FROM DUNDEE TO MANCHESTER.
Scotch Presbyterians in Convention—Their Character and Bearing—On
the Footpath to Abbotsford—The Home of Scott—Five Miles through the
Fields—Melrose Abbey and the Heart of Bruce—Hospitality of a Baptist
Preacher—Adieu to Scotland—Merry England—Manchester—Exposition and
Prince of Wales—Manchester and Cotton Manufacturers—A $25,000,000
Scheme—Dr. Alexander Maclaren—His Appearance—The Force of his
Thought—The Witchery of his Eloquence—His Hospitality Enjoyed—A
Promise Made.
LEAVING Dundee I run down to Edinburgh to attend the annual meeting of
the established church of Scotland. I am anxious to see this venerable
body of men, whose deep-toned piety has pervaded the nation, and who
wield such a powerful influence over the political and religious
thought of the century. Whether around the family fireside, or on the
public platform, most of these men are dignified, stiff and formal in
their bearing. I can but think that if they were put under the water,
the starch would be taken out of them, and they would be more useful to
the world. I say to a friend that if I had only a little Baptist water
and Methodist fire, I could get up enough steam in half an hour to set
the whole convention in motion.
We set out on Friday for the home of Sir Walter Scott, some thirty
miles distant. One hour brings us to Gallashields. Here we leave our
baggage and take the foot-path leading along the banks of the river
Tweed and terminating at Abbotsford. The day is fine. The scenery is
not grand, but varied and beautiful. The pedestrians are so engaged in
contemplating the beauties of nature, that the walk of five miles seems
rather to rest than to tire them.
[Illustration: ABBOTSFORD.]
Abbotsford is situated upon a hillside about two hundred yards from the
river. Between the house and the stream there are two high terraces,
making two distinct flower-gardens, one being some twenty feet higher
than the other. The house is large and quaint and old. It is always
open to visitors, and daily many enter its portals. One feels as if he
would like to remain here a week, examining the clothes, furniture,
books, manuscripts and curiosities once belonging to the lord of
letters and of language. Here one sees locks of hair from the heads of
the Duke of Wellington and Lord Nelson. Here one sees the bones of many
Christian martyrs; also guns, pistols, swords, shot, shells, canteens,
and other relics of interest, gathered from the field of Waterloo by
Scott himself.
But we must not linger here. I want the reader to go with me to
Melrose. It is only five or six miles, and I am sure we shall enjoy the
walk, as our winding path leads through fields, sheep-pastures, and
grassy meadows. It will be sport for us to jump the fences, jump the
ditches and babbling brooks. We will take dinner as we sit beside the
second stream, whose limpid water will fill our glasses.
Now that we have reached Melrose, let us go at once to the old Abbey,
and view that ruined pile in which repose the body of Douglass and
the heart of Bruce, and around which the bard of Abbotsford loved to
linger. This old church, or abbey, which for hundreds and hundreds
of years resounded with the songs and prayers of monks and Catholic
priests, was demolished by the Protestants in the time of the
Reformation, and now serves only as the dwelling-place of blind bats
and hooting owls. After spending three hours in and around the Abbey,
and regretting that we cannot linger three days, we leave, feeling that
we can fully appreciate, and heartily adopt the sentiment expressed in
the second canto of “The Lay of the Last Minstrel:”
“If thou wouldst view fair Melrose aright.
Go visit it by the pale moonlight;
And, home returning, soothly swear,
Was never seen so sad and fair.”
[Illustration: MELROSE ABBEY.]
We now retrace our steps toward Gallashields; and, on reaching there,
are met by the Rev. Mr. Thompson, a Baptist preacher, who takes us to
his house, and treats us so kindly that I really regret my inability to
accept his kind invitation to remain until Sunday and preach for him.
I sincerely regret that my stay in Scotland has ended. I am loath to
leave. I have walked two hundred and fifty or three hundred miles
through the Highlands. I have viewed the whole country through a veil
of poesy which the hands of Scott and Burns have thrown over it. To me,
it is indeed “Bonnie Scotland;” and in leaving it I can but say:
“Farewell to the land where the clouds love to rest,
Like the shroud of the dead on the mountains’ cold breast;
To the cataracts’ roar, where the eagles reply,
And the lakes their broad bosoms expand to the sky.”
The night passes; morning comes. The day is bright and beautiful.
I now bid adieu to bonnie Scotland, and set my face, for the first
time, toward merry England. It is Saturday. Hence, I go direct to
Manchester, so as to be there on Sunday. Manchester has almost a
million inhabitants. It is the greatest cotton-manufacturing city in
the world. The great English Exposition was opened in Manchester by the
Prince and Princess of Wales, a few days ago, and will not close for
some weeks yet. I have attended exhibitions in New Orleans, Atlanta,
Louisville, Washington City, Philadelphia and Boston, and the main
difference between an American exposition and an English one is that
in America we make a specialty of fruits, seeds, agricultural products
and implements, fine wood, valuable timbers, gold and silver ore, etc.,
while in England the specialties are emblems of royalty, relics of
antiquity, and products of the loom and spindle.
The manufacturers of Manchester know much more about cotton than do
Southern planters in the United States. They know each spring how
much cotton is planted. They study carefully the crop prospects. They
have approximately correct ideas as to what the yield will be. They
then estimate the demand, and calculate the price. Most of these men
manufacture goods to order. When one buys a thousand bales of cotton,
he knows exactly how much money it will cost to work it up, how much
goods it will turn out, how much waste there will be, and how much
profit he is to reap. The people here say that the speculators of New
York frequently buy up great quantities of cotton and hold it for
better prices. To counteract this, a paper is addressed to the cotton
manufacturers of England, and circulated through the country. Those
signing this petition agree thereby to run their factories only half
the time until the next cotton crop is put on the market.
The enterprising people of Manchester have inaugurated a scheme by
which they will be enabled to greatly reduce the price of their goods,
and at the same time realize greater profits for themselves. It now
costs them as much to send their goods by rail to Liverpool, a distance
of thirty-six miles, as it does to get them from Liverpool to New
York. The new scheme is to cut a canal from Liverpool to Manchester,
through which the great sea-going vessels can come up to Manchester and
be loaded from the factories. For this purpose, $25,000,000 have been
raised. Work on the canal was begun some time ago, and will be pushed
most vigorously. It will be the broadest and deepest canal in the world.
To me, however, the object of greatest interest in the city is Dr.
Alexander Maclaren, who is regarded by many competent judges as the
greatest living preacher. Six volumes of his sermons grace the shelves
of my library. My knowledge of his personal history, and my familiarity
with his style of thought, make me all the more anxious to see and hear
the man whose eloquence sways the multitude as the wind turns the grass
of the field.
Little before eleven o’clock on Sunday morning, I enter the elegant
Union Chapel, wherein are seated some 2,500 to 3,000 persons. The
preacher soon enters the pulpit. He is somewhat under medium size,
measuring perhaps five feet and seven inches in height, and weighing,
I imagine, about one hundred and twenty-eight pounds. His iron-grey
hair is somewhat long, is combed straight back, and parted in the
middle. His forehead is high and broad, and projects far over the large
blue eyes which are set deep back in his head. His mouth is small; his
features are hard and dry. He reminds me much of the late Jefferson
Davis and Dr. Henson.
His prayer is but the overflowing of a large heart filled with
love. The text is Matthew 3:16. For fifty minutes the multitude is
spellbound. Dr. Maclaren’s speaking corresponds with Dr. Henson’s
definition of eloquence—it is _logic set on fire_. The most striking
peculiarity of his style is the force with which he projects his words.
As was said of Henry Clay, each word has positive weight. As I hear the
man speaking, and feel the force of his utterances, I am impelled to
say: “This is naught else than the artillery of heaven besieging the
citadel of the soul!” The thoughts are projected with such dynamitic
force that resistance is impossible—every barrier is soon broken down,
then every projectile burns its way into the soul. His words have in
them scorpion-stings—they arouse an accusing conscience. Then a change
comes over the spell of his preaching. He says: “You now see how poor a
thing is man; how corrupt his heart; how wicked his thoughts; how vile
his deeds! So turn away from self, and look to that Christ upon whom
the Spirit descended, and of whom God said, ‘This is my Son.’”
I accept the Doctor’s invitation to call on him in the afternoon. He
is desirous that the Baptists on the two sides of the Atlantic should
know each other better—that there should be a closer bond of union and
sympathy between them. He is as pleasant at home as he is forcible in
the pulpit. I promise to go with him to a Baptist Association, about
which we shall speak in the next chapter.