Part 8

To go further into the story of modern Lancashire manufacturing is not possible, since there is scarcely a British industry which in this county is without example, and to treat of the whole even briefly would require thrice the space already occupied. Among the foremost scenes to be described would be the plate-glass works at St. Helens; and the Manchester india-rubber works, the original, now sixty-seven years old, still carried on under the familiar name of Charles Macintosh & Co. The first were established in Glasgow; London, and then Manchester, were the next following centres, beginning with simple waterproof, but now producing articles of every conceivable variety. Thread, tape, pins, carpenters' tools, nails, screws, terra-cotta, bottles, aniline, soap, brass, and pewter-work, are also Lancashire staples. Gunpowder is manufactured near the foot of Windermere; and at Prescot and thereabouts the people employ themselves, as they have done now for nearly three centuries, in manufacturing the delicate "works" and "movements" required for watches. Not without significance either, in regard to the general capabilities of the county, is the preparation at Newton by Messrs. M'Corquodale of the whole of the requirements of the Government, both for home use and in India, in the way of stationery and account-books. For the Government alone they manufacture forty millions of envelopes every year. They also execute the enormous amount of printing demanded by the L. & N. W. Railway Company. The great ship-building works at Barrow now need no more than a reference. The magnificent Atlantic Inman steamer, the _City of Rome_, a ship with a gross tonnage of 8400, and propelled by, upon the lowest estimate, 8500 indicated horse-power, was launched here in June 1881. After the ill-fated _Great Eastern_, this was the largest vessel then afloat. All has come into existence since about 1860, when the population of this out-of-the-way Lancashire village was under 4000, though now nearly 50,000, a growth without parallel except in the United States.

Omitting a considerable number of minor activities, there is, in addition to the above, the vast sphere of industry, part of the very life of working Lancashire, though not a manufacture, indicated by the little word "coal." In their value and importance the Lancashire collieries vie with the cotton-mills, declaring once again how close and constant is the dependence of the prosperity of a great manufacturing district upon its geology. Coalfields lying below the surface leave the soil above them free for the purposes of the farmer and the builder; in other words, for the raising of human food and the development of useful constructive arts. Where there is plenty of coal double the number of people can exist; the enormous population of Lancashire south of the Ribble has unquestionably come as much of its coalfields as of the invention of the spinning-jenny. The prevailing rock in this portion of Lancashire is the well-known new red sandstone, the same as that which overlies all our other best English coal deposits. Concurrently with it, and with the millstone-grit, the measures which have brought so much wealth to the county, extend from Pendleton, two miles from Manchester, to Colne in the north-east, and to St. Helen's in the west, many vast branches running out in various directions from the principal mass. What the exact thickness may be of course is not known, but, according to Mr. Dickinson, it may be estimated at 6450 feet. Some of the deepest pits in the country have been sunk in it, as at the Rosebridge Colliery, near Wigan, where the depth already reached is nearly 2500 feet, and the Ashton-moss Pit, near Ashton-under-Lyne, which goes still lower,--it is said to 2700 feet,--in which case this last will be the deepest in England. The direction of the dip is described by the colliers in a very pretty way. They say it is towards "the rising sun," or "the setting sun," the different points included between these opposites being similarly expressed by "dipping towards nine-o'clock sun," "twelve-o'clock sun," and so on. The sun is thus their compass, though few men see less of it during their hours of labour. The neighbourhood of a colliery is generally well declared. Independently of the apparatus over the opening of the pit, there is no mistaking the significance of the row of neat cottages, all fashioned on the same architectural model, a few stray ones here and there, a trim little front garden seldom wanting, with close by a few shops, a school-house, a chapel, both very plain, and the proprietor's or agent's residence, somewhat ornate, and garnished with evergreen shrubs, ready always for the washing of a kindly shower. In many places, as at Wigan, Atherton, Tyldesley, and St. Helens, women, both single and married, work at the collieries, but only above ground, or at the bank. They are prohibited by statute from descending the pit, and their names and ages are all exactly registered. Up to the waist they are dressed like men. Above the knees, instead of a coat, they have a peculiarly fashioned tunic, a compromise between gown and jacket, by which they may be distinguished from afar: a limp bonnet tied under the chin protects the head, but never conceals the ear-rings and plaited hair. Many of these women are plainly equal to their masculine colleagues in physical power, yet they earn only two-thirds of the wages given to men. The decorum of their behaviour while at work is unimpeachable; on Sundays they do their best to dress like ladies. The Lancashire quarries are also remarkable, though little resorted to by the architect. Commercial prosperity is always most conspicuous where the buildings are principally not of stone, but of brick.

Nothing does more to sustain and encourage the industry of a working population than a steady system of transit, and a well-timed delivery, alike of the natural products of the ground and of the articles manufactured. Hence the early development in Lancashire of the idea of the canal, and, sixty years afterwards, of that of the railway. The history of the Bridgewater Canal is one of the most interesting connected with the county enterprise, the more so since all other canals were imitations of it. Many, however, are not aware that the celebrated peer under whose dictation it was constructed--Francis Egerton, the third and last Duke of Bridgewater--was led to devote himself for solace sake to engineering through a disappointment in love. That women, when troubled or bereaved, should take refuge in works of charity, and that when wealthy they should found hospitals and build orphanages, is very natural, and has plenty of exemplification; but for a man to turn when similarly circumstanced to science is phenomenal, and the records of search for consolation after this manner would probably be sifted in vain for a parallel case. Several versions of the story are afloat; whichever way be the true one, it is beyond a doubt that one of the greatest industrial achievements ever witnessed in England had for its prime cause the caprice or the temper of the widowed Duchess of Hamilton,--to whom a second coronet was offered,--she who in her early days was the celebrated belle Elizabeth Gunning. There is a waterway of this description in Lancashire more remarkable in some respects even than the duke's canal--that one called the Leeds and Liverpool, the Lancashire portion of which curls round from the great seaport by way of Ormskirk, Southport, Wigan, Chorley, Burnley, and Colne, where the Yorkshire boundary is crossed. Near the towns, and especially in the south-west and south-east, these useful highways are dreary and uninteresting; but in rural districts, such as they must needs traverse, often for lengths of many miles, the borders sometimes acquire an unlooked-for picturesqueness, and are gaily dressed with wild-flowers. In any case they never fail in possession of the rude charms of the gliding boat, the slow-paced horse, and artless guide. The Lancashire railway system, it may be remarked, extends to within a trifle of 600 miles.

VI

PECULIARITIES OF CHARACTER, DIALECT, AND PASTIMES

The primitive Lancashire character--industrious, frugal, sanguine, persevering, inflexible in determination--has already been sketched in brief. Some additional features, observable more particularly among the operatives and away in the country, deserve notice, the more so since it is in a people's average temperament that the key is usually found to their pursuits in playtime--after the songs, the most interesting chapter in a local history. The sum total of the private morals of working Lancashire probably does not differ _pro rata_ from that which would be disclosed by a census of any other county. So with the manners and customs, for although in Lancashire the suavity of the South is soon missed, and though there is little touching of the hat or saying of "Sir," the absence of a courteous spirit is more apparent than real, and in any case is amply compensated by a thoroughness of kindly sentiment which more polished communities do not always share. The "factory-folk," the colliers, and others, are usually considered turbulent and given to outrages. They are not so by nature. Though often rough, self-willed, and obstinate, the working population as a whole is too thoroughly Saxon for the riotousness one looks for while in the presence of the Celt. Social conflicts, when they arise, are set on foot by mischief-makers and noisy idlers whose personal interest it is to promote antagonisms. Save for these veritable "disturbers of the peace" the probability is that there would be few or none of the "strikes" and "turn-outs" which bring so much misery to the unfortunate women and children who have no say in the matter. The people who "strike" are in the mass more to be pitied than held chargeable with love of disorder, for, as a rule, they have been cruelly misled into the notion that it is the master's interest to pay as little as possible for their labour, the truth being that for his own sake he pays them the utmost the business will justify, so that they shall be strong enough, healthy enough, cheerful and good-tempered enough, to work with a will, thus augmenting his personal profits. Every master of common-sense understands the principle, and _does_ so pay. It may be useful to remind the reader that the profits made by a Lancashire "cotton-lord" differ totally in their composition from the payment received for his work by an artist, a physician, or a barrister. The cotton-manufacturer's profits consist of an infinite number of particles, an atom per head on the work of 500, and often 1000 assistants. To the outside and afar-off public, who hear of contentions over pennies, the sum seems nothing, and the man who refuses the penny a sordid fellow. But to the employer it very soon means hundreds of pounds, and represents perhaps half a year's income.

In Lancashire, whatever may be the case elsewhere, the people who "strike" are deceived in no slight measure through their own honesty and sincerity of purpose. One of the original characteristics of the county is to be fair and unsuspecting; no people in the world have a stronger dislike of deceit; one of the reasons why a genuine Lancashire man can usually be trusted is, that he is so little inclined to overstate or misrepresent. The very circumstance that wins our esteem thus renders him vulnerable. Disposed to be honest themselves, the operatives fall so much more readily a prey to unscrupulous agitators. It is amusing, at the same time, to note how soon, when he detects an impostor, a Lancashire man will put him out of countenance; and how quick he is, in excellent balance, to perceive the meritorious, either in person or subject, and, perceiving, to appreciate.

A remarkable instance of the promotion of strikes by mischief-makers occurred at the commencement of the spring of 1881, when the colliers stood out for six weeks, at a loss to themselves of no less than £250,000 in wages, such as otherwise they would have earned. The chairman of the London and North-Western Railway Company explained it at the shareholders' meeting on 24th July, pointing out at the same time the immense collateral harm inflicted:

"They might remember that at the beginning of the year there was a settlement made with the colliers of Lancashire and their employers with regard to a mutual insurance fund against accident; but a Member of Parliament went down and persuaded these poor, unhappy people that they had better not accept it, but take care of themselves. He also persuaded them to make a strike, the result of which was disaster to every one. Prices did not go up, and unless prices went up wages could not; and the men afterwards suffered great distress. From this cause they estimated that the Company had lost traffic to the amount of about £100,000."

Another result was the permanent loss of an important market to the local colliery proprietors. Many thousands of tons of Lancashire steam-coal were previously being sent weekly to Birkenhead; but during the stoppage of the Wigan collieries the coal masters of North and South Wales obtained possession of the market, and the quantity now sent to Birkenhead is confined to only a few hundreds of tons. The general question as to strikes, and of the kind of grievances that may sometimes be not unreasonably complained of, is no doubt a very large and complex one. But whatever may be the case elsewhere, it is impossible for the "strikers" to deny that in the aggregate, and in the long run, the tendency of the Lancashire masters' doings is to create and diffuse social happiness among the employed. It is the master's interest that his people should be not only strong and healthy and good workmen, but good men. Comfortable homes are prepared for their families. Schools were provided by innumerable Lancashire masters long before they were required to do so by law. Many an employer is noted for the pains he takes, and the money he spends, with a view to the operatives' enjoyments.

During the continuance of these ill-advised "strikes," and when the depression of trade--quite as distasteful to the master as to the man--involves "short time"--four or five days' work in the week, or even less, instead of six, another capital feature of the Lancashire character comes to the front. No people in the world are capable of profounder fortitude. Patience under suffering never fails. Though pinched by hunger, such is the manly and womanly pride of the Lancashire operatives that they care less about privations than to be constrained to surrender any portion, however trifling, of their independence. That the large-hearted and intelligent among mankind are always the last to complain in the hour of trial no one needs telling. People of this character are probably more numerous everywhere than may be thought, for the simple reason that they are the least likely to be heard of; but it is worth putting on paper that no better illustrations are to be found than exist in plenty in working Lancashire. It is refreshing also to note the hearty kindness of the Lancashire operatives one to another in time of distress. Not upon "Trades' Union" principles, but upon the broad and unselfish basis of strong, natural, human sympathy, familiar to the friendly visitor; and which, when elevated, as it often is, by religion, and warmed and expanded by personal affection, becomes so beautiful that in its presence all short-comings are forgotten. These good qualities are unfolded very specially on the occurrence of a terrible accident, such as a coal-pit explosion. In the yearning to be foremost in help to rescue; in the gentleness, the deference to authority, the obedience to discipline, the resignation then exhibited,--this last coming not of indifference, but of calmness,--a capacity is plainly shown for the highest conceivable moral development.

_The Dialect._--The original county dialect of Lancashire is of twofold interest. Still heard among the rustics, it is peculiarly valuable to the student of the English language. "Our South Lancashire speech," says its most accomplished interpreter, "is second to none in England in the vestiges which it contains of the tongue of other days.... To explain Anglo-Saxon there is no speech so original and important as our own South Lancashire _patois_."[26] To the ears of strangers who know nothing about it the sound is often uncouth and barbarous. That it is far from being so is proved by the use long made of this dialect for lyric poetry and for tales both racy and pathetic.[27] There is conclusive evidence also of its sweet and meaningful pathos in the resorting to it in times of deep emotion by people of the highest culture, who then unconsciously throw aside the learning and the vocabulary of school and college for the simplicity that never fails to touch the heart. The titles of the stories hold a conspicuous place in Mr. Axon's list of the no fewer than 279 publications illustrative of the general subject of the Lancashire dialect;[28] the literature of which, he justly remarks in the introduction, is richer than that of the popular speech of any other English county. This is so much the more noteworthy since, with the famous manufacturing epoch of 1785, everything belonging to primitive Lancashire began to experience change and decay. In a certain sense it may be said that the dialect has not only survived unhurt, but has risen, during the last thirty or forty years, to a position worthy of the native talent; and that the latter, in days to come, will have no better commemoration than the metrical literature. Two particulars at once arrest attention. No English dialect more abounds in interesting archaisms; and certainly not one is so little tainted with expressions of the nature of slang.[29]

[26] _On the South Lancashire Dialect_. By Thomas Heywood, F.S.A. Chetham Society. Vol. lvii. pp. 8, 36.

[27] _Vide_ Mr. George Milner, "On the Lancashire Dialect considered as a Vehicle for Poetry," _Manchester Literary Club Papers_, vol. i. p. 20. 1875.

[28] _Vide_ Mr. George Milner, "On the Lancashire Dialect considered as a Vehicle for Poetry," _Manchester Literary Club Papers_, Appendix to the vol. for 1876.

[29] The modern slang of great towns is of course quite a different thing from the ancient dialect of a rural population. Affected misspellings, as of "kuntry" for country, are also to be distinguished _in toto_ from the phonetic representation of sounds purely dialectical.

Rochdale occupies the centre of the most distinctively Lancashire-dialect region. As ordinarily employed, the phrase vaguely denotes the rural speech of the manufacturing districts. But beyond the Ribble, and more particularly beyond the Lune, there is unmistakable variation from the genuine Lancashire of "Tim Bobbin"; and in Furness there is an echo of Cumberland. In genuine Lancashire we have first the old-accustomed permutations of the vowels. Then come elisions of consonants, transpositions, and condensations of entire syllables, whereby words are often oddly transformed. Ancient idioms attract us next; and lastly, there are many of the energetic old words, unknown to current dictionaries, which five centuries ago were an integral part of the English vernacular. The vowel permutations are illustrated in the universal "wayter," "feyther," "reet," "oi," "aw," "neaw," used instead of water, father, right, I, now. "Owt" stands for aught, "nowt" for naught. Elisions and contractions appear in a thousand such forms as "dunnoyo" for "do you not," "welly" for "well-nigh." "You" constantly varies to thee and thou, whence the common "artu" for "art thou," "wiltohameh" for "wilt thou have me." A final _g_ is seldom heard; there is also a characteristic rejection of the guttural in such words as scratched, pronounced "scrat." The transpositions are as usual, though it is only perhaps in Lancashire that gaily painted butterflies are "brids," and that the little field-flowers elsewhere called birds' eye are "brid een."

The old grammatical forms and the archaic words refer the careful listener, if not to the Anglo-Saxon of King Alfred, at all events to the _Canterbury Tales_; they take us pleasantly to Chaucer, and Chaucer in turn introduces us agreeably to Lancashire, where "she" is always "hoo," through abiding in the primitive "he, heo, hit;" and where the verbs still end in _n_: "we, ye, they loven," as in the Prologue--

"For he had geten him yet no benefice."

Very interesting is it also when the ear catches the antiquated _his_ and _it_ where to-day we say _it_ and _its_. Often supposed to correspond with the poetical use of "his" in personifications (often found in the authorised version of Scripture), the Lancashire employment of _his_ is in truth the common Shaksperean one, _his_ in the county palatine being the simple genitive of the old English _hit_, as in _Hamlet_, iv. 7--

"There is a willow grows aslant the brook, That shows _his_ hoar leaves in the glassy stream."

So with the obsolete possessive _it_. When a Lancashire woman says, "Come to it mammy!" how plain the reminder of the lines in _King John_--

Do, child, go to _it_ grandam, child; Give grandam kingdom, and _it_ grandam will Give it a plum, a cherry, and a fig; There's a good grandam.

Archaic words are illustrated in many a familiar phrase. A Lancashire girl in quest of something "speers" for it (Anglo-Saxon _spirian_, to inquire). If alarmed, she "dithers"; if comely and well conducted, she behaves herself "farrantly"; if delicately sensitive, she is "nesh"--

It seemeth for love his herte is tendre and neshe.

So when the poor "clem" for want of food--"Hard is the choice," says Ben Jonson, "when the valiant must eat their arms or clem." Very many others which, though not obsolete in polite society, are seldom heard, help to give flavour to this inviting old dialect. To embrace is in Lancashire to "clip"; to move house is to "flit"; when the rain descends heavily, "it teems"; rather is expressed by "lief" or "liefer," as in _Troilus and Cresseide_--

Yet had I levre unwist for sorrow die.