56 



QL\)C iTarmcf'g iHoiU()l|) bisttor. 



of 930,275 tons ""J crews ni' 54,057 iiien and I 

 720 boj's— cleiued finm llic ports of the United 

 Slates duiinjj; the year 1843-45. 



Anieiicaii vessels 813:1, witli a loliil of 2,505- 

 480 toiis,iind crews of i!il,020 nienand25021i^.ys ; 

 and 5590 foreign vessels, with a toi;d of !I10,330 

 tons, and crews of 55,315 men and 700 boys, en- 

 tered llie ports of tlie United States during llie 

 above time. 



The C^ory and the Shame of Great Britaiu. 



BY WILLIAM HdWlTT. 



1. Her Landlords and her Laborers, — 

 What a niiglily space lies between tlie piiaee 

 and the cottage in tins coiuitry 1 ay, what a migh- 

 ty sjwce between the mansion of the private gen- 

 tleman and the hut of the laborer on his estate! 

 To enter the one, to see its slateliness and ex- 

 tent ; all its ofliees, out-buildings, gardens, green- 

 liouses, liot-hoiises; its extensive fruit-walls, and 

 the people laboring to furnish the table simply 

 with Irnit, vegetables and flowers: its coach- 

 liouse«,liarness-houses, stables, and all the steeds, 

 draught horses and saddle-ljorses, hunters and 

 ladies' pads, ponies for ladies' airing carriages, 

 and ponies for children ; and all the grooms and 

 attendants thereon ; to see the waters for fish, 

 the woods for game, the elegant dairy for the 

 supply of milk and cream, cmds and butter, and 

 the dairy maids and managers belonging to tliern; 

 — and then, to enter the house itself, and see all 

 its different suites of apartments, drawing-rooms, 

 boudoirs, sleeping-rooms, dining and lireakfast 

 rooms ; its steward's, housekeeper's, and butler's 

 rooms ; its ample kitcheiwsand larders, with their 

 store of provisions, liesli and dried ; its stores of 

 costly plate, porcelain and crockery apparatus of 

 a hundred dift'erent kinds^ its-cellars of wine and 

 strong beer; its stores 'ofdinen ; its library of 

 books; its collections of paintings, engravings, 

 an<l statuary ; the jewels, musical instrmnenis, 

 and expensive and interjninable nick-ktiackery 

 of the ladies; the guns and dogs; the cross- 

 bows, long-bows, nets, and other implements of 

 amusement of the gentlemen ; all the rich car- 

 peting and fittings-up of day-rooms, and night- 

 rooms, with every contrivance and luxury which 

 a most ingenious and luxurious age can fmiiish ; 

 and all the troops of servants, male and female, 

 having their own exclusive oflices, to wait upon 

 the person of lady or getitleman, upon table, or 

 carriage, or upon some one ministration of pleas- 

 ure or necessity ; i say, to see all this, and then 

 10 enter the cottage of a laborer, we must cer- 

 taiidy think that one has too nmch for the insur- 

 ance of comfort, or the other must have extreme- 

 ly too little. If the peasant can be satisfied with 

 his eslal'lishnvent, and the gentleman could not 

 tell how to live without his, one would be almost 

 peremideel that they conW not be of the same 

 class of animals. Knowing, however, that they 

 are of the satne spwries, it oidy shows of what 

 elastic stuff human natiu'e is made ; into what a 

 nutshell it can compress its cravings, and how 

 immensely it can expand itself when the pres- 

 sure of necessity is withdrawn. 1 am not going 

 here to moot the old (piestion of whereabout hap- 

 piness lies in this strange disparity of circiun- 

 Btance ; it, no doubt, lies somewhere between the 

 extremes. It cerlaiidy cannot be created by ex- 

 ternal superfluities. 1'lieij lay open their posses- 

 sors to the exercise of despotic power; to the 

 corruptions of pride anil luxury ; to (idse tastes, 

 frivolous pursuits, atvl the dill'usion of the atten- 

 tion over so many objects as lo pieveni thelie.nn 

 from settling (irndy on any. They have a ten- 

 <lency lo weaken the domestic attachments, anil 

 the love of solid pursuits. On the other hand, 

 the pressm'e of |>overty and ignorance certainly 

 can, and too often does, lie so heavily as to des- 

 troy the relish of life's enjoyments in the cotta- 

 ger. Yet happiness is a fireside thing; and the 

 simplicity of cottag<; life, the fewness of iis ob- 

 jects, and the strong syiiipalhii's awakened by its 

 trials and sufterings, tend lo condense the atlec- 

 tions, and to strike deep the roots of happiness 

 in the sacred soil of consanguinity. When 

 weafth is accompanied by a desire to do good, it 

 is a glorious and happy destiny; when lowly life 

 is virtuous, easy, and eidightened, it is a happy 

 destiny too — fiir it is full of the strong zest ol 

 existence, and strong afiections. 

 2. The Hetter Class of Knolish Ladok- 



i;rs. — When we go into the coitiige of the work- 

 in"' man how forcil>ly are we struck with the 



difference between his mode of life and our own. 

 There is his tenement, of, at most, one or two 

 rooms. His naked walls; hare brick, stone or 

 mud floor, as it may be ; a fi;w wooden, or rush- 

 bottomed chairs; a deal or old oak table ; a sim- 

 ple fire-|dace, with its oven beside it, or, in many 

 parts of the kingdom, no other fire-place than the 

 hearth ; a few pots and pans — and you have his 

 whole abode, goods and chattels, lie conies 

 home weary IVom hisont-door work, having eat- 

 en bis diimer under hedge or tree, and seats him- 

 self (or a few hours witli his wife and children, 

 then turns into a rudi- bi.Ml, standing perha;;s on 

 the IJirther side of his only room, and out again 

 before daylight, if it be winter. He has no oiw 

 to make a fire in his dressing-room, to lay out his 

 clothes, to assist him in his toilet ; he flings on 

 his patched garments, washes his face in a wood- 

 en or earthen dish at the door; blows up the fire, 

 often gets ready his own breakfiist, and is gone. 

 Such is the lontine of his life, from week to 

 week and year to year; Sundays, and a few holi- 

 days, arc white days in his calendar. On them 

 he shaves, puts on a clee.n shirt and hetter coat, 

 drawn from that old chest which contains the 

 whole wardrobe of himself and children ; his 

 wife has generally some separate drawer or band- 

 box, in which to stow her ligliler and tnore fra- 

 gile gear. Then he walks around his little gar- 

 den if he have it ; goes with his wile; and children 

 to church or meeting; to sit with a neighbor, or 

 to have a nrighhor look in upon him. 'I'here he 

 sits, his children upon his knee, ami tells them 

 how his father used to talk to Mm. 



This is cottage life in its best estate ; in its im- 

 sophislicated and nnpnuperized condition. He 

 has no carriages, no horses, no c^rds of invita- 

 tion, or of admittance to places of amusement; 

 none of the luxuries, fascinations, or embellisb- 

 meiits of life belong to him. It is existence shorn 

 of all its spreading and flowering branches, hut 

 not pared to the quick. This is supposing the 

 father of the family is sober ami industrious — 

 that he is neither a pot-house haunter, a gambler 

 at the cock-jiit, a boxer, a dog-fighter, a poacher, 

 an idle, rackety, and demoralized fellow, a« thou- 

 sands are. This is supposing that he brings home 

 his week's wages, and puts them into the bands 

 of his wifi}, as their best guardian and distribu- 

 ter ; — saying, " Here, my lass, this is all that I have 

 earned ; thou must lay it out for the best; /have 

 enough to do to win il." 



And what are these wages, out of which to 

 maintain his finnily, .aided by the lesser earnings 

 of his wife, by taking in washing, helping in har- 

 vest fields, charring in more affluent people's 

 houses, and so on, and theeai-nings of the child- 

 ren in similar ways, or in soni<" neighboring fac- 

 tory ? His own probably ammnit to nine, or, at 

 most, twelve shillings, and if liis family be large, 

 and there are several workers among them, the 

 whole united earnings may reach twenty shillings 

 per week ; a suin which will hardly find other 

 men wherewith to pay toll-bars, or purchase gun- 

 powder, a s(im which we throw away repeated- 

 ly on some baulile ; and yet, on this will a whole 

 family maintain life and credit fi)r a week, aye, 

 ami on much less too. In this little hut, which 

 w« slioidd hardly think would do lor a cow-shed 

 or a hay-loft, ami to which the stables of many 

 gentlemen are real palaces, is the poor man pack- 

 ed away with all his kindred lives, interest and 

 aflections : and so he carries on the warfare of 

 hum.inity, till He, who is no respecter of ^lersons, 

 calls him to stand, side by side, before His throne, 

 with the rich man «lio "has fiired snmptnously 

 every day." 



Such lire " the short and simple annals" of thou- 

 sands in these kingdoms; and yet, what fine, 

 stripping young fi'llows s|u'iiig up in these little 

 cabins, men who have tilled the soil of Kngland 

 and wielded at hotne lier mech.anics' tools, and 

 borne her arms abroad, till tliiir industry ;md ge- 

 niu.s, uinler the direclion of higher minds, have 

 raised her to her present pitch of emiiMMice ; and 

 what sweet liices and lovely forms issue thence 

 to Smiday worship, to village fi'ast and dance ; or 

 are seen by the eveniLig passer-by in the height 

 of the ingle, amid the liimily group, making some 

 sinoky-raliered hut a little temple of rare jieauly, 

 and of filial or sisterly afli'ctions. 



3. Scotch and Irish Laiiorers. — Thecottaj 

 lilti I have been speaking of, is that of the belt 



class of cottagers ; the.solier and industrious pea- 

 santry ; but how far short of ihis condition is that 



of millions in iliis em[iire ! To s;iy nothing oflrish 

 cabins, the examples of what a state of destitu- 

 tion, misery, and squalor men may sink into; how 

 mneh below this is the comfiirl of a Highland 

 hut ? What a eonlrast is there often between the 

 cotlas;e of an English laborer, and the steailing 

 of a Highland liirmer. 'J'here it stands, in a deep 

 g(en, between higli, rocky mountains. His farm 

 is a wild sheep-tr.iik among the bill.s. Wheat, 

 he grows none, for it is too cold and weeping a 

 Mimate. He has a little ]'ateh of oats for crowdie 

 and oaic;d<e ; potatoes he has, if the torrent has 

 not risen during sudden rains so high in the glen 

 as to sweep his crop away. He has contrived a 

 little stock of' hay lor his cows, but where it can 

 have grown you cannot conceive, till some day, 

 as you see a woman or a boy herding the cattle 

 among llie patches of cultivation — for there are 

 no ((;nces between the grass and arable land — 

 you find one or the other ciuting the longer grass 

 from the boggy waste with a sickle, and drying 

 it often in little sheaves as our fiirmers dry corn. 

 But the honsi! itself; — it is a little, low, long build- 

 ing of mud, or rough stones ; the chimney com- 

 posed of four shoit poles wrapped round with 

 hay bands ; a flat sloue laid upon it to prevent 

 the smoke being driven down into the hut by the 

 lenipestnons winds lioin the hill ; and anollier 

 stone laid upon that to keep it from being IiIo>mi 

 away. The roof is ihalclied with bracken, ling, 

 broom and tnrf. A little window of perhajis one 

 pane of thick glass, or of I'our of oili'd paper, 'llie 

 iloor, which reaches to the eaves, is so low that 

 you must stoop to enter : and the smoke is pour- 

 ing faster out of it than it ascends from the chim- 

 ney. A fiiw goats are, most likely, lying or stand- 

 ing ahoui the door. V'oii chter, and as soon as 

 you can discern any thing through the eternal 

 cloud of smoke, you most probably found your- 

 self in a crowd, 'i'he fire of peat lies in the cen- 

 tre of the hut, surrounded by a liiw stones ; wood- 

 en benches are nailed one side against the wall, 

 and the other is partitioned off' like a large wood- 

 en Clipboard, with sliding doors or curtains, for 

 the liimily bed, as you find all over Scotland and 

 even in Northiimherland. The pigs are running 

 about the floor , hens are roosting over your head 

 the cows are lowing in what we should call tl)^ 

 parlor; nine or ten children, or weans, as thy 

 call them, and a callant or boy, who leaches "c 

 weans, and the father and mother, and very p""'" 

 ably their father and moiher, or one of ihi", m 

 extremi! age, are fixing their eyes on the st '"f-'cr. 

 In the Slimmer of i83o, i\lrs. Houitt a'' "O" 

 self pa.ssed the night in such a dwellii' aiid a 

 slight notice of the place may prese-' '•' ""r 

 readers, a new view o(' co;ia;,e life " '"''"* "' 

 Rosshire, some thirty or foriv mil' "prthwest 



lyimr 

 A 

 wild and vet most bea'iiliful spr'' "as,— a little 

 strath openini;- it.self out hcf'!!,' '!''-' wooded 

 mountains wli'ich surronnd L*-' t''7n''.v, and the 

 bare stonv hills in the direci'."' *"'""'' <-'onan. 

 We came" upon it after wu '""'^ through the 

 delicious tairv land of hi'' "<""'« ''.'at clothe 

 that Loch in 'the verv >'"'"''' "' pa'tme.sq„« 

 beautv, springim; up an,'^''' "'" "'I'', <■''■•'''« "f 

 crag.s here haiiiiin- ov''"' """■'■•. "'"' '"-'c sni- 

 rounding the romous "'f '":"■•'= '"' ?<""«•" '*"litary 

 hut, thai', hut fin- chil " I' "-^ '"/ ''••<■"■''' ". "•""''• 

 nvelieei'"""''-"^ ''"'■'"">'■■"'• Astern 



of Inverness, at a spot called the -'"jrie, ly 

 between Loch Echiltv nml Loc '''nchart. 



appear lo I 

 defile guarded bv 



•!i 



SOf 11 



rojecling rucks, 



bv places clothe",-"' ""- '■'^' "--^t Wrnpery of 

 crimson heaihe-' l'^"''" ""J'"'''' "'"J.l'vnlly gray, 



I wiih chmhing 



.'ht 



i| 



heiilil alii I , ,. , 



^glit ns to a little iiamele.-s h> 



I, ,1, ""<''*i j;iit with .-I den.-<' margin 



i-ed w iih the most niagiiiricent ilis- 



lilies.and then appeared two 



I'll.! 



eveniii" '''■''"'"-*■ S"ik"ig into night, and w>. 



were i? ''"" '"'"' '''"' '' "'"* '" ''"' '""^'- '""• 

 Two • ". "I'l"'''""'^^.'' "' '''^' ''""r of one of these 



I 



anil 



birch trees. I 



hidden i 



reeds, and i,,.,, ,, 

 . ,■ I water 



of those l'""'' '" "i*' "'Sidaiid ..olilndc, 



" . rather startled ns wiihthe inthrmalioii. 



nciiri'st inn in ti 

 'l'"5 di 



way we projiosed to 



slant live and twi'iity miles! That an- 



r"mile brought iiti to the fi'iry over the Conaii, 



"e the cariiago road cea.sed", .and all hevoml 



nionnlain and moorl.Miul waste. We seem- 



', IIS it were, to be on the verv verge of civilizu- 



m; and there appeared to he nothing for us, 



