Liverpool, August 4th, 1853.--A month lacking two days since we left
America,--a fortnight and some odd days since we arrived in England. I
began my services, such as they are, on Monday last, August 1st, and here
I sit in my private room at the Consulate, while the Vice-Consul and
clerk are carrying on affairs in the outer office.
The pleasantest incident of the morning is when Mr. Pearce (the
Vice-Consul) makes his appearance with the account-books, containing the
receipts and expenditures of the preceding day, and deposits on my desk a
little rouleau of the Queen's coin, wrapped up in a piece of paper. This
morning there were eight sovereigns, four half-crowns, and a shilling,--a
pretty fair day's work, though not more than the average ought to be.
This forenoon, thus far, I have had two calls, not of business,--one from
an American captain and his son, another from Mr. H---- B----, whom I
met in America, and who has showed us great attention here. He has
arranged for us to go to the theatre with some of his family this
evening.
Since I have been in Liverpool we have hardly had a day, until yesterday,
without more or less of rain, and so cold and shivery that life was
miserable. I am not warm enough even now, but am gradually getting
acclimated in that respect.
Just now I have been fooled out of half a crown by a young woman, who
represents herself as an American and destitute, having come over to see
an uncle whom she found dead, and she has no means of getting back again.
Her accent is not that of an American, and her appearance is not
particularly prepossessing, though not decidedly otherwise. She is
decently dressed and modest in deportment, but I do not quite trust her
face. She has been separated from her husband, as I understand her, by
course of law, has had two children, both now dead. What she wants is to
get back to America, and perhaps arrangements may be made with some
shipmaster to take her as stewardess or in some subordinate capacity. My
judgment, on the whole, is that she is an English woman, married to and
separated from an American husband,--of no very decided virtue. I might
as well have kept my half-crown, and yet I might have bestowed it worse.
She is very decent in manner, cheerful, at least not despondent.
At two o'clock I went over to the Royal Rock Hotel, about fifteen or
twenty minutes' steaming from this side of the river. We are going there
on Saturday to reside for a while. Returning, I found that, Mr. B., from
the American Chamber of Commerce, had called to arrange the time and
place of a visit to the Consul from a delegation of that body. Settled
for to-morrow at quarter past one at Mr. Blodgett's.
August 5th.--An invitation this morning from the Mayor to dine at the
Town Hall on Friday next. Heaven knows I had rather dine at the humblest
inn in the city, inasmuch as a speech will doubtless be expected from me.
However, things must be as they may.
At a quarter past one I was duly on hand at Mr. Blodgett's to receive the
deputation from the Chamber of Commerce. They arrived pretty seasonably,
in two or three carriages, and were ushered into the drawing-room,--seven
or eight gentlemen, some of whom I had met before. Hereupon ensued a
speech from Mr. B., the Chairman of the delegation, short and sweet,
alluding to my literary reputation and other laudatory matters, and
occupying only a minute or two. The speaker was rather embarrassed,
which encouraged me a little, and yet I felt more diffidence on this
occasion than in my effort at Mr. Crittenden's lunch, where, indeed, I
was perfectly self-possessed. But here, there being less formality, and
more of a conversational character in what was said, my usual diffidence
could not so well be kept in abeyance. However, I did not break down to
an intolerable extent, and, winding up my eloquence as briefly as
possible, we had a social talk. Their whole stay could not have been
much more than a quarter of an hour.
A call, this morning, at the Consulate, from Dr. Bowrug, who is British
minister, or something of the kind, in China, and now absent on a
twelvemonth's leave. The Doctor is a brisk person, with the address of a
man of the world,--free, quick to smile, and of agreeable manners. He
has a good face, rather American than English in aspect, and does not
look much above fifty, though he says he is between sixty and seventy. I
should take him rather for an active lawyer or a man of business than for
a scholar and a literary man. He talked in a lively way for ten or
fifteen minutes, and then took his leave, offering me any service in his
power in London,--as, for instance, to introduce me to the Athenaeum
Club.
August 8th.--Day before yesterday I escorted my family to Rock Ferry, two
miles either up or down the Mersey (and I really don't know which) by
steamer, which runs every half-hour. There are steamers going
continually to Birkenhead and other landings, and almost always a great
many passengers on the transit. At this time the boat was crowded so as
to afford scanty standing-room; it being Saturday, and therefore a kind
of gala-day. I think I have never seen a populace before coming to
England; but this crowd afforded a specimen of one, both male and female.
The women were the most remarkable; though they seemed not disreputable,
there was in them a coarseness, a freedom, an--I don't know what, that
was purely English. In fact, men and women here do things that would at
least make them ridiculous in America. They are not afraid to enjoy
themselves in their own way, and have no pseudo-gentility to support.
Some girls danced upon the crowded deck, to the miserable music of a
little fragment of a band which goes up and down the river on each trip
of the boat. Just before the termination of the voyage a man goes round
with a bugle turned upwards to receive the eleemosynary pence and
half-pence of the passengers. I gave one of them, the other day, a
silver fourpence, which fell into the vitals of the instrument, and
compelled the man to take it to pieces.
At Rock Ferry there was a great throng, forming a scene not unlike one of
our muster-days or a Fourth of July, and there were bands of music and
banners, and small processions after them, and a school of charity
children, I believe, enjoying a festival. And there was a club of
respectable persons, playing at bowls on the bowling-green of the hotel,
and there were children, infants, riding on donkeys at a penny a ride,
while their mothers walked alongside to prevent a fall. Yesterday, while
we were at dinner, Mr. B. came in his carriage to take us to his
residence, Poulton Hall. He had invited us to dine; but I misunderstood
him, and thought he only intended to give us a drive. Poulton Hall is
about three miles from Rock Ferry, the road passing through some pleasant
rural scenery, and one or two villages, with houses standing close
together, and old stone or brick cottages, with thatched roofs, and now
and then a better mansion, apart among trees. We passed an old church,
with a tower and spire, and, half-way up, a patch of ivy, dark green, and
some yellow wall-flowers, in full bloom, growing out of the crevices of
the stone. Mr. B. told us that the tower was formerly quite clothed with
ivy from bottom to top, but that it had fallen away for lack of the
nourishment that it used to find in the lime between the stones. This
old church answered to my Transatlantic fancies of England better than
anything I have yet seen. Not far from it was the Rectory, behind a deep
grove of ancient trees; and there lives the Rector, enjoying a thousand
pounds a year and his nothing-to-do, while a curate performs the real
duty on a stipend of eighty pounds.
We passed through a considerable extent of private road, and finally
drove over a lawn, studded with trees and closely shaven, till we reached
the door of Poulton Hall. Part of the mansion is three or four hundred
years old; another portion is about a hundred and fifty, and still
another has been built during the present generation. The house is two
stories high, with a sort of beetle-browed roof in front. It is not very
striking, and does not look older than many wooden houses which I have
seen in America. There is a curious stately staircase, with a twisted
balustrade much like that of the old Province House in Boston. The
drawing-room is a handsome modern apartment, being beautifully painted
and gilded and paper-hung, with a white marble fireplace and rich
furniture, so that the impression is that of newness, not of age. It is
the same with the dining-room, and all the rest of the interior so far as
I saw it.
Mr. B. did not inherit this old hall, nor, indeed, is he the owner, but
only the tenant of it. He is a merchant of Liverpool, a bachelor, with
two sisters residing with him. In the entrance-hall, there was a stuffed
fox with glass eyes, which I never should have doubted to be an actual
live fox except for his keeping so quiet; also some grouse and other
game. Mr. B. seems to be a sportsman, and is setting out this week on an
excursion to Scotland, moor-fowl shooting.
While the family and two or three guests went to dinner, we walked out to
see the place. The gardener, an Irishman, showed us through the garden,
which is large and well cared for. They certainly get everything from
Nature which she can possibly be persuaded to give them, here in England.
There were peaches and pears growing against the high brick southern
walls,--the trunk and branches of the trees being spread out perfectly
flat against the wall, very much like the skin of a dead animal nailed up
to dry, and not a single branch protruding. Figs were growing in the
same way. The brick wall, very probably, was heated within, by means of
pipes, in order to re-enforce the insufficient heat of the sun. It seems
as if there must be something unreal and unsatisfactory in fruit that
owes its existence to such artificial methods. Squashes were growing
under glass, poor things! There were immensely large gooseberries in the
garden; and in this particular berry, the English, I believe, have
decidedly the advantage over ourselves. The raspberries, too, were large
and good. I espied one gigantic hog-weed in the garden; and, really, my
heart warmed to it, being strongly reminded of the principal product of
my own garden at Concord. After viewing the garden sufficiently, the
gardener led us to other parts of the estate, and we had glimpses of a
delightful valley, its sides shady with beautiful trees, and a rich,
grassy meadow at the bottom. By means of a steam-engine and subterranean
pipes and hydrants, the liquid manure from the barn-yard is distributed
wherever it is wanted over the estate, being spouted in rich showers from
the hydrants. Under this influence, the meadow at the bottom of the
valley had already been made to produce three crops of grass during the
present season, and would produce another.
The lawn around Poulton Hall, like thousands of other lawns in England,
is very beautiful, but requires great care to keep it so, being shorn
every three or four days. No other country will ever have this charm,
nor the charm of lovely verdure, which almost makes up for the absence of
sunshine. Without the constant rain and shadow which strikes us as so
dismal, these lawns would be as brown as an autumn leaf. I have not,
thus far, found any such magnificent trees as I expected. Mr. B. told me
that three oaks, standing in a row on his lawn, were the largest in the
county. They were very good trees, to be sure, and perhaps four feet in
diameter near the ground, but with no very noble spread of foliage. In
Concord there are, if not oaks, yet certainly elms, a great deal more
stately and beautiful. But, on the whole, this lawn, and the old Hall in
the midst of it, went a good way towards realizing some of my fancies of
English life.
By and by a footman, looking very quaint and queer in his livery coat,
drab breeches, and white stockings, came to invite me to the table, where
I found Mr. B. and his sisters and guests sitting at the fruit and wine.
There were port, sherry, madeira, and one bottle of claret, all very
good; but they take here much heavier wines than we drink now in America.
After a tolerably long session we went to the tea-room, where I drank
some coffee, and at about the edge of dusk the carriage drew up to the
door to take us home. Mr. B. and his sisters have shown us genuine
kindness, and they gave us a hearty invitation to come and ramble over
the house whenever we pleased, during their absence in Scotland. They
say that there are many legends and ghost-stories connected with the
house; and there is an attic chamber, with a skylight, which is called
the Martyr's chamber, from the fact of its having, in old times, been
tenanted by a lady, who was imprisoned there, and persecuted to death for
her religion. There is an old black-letter library, but the room
containing it is shut, barred, and padlocked,--the owner of the house
refusing to let it be opened, lest some of the books should be stolen.
Meanwhile the rats are devouring them, and the damps destroying them.
August 9th.--A pretty comfortable day, as to warmth, and I believe there
is sunshine overhead; but a sea-cloud, composed of fog and coal-smoke,
envelops Liverpool. At Rock Ferry, when I left it at half past nine,
there was promise of a cheerful day. A good many gentlemen (or, rather,
respectable business people) came in the boat, and it is not unpleasant,
on these fine mornings, to take the breezy atmosphere of the river. The
huge steamer Great Britain, bound for Australia, lies right off the Rock
Ferry landing; and at a little distance are two old hulks of ships of
war, dismantled, roofed over, and anchored in the river, formerly for
quarantine purposes, but now used chiefly or solely as homes for old
seamen, whose light labor it is to take care of these condemned ships.
There are a great many steamers plying up and down the river to various
landings in the vicinity; and a good many steam-tugs; also, many boats,
most of which have dark-red or tan-colored sails, being oiled to resist
the wet; also, here and there, a yacht or pleasure-boat, and a few ships
riding stately at their anchors, probably on the point of sailing. The
river, however, is by no means crowded; because the immense multitude of
ships are ensconced in the docks, where their masts make an intricate
forest for miles up and down the Liverpool shore. The small black
steamers, whizzing industriously along, many of them crowded with
passengers, snake up the chief life of the scene. The Mersey has the
color of a mud-puddle, and no atmospheric effect, as far as I have seen,
ever gives it a more agreeable tinge.
Visitors to-day, thus far, have been H. A. B., with whom I have arranged
to dine with us at Rock Ferry, and then he is to take us on board the
Great Britain, of which his father is owner (in great part). Secondly,
Monsieur H., the French Consul, who can speak hardly any English, and who
was more powerfully scented with cigar-smoke than any man I ever
encountered; a polite, gray-haired, red-nosed gentleman, very courteous
and formal. Heaven keep him from me! At one o'clock, or thereabouts, I
walked into the city, down through Lord Street, Church Street, and back
to the Consulate through various untraceable crookednesses. Coming to
Chapel Street, I crossed the graveyard of the old Church of St. Nicholas.
This is, I suppose, the oldest sacred site in Liverpool, a church having
stood here ever since the Conquest, though, probably, there is little or
nothing of the old edifice in the present one, either the whole of the
edifice or else the steeple, being thereto shaken by a chime of bells,--
perhaps both, at different times,--has tumbled down; but the present
church is what we Americans should call venerable. When the first church
was built, and long afterwards, it must have stood on the grassy verge of
the Mersey; but now there are pavements and warehouses, and the thronged
Prince's and George's Docks, between it and the river; and all around it
is the very busiest bustle of commerce, rumbling wheels, hurrying men,
porter-shops, everything that pertains to the grossest and most practical
life. And, notwithstanding, there is the broad churchyard extending on
three sides of it, just as it used to be a thousand years ago. It is
absolutely paved from border to border with flat tombstones, on a level
with the soil and with each other, so that it is one floor of stone over
the whole space, with grass here and there sprouting between the
crevices. All these stones, no doubt, formerly had inscriptions; but as
many people continually pass, in various directions, across the
churchyard, and as the tombstones are not of a very hard material, the
records on many of them are effaced. I saw none very old. A quarter of
a century is sufficient to obliterate the letters, and make all smooth,
where the direct pathway from gate to gate lies over the stones. The
climate and casual footsteps rub out any inscription in less than a
hundred years. Some of the monuments are cracked. On many is merely cut
"The burial place of" so and so; on others there is a long list of
half-readable names; on some few a laudatory epitaph, out of which,
however, it were far too tedious to pick the meaning. But it really is
interesting and suggestive to think of this old church, first built when
Liverpool was a small village, and remaining, with its successive dead of
ten centuries around it, now that the greatest commercial city in the
world has its busiest centre there. I suppose people still continue to
be buried in the cemetery. The greatest upholders of burials in cities
are those whose progenitors have been deposited around or within the city
churches. If this spacious churchyard stood in a similar position in one
of our American cities, I rather suspect that long ere now it would have
run the risk of being laid out in building-lots, and covered with
warehouses; even if the church itself escaped,--but it would not escape
longer than till its disrepair afforded excuse for tearing it down. And
why should it, when its purposes might be better served in another spot?
We went on board the Great Britain before dinner, between five and six
o'clock,--a great structure, as to convenient arrangement and adaptation,
but giving me a strong impression of the tedium and misery of the long
voyage to Australia. By way of amusement, she takes over fifty pounds'
worth of playing-cards, at two shillings per pack, for the use of
passengers; also, a small, well-selected library. After a considerable
time spent on board, we returned to the hotel and dined, and Mr. B. took
his leave at nine o'clock.
August 10th.--I left Rock Ferry for the city at half past nine. In the
boat which arrived thence, there were several men and women with baskets
on their heads, for this is a favorite way of carrying burdens; and they
trudge onward beneath them, without any apparent fear of an overturn, and
seldom putting up a hand to steady them. One woman, this morning, had a
heavy load of crockery; another, an immense basket of turnips, freshly
gathered, that seemed to me as much as a man could well carry on his
back. These must be a stiff-necked people. The women step sturdily and
freely, and with not ungraceful strength. The trip over to town was
pleasant, it being a fair morning, only with a low-hanging fog. Had it
been in America, I should have anticipated a day of burning heat.
Visitors this morning. Mr. Ogden of Chicago, or somewhere in the Western
States, who arrived in England a fortnight ago, and who called on me at
that time. He has since been in Scotland, and is now going to London and
the Continent; secondly, the Captain of the Collins steamer Pacific,
which sails to-day; thirdly, an American shipmaster, who complained that
he had never, in his heretofore voyages, been able to get sight of the
American Consul.
Mr. Pearce's customary matutinal visit was unusually agreeable to-day,
inasmuch as he laid on my desk nineteen golden sovereigns and thirteen
shillings. It being the day of the steamer's departure, an unusual
number of invoice certificates had been required,--my signature to each
of which brings me two dollars.
The autograph of a living author has seldom been so much in request at so
respectable a price. Colonel Crittenden told me that he had received as
much as fifty pounds on a single day. Heaven prosper the trade between
America and Liverpool!
August 15th.--Many scenes which I should have liked to record have
occurred; but the pressure of business has prevented me from recording
them from day to day.
On Thursday I went, on invitation from Mr. B., to the prodigious steamer
Great Britain, down the harbor, and some miles into the sea, to escort
her off a little way on her voyage to Australia. There is an immense
enthusiasm among the English people about this ship, on account of its
being the largest in the world. The shores were lined with people to see
her sail, and there were innumerable small steamers, crowded with men,
all the way out into the ocean. Nothing seems to touch the English
nearer than this question of nautical superiority; and if we wish to hit
them to the quick, we must hit them there.
On Friday, at 7 P.M., I went to dine with the Mayor. It was a dinner
given to the Judges and the Grand Jury. The Judges of England, during
the time of holding an Assize, are the persons first in rank in the
kingdom. They take precedence of everybody else,--of the highest
military officers, of the Lord Lieutenants, of the Archbishops,--of the
Prince of Wales,--of all except the Sovereign, whose authority and
dignity they represent. In case of a royal dinner, the Judge would lead
the Queen to the table.
The dinner was at the Town Hall, and the rooms and the whole affair were
all in the most splendid style. Nothing struck me more than the footmen
in the city livery. They really looked more magnificent in their
gold-lace and breeches and white silk stockings than any officers of
state. The rooms were beautiful; gorgeously painted and gilded,
gorgeously lighted, gorgeously hung with paintings,--the plate was
gorgeous, and the dinner gorgeous in the English fashion.
After the removal of the cloth the Mayor gave various toasts, prefacing
each with some remarks,--the first, of course, the Sovereign, after which
"God save the Queen" was sung, the company standing up and joining in the
chorus, their ample faces glowing with wine, enthusiasm, and loyalty.
Afterwards the Bar, and various other dignities and institutions were
toasted; and by and by came the toast to the United States, and to me, as
their Representative. Hereupon either "Hail Columbia," or "Yankee
Doodle," or some other of our national tunes (but Heaven knows which),
was played; and at the conclusion, being at bay, and with no alternative,
I got upon my legs, and made a response. They received me and listened
to my nonsense with a good deal of rapping, and my speech seemed to give
great satisfaction; my chief difficulty being in not knowing how to pitch
my voice to the size of the room. As for the matter, it is not of the
slightest consequence. Anybody may make an after-dinner speech who will
be content to talk onward without saying anything. My speech was not
more than two or three inches long; and, considering that I did not know
a soul there, except the Mayor himself, and that I am wholly unpractised
in all sorts of oratory, and that I had nothing to say, it was quite
successful. I hardly thought it was in me, but, being once started, I
felt no embarrassment, and went through it as coolly as if I were going
to be hanged.
Yesterday, after dinner, I took a walk with my family. We went through
by-ways and private roads, and saw more of rural England, with its
hedge-rows, its grassy fields, and its whitewashed old stone cottages,
than we have before seen since our arrival.
August 20th.--This being Saturday, there early commenced a throng of
visitants to Rock Ferry. The boat in which I came over brought from the
city a multitude of factory-people. They had bands of music, and banners
inscribed with the names of the mills they belong to, and other devices:
pale-looking people, but not looking exactly as if they were underfed.
They are brought on reduced terms by the railways and steamers, and come
from great distances in the interior. These, I believe, were from
Preston. I have not yet had an opportunity of observing how they amuse
themselves during these excursions.
At the dock, the other day, the steamer arrived from Rock Ferry with a
countless multitude of little girls, in coarse blue gowns, who, as they
landed, formed in procession, and walked up the dock. These girls had
been taken from the workhouses and educated at a charity-school, and
would by and by be apprenticed as servants. I should not have conceived
it possible that so many children could have been collected together,
without a single trace of beauty or scarcely of intelligence in so much
as one individual; such mean, coarse, vulgar features and figures
betraying unmistakably a low origin, and ignorant and brutal parents.
They did not appear wicked, but only stupid, animal, and soulless. It
must require many generations of better life to wake the soul in them.
All America could not show the like.
August 22d.--A Captain Auld, an American, having died here yesterday, I
went with my clerk and an American shipmaster to take the inventory of
his effects. His boarding-house was in a mean street, an old dingy
house, with narrow entrance,--the class of boarding-house frequented by
mates of vessels, and inferior to those generally patronized by masters.
A fat elderly landlady, of respectable and honest aspect, and her
daughter, a pleasing young woman enough, received us, and ushered us into
the deceased's bedchamber. It was a dusky back room, plastered and
painted yellow; its one window looking into the very narrowest of
back-yards or courts, and out on a confused multitude of back buildings,
appertaining to other houses, most of them old, with rude chimneys of
wash-rooms and kitchens, the bricks of which seemed half loose.
The chattels of the dead man were contained in two trunks, a chest, a
sail-cloth bag, and a barrel, and consisted of clothing, suggesting a
thickset, middle-sized man; papers relative to ships and business, a
spyglass, a loaded iron pistol, some books of navigation, some charts,
several great pieces of tobacco, and a few cigars; some little plaster
images, that he had probably bought for his children, a cotton umbrella,
and other trumpery of no great value. In one of the trunks we found
about twenty pounds' worth of English and American gold and silver, and
some notes of hand, due in America. Of all these things the clerk made
an inventory; after which we took possession of the money and affixed the
consular seal to the trunks, bag, and chest.
While this was going on, we heard a great noise of men quarrelling in an
adjoining court; and, altogether, it seemed a squalid and ugly place to
live in, and a most undesirable one to die in. At the conclusion of our
labors, the young woman asked us if we would not go into another chamber,
and look at the corpse, and appeared to think that we should be rather
glad than otherwise of the privilege. But, never having seen the man
during his lifetime, I declined to commence his acquaintance now.
His bills for board and nursing amount to about the sum which we found in
his trunk; his funeral expenses will be ten pounds more; the surgeon has
sent in a bill of eight pounds, odd shillings; and the account of another
medical man is still to be rendered. As his executor, I shall pay his
landlady and nurse; and for the rest of the expenses, a subscription must
be made (according to the custom in such cases) among the shipmasters,
headed by myself. The funeral pomp will consist of a hearse, one coach,
four men, with crape hatbands, and a few other items, together with a
grave at five pounds, over which his friends will be entitled to place a
stone, if they choose to do so, within twelve months.
As we left the house, we looked into the dark and squalid dining-room,
where a lunch of cold meat was set out; but having no associations with
the house except through this one dead man, it seemed as if his presence
and attributes pervaded it wholly. He appears to have been a man of
reprehensible habits, though well advanced in years. I ought not to
forget a brandy-flask (empty) among his other effects. The landlady and
daughter made a good impression on me, as honest and respectable persons.
August 24th.--Yesterday, in the forenoon, I received a note, and shortly
afterwards a call at the Consulate from Miss H----, whom I apprehend to
be a lady of literary tendencies. She said that Miss L. had promised her
an introduction, but that, happening to pass through Liverpool, she had
snatched the opportunity to make my acquaintance. She seems to be a
mature lady, rather plain, but with an honest and intelligent face. It
was rather a singular freedom, methinks, to come down upon a perfect
stranger in this way,--to sit with him in his private office an hour or
two, and then walk about the streets with him, as she did; for I did the
honors of Liverpool, and showed her the public buildings. Her talk was
sensible, but not particularly brilliant nor interesting; a good, solid
personage, physically and intellectually. She is an English woman.
In the afternoon, at three o'clock, I attended the funeral of Captain
Auld. Being ushered into the dining-room of his boarding-house, I found
brandy, gin, and wine set out on a tray, together with some little
spicecakes. By and by came in a woman, who asked if I were going to the
funeral; and then proceeded to put a mourning-band on my hat,--a
black-silk band, covering the whole hat, and streaming nearly a yard
behind. After waiting the better part of an hour, nobody else appeared,
although several shipmasters had promised to attend. Hereupon, the
undertaker was anxious to set forth; but the landlady, who was arrayed in
shining black silk, thought it a shame that the poor man should be buried
with such small attendance. So we waited a little longer, during which
interval I heard the landlady's daughter sobbing and wailing in the
entry; and but for this tender-heartedness there would have been no tears
at all. Finally we set forth,--the undertaker, a friend of his, and a
young man, perhaps the landlady's son, and myself, in the black-plumed
coach, and the landlady, her daughter, and a female friend, in the coach
behind. Previous to this, however, everybody had taken some wine or
spirits; for it seemed to be considered disrespectful not to do so.
Before us went the plumed hearse, a stately affair, with a bas-relief of
funereal figures upon its sides. We proceeded quite across the city to
the Necropolis, where the coffin was carried into a chapel, in which we
found already another coffin, and another set of mourners, awaiting the
clergyman. Anon he appeared,--a stern, broad-framed, large, and
bald-headed man, in a black-silk gown. He mounted his desk, and read the
service in quite a feeble and unimpressive way, though with no lack of
solemnity. This done, our four bearers took up the coffin, and carried
it out of the chapel; but, descending the steps, and, perhaps, having
taken a little too much brandy, one of them stumbled, and down came the
coffin,--not quite to the ground, however; for they grappled with it, and
contrived, with a great struggle, to prevent the misadventure. But I
really expected to see poor Captain Auld burst forth among us in his
grave-clothes.
The Necropolis is quite a handsome burial-place, shut in by high walls,
so overrun with shrubbery that no part of the brick or stone is visible.
Part of the space within is an ornamental garden, with flowers and green
turf; the rest is strewn with flat gravestones, and a few raised
monuments; and straight avenues run to and fro between. Captain Auld's
grave was dug nine feet deep. It is his own for twelve months; but, if
his friends do not choose to give him a stone, it will become a common
grave at the end of that time; and four or five more bodies may then be
piled upon his. Every one seemed greatly to admire the grave; the
undertaker praised it, and also the dryness of its site, which he took
credit to himself for having chosen. The grave-digger, too, was very
proud of its depth, and the neatness of his handiwork. The clergyman,
who had marched in advance of us from the chapel, now took his stand at
the head of the grave, and, lifting his hat, proceeded with what remained
of the service, while we stood bareheaded around. When he came to a
particular part, "ashes to ashes, dust to dust," the undertaker lifted a
handful of earth, and threw it rattling on the coffin,--so did the
landlady's son, and so did I. After the funeral the undertaker's friend,
an elderly, coarse-looking man, looked round him, and remarked that "the
grass had never grown on the parties who died in the cholera year"; but
at this the undertaker laughed in scorn.
As we returned to the gate of the cemetery, the sexton met us, and
pointed to a small office, on entering which we found the clergyman, who
was waiting for his burial-fees. There was now a dispute between the
clergyman and the undertaker; the former wishing to receive the whole
amount for the gravestone, which the undertaker, of course, refused to
pay. I explained how the matter stood; on which the clergyman
acquiesced, civilly enough; but it was very strange to see the worldly,
business-like way in which he entered into this squabble, so soon after
burying poor Captain Auld.
During our drive back in the mourning-coach, the undertaker, his friend,
and the landlady's son still kept descanting on the excellence of the
grave,--"Such a fine grave,"--"Such a nice grave,"--"Such a splendid
grave,"--and, really, they seemed almost to think it worth while to die,
for the sake of being buried there. They deemed it an especial pity that
such a grave should ever become a common grave. "Why," said they to me,
"by paying the extra price you may have it for your own grave, or for
your family!" meaning that we should have a right to pile ourselves over
the defunct Captain. I wonder how the English ever attain to any
conception of a future existence, since they so overburden themselves
with earth and mortality in their ideas of funerals. A drive with an
undertaker, in a sable-plumed coach!--talking about graves!--and yet he
was a jolly old fellow, wonderfully corpulent, with a smile breaking out
easily all over his face,--although, once in a while, he looked
professionally lugubrious.
All the time the scent of that horrible mourning-coach is in my nostrils,
and I breathe nothing but a funeral atmosphere.
Saturday, August 27th.--This being the gala-day of the manufacturing
people about Liverpool, the steamboats to Rock Ferry were seasonably
crowded with large parties of both sexes. They were accompanied with two
bands of music, in uniform; and these bands, before I left the hotel,
were playing, in competition and rivalry with each other in the
coach-yard, loud martial strains from shining brass instruments. A prize
is to be assigned to one or to the other of these bands, and I suppose
this was a part of the competition. Meanwhile the merry-making people
who thronged the courtyard were quaffing coffee from blue earthen mugs,
which they brought with them,--as likewise they brought the coffee, and
had it made in the hotel.
It had poured with rain about the time of their arrival, notwithstanding
which they did not seem disheartened; for, of course, in this climate, it
enters into all their calculations to be drenched through and through.
By and by the sun shone out, and it has continued to shine and shade
every ten minutes ever since. All these people were decently dressed;
the men generally in dark clothes, not so smartly as Americans on a
festal day, but so as not to be greatly different as regards dress. They
were paler, smaller, less wholesome-looking and less intelligent, and, I
think, less noisy, than so many Yankees would have been. The women and
girls differed much more from what American girls and women would be on a
pleasure-excursion, being so shabbily dressed, with no kind of smartness,
no silks, nothing but cotton gowns, I believe, and ill-looking bonnets,--
which, however, was the only part of their attire that they seemed to
care about guarding from the rain. As to their persons, they generally
looked better developed and healthier than the men; but there was a woful
lack of beauty and grace, not a pretty girl among them, all coarse and
vulgar. Their bodies, it seems to me, are apt to be very long in
proportion to their limbs,--in truth, this kind of make is rather
characteristic of both sexes in England. The speech of these folks, in
some instances, was so broad Lancashire that I could not well understand
it.