mass of pure poverty in the worst quarter
of our worst city. In New York, such a street would be ten times as
filthy and stinking, and ten times as lively; in the middle of it there
would be a large fair building, set a little back (would that I could
say with a few roods of green turf and shrubbery between it and the
gutter in which the children are playing), with the inscription upon
it, “Public Free School;” across from the windows would be a banner
with the “Democratic Republican Nominations;” hand-organs would be
playing, hogs squealing, perhaps a stampede of firemen; boys would
be crying newspapers, and the walls would be posted with placards,
appealing, with whatever motive, to patriotism and duty, showing that
statesmen and demagogues could calculate on the people’s reading and
thinking there. There would be gay grog-shops too, with liberty poles
before them, and churches and Sunday-school rooms (with lying faces
of granite-painted pine) by their side. The countenances of the
people here, too, exhibited much less, either of virtuous or vicious
character, than you would discern among an equally poor multitude in
America, yet among the most miserable of them (they were Irish), I was
struck with some singularly intelligent, and even beautiful faces,
so strangely out of place, that if they had been cleaned and put in
frames, so the surroundings would not appear, you would have taken them
for those of delicate, refined, and intellectual ladies.
* * * * *
_Thursday morning, May 30th._
We packed all our travelling matter, except a few necessaries, in two
trunks and a carpet-bag, and I took them in a public carriage to the
freight station, to be sent to London. The trunks were received, but
the bag the clerks refused, and said it must be sent from the passenger
station. I had engaged to meet my friends in a few minutes at the
opposite side of the town from the passenger station, and the delay of
going there would vexatiously disarrange our plans. I therefore urged
them to take it, offering to pay the passenger luggage extra, freight,
&c. They would be happy to accommodate me, but their rules did not
admit of it. A _carpet-bag_ could not be sent from that station at any
price. I jumped on to the box, and drove quickly to the nearest street
of shops, where, at a grocer’s, I bought for twopence a coffee-sack,
and enclosing the bag, brought it in a few minutes back to the station.
There was a good laugh, and they gave me a receipt at once for _a
sack_—to be kept in London until called for.
[Sidenote: _STREET BEGGING._]
On the quay, I noticed a bareheaded man drawing with coloured crayons
on a broad, smooth flagstone. He had represented, in a very skilful and
beautiful manner, a salmon laid on a china platter, opposite a broken
plate of coarse crockery; between these were some lines about a “rich
man’s dish” and a “poor man’s dinner.” He was making an ornamental
border about it, and over all was written, “_Friends! I can get_ NO
WORK; _I must do this or starve_.”
His hat, with a few pence in it, stood by the side of this. Was it not
eloquent?