Glasgow (5 page)

The city of Glasgow at this time, though very industrious, wealthy, and commercial, was far inferior to what it afterwards became, both before and after the failure of the Virginia trade. The modes of life, too, and manners, were different from what they are at present. Their chief branches were the tobacco trade with the American colonies, and sugar and rum with the West India. There were not manufacturers sufficient, either there or at Paisley, to supply an outward-bound cargo for Virginia. For this purpose they were obliged to have recourse to Manchester. Manufacturers were in their infancy. About this time the inkle manufactory was first begun by Ingram & Glasford, and was shown to strangers as a great curiosity. But the merchants had industry and stock, and the habits of business, and were ready to seize with eagerness, and prosecute with vigour, every new object in commerce or manufactures that promised success.

Few of them could be called learned merchants; yet there was a weekly club, of which Provost Cochrane was the founder and a leading member, in which their express design was to inquire into the nature and principles of trade in all its branches, and to communicate their knowledge and views on that subject to each other. I was not acquainted with Provost Cochrane at this time, but I observed that members of this society had the highest admiration of his knowledge and talents. I became well acquainted with him twenty years afterwards, when Drs Smith and Wight were members of the club, and was made sensible that too much could not be said of his accurate and extensive knowledge, of his agreeable manners, and colloquial eloquence. Dr Smith acknowledged his obligations to this gentleman's information, when he was collecting materials for his
Wealth of Nations
; and the junior merchants who have flourished since his time, and extended their commerce far beyond what was then dreamt of, confess, with respectful remembrance, that it was Andrew Cochrane who first opened and enlarged their views.

It was not long before I was well established in close intimacy with many of my fellow-students, and soon felt the superiority of an education
at the College of Edinburgh; not in point of knowledge, or acquirements in the languages or sciences, but in knowledge of the world, and a certain manner and address that can only be attained in the capital. It must be confessed that at this time they were far behind in Glasgow, not only in their manner of living, but in those accomplishments and that taste that belong to people of opulence, much more to persons of education. There were only a few families of ancient citizens who pretended to be gentlemen; and a few others, who were recent settlers there, who had obtained wealth and consideration in trade. The rest were shopkeepers and mechanics, or successful pedlars, who occupied large warerooms full of manufactures of all sorts, to furnish a cargo to Virginia. It was usual for the sons of merchants to attend the college for one or two years, and a few of them completed their academical education. In this respect the females were still worse off, for at that period there was neither a teacher of French nor of music in the town. The consequence of this was twofold; first, the young ladies were entirely without accomplishments, and in general had nothing to recommend them but good looks and fine clothes, for their manners were ungainly. Secondly, the few who were distinguished drew all the young men of sense and taste about them; for, being void of frivolous accomplishments, which in some respects make all women equal, they trusted only to superior understanding and wit, to natural elegance and unaffected manners.

The manner of living, too, at this time, was but coarse and vulgar. Very few of the wealthiest gave dinners to anybody but English riders, or their own relations at Christmas holidays. There were not half-a-dozen families in town who had men-servants; some of those were kept by the professors who had boarders. There were neither post-chaises nor hackney-coaches in the town, and only about three or four sedan-chairs for carrying midwives about in the night, and old ladies to church, or to the dancing assemblies once-a-fortnight.

The principal merchants, fatigued with the morning business, took an early dinner, and then resorted to the coffeehouse or tavern to read the newspapers, which they generally did in companies of four or five in separate rooms, over a bottle of claret or a bowl of punch. But they never stayed supper, but always went home by nine o'clock, without company or further amusement. At last an arch fellow from Dublin, a Mr Cockaine, came to be master of the chief coffeehouse, who seduced them gradually to stay supper by placing a few nice cold things at first on the table, as relishers to the wine, till he gradually led them on to bespeak fine hot suppers, and to remain till midnight.

There was an order of women at that time in Glasgow, who, being either young widows not wealthy, or young women unprovided for,
were set up in small grocery-shops in various parts of the town, and generally were protected and countenanced by some creditable merchant. In their back shops much time and money were consumed; for it being customary then to drink drams and white wine in the forenoon, the tipplers restored much to those shops, where there were bedrooms; and the patron, with his friends, frequently passed the evening there also, as taverns were not frequented by persons with affected characters of strict decency.

1751–1800

WHAT TO DO WITH DUNG

THE SARACEN'S HEAD, 1755
Robert Tennant

Prior to the 1750s, according to one nineteenth-century chronicler, Glasgow ‘possessed no inns for the accommodation of travellers, except small public houses to which stabling was attached, and the signboard of these petty hostelries generally bore the well-known intimation to wayfarers of “Entertainment for men and horses here”.' The first purpose-built inn in the city was the Saracen's Head, built in 1755, with stones recycled from the nearby medieval archbishop's palace. The land was donated by Glasgow magistrates. It had thirty-six rooms and a large meeting room which could accommodate one hundred people. It soon acquired a good reputation and was used by judges on the circuit. In 1779, the ‘Sarrie Heid', as it soon became known, hosted a charity dinner, attended by members of the nobility and country gentry who were pleasantly surprised to see ‘fifteen or sixteen elegant young cooks, with white aprons' acting as waitresses. Robert Tennant, its original owner, told the
Glasgow Courant:

The bed-chambers are all separate, none of them entering through another, and so contrived that there is no need of going out of doors to get to them. The beds are all very good, clean and free from bugs.

THE HUNT FOR THOMAS DIDDY,
c
. 1770s
Advert in a Glasgow paper

Glasgow's – and Scotland's – role in the slave trade has long been under-acknowledged, ignored and brushed under the carpet. While it is true that few vessels left Scottish ports for Africa to participate in this abhorrent business, and that Scots were at the forefront of the abolitionist
movement, there can be no doubt that Scots in general and Glaswegians in particular were no innocent bystanders as human beings were treated like animals and traded like commodities
.

From his master's house in Glasgow, on the morning of Saturday 3d current, A NEGRO MAN. He is about 35 years of age, and 5 feet 9 or 10 inches high, pretty broad and stout made, broad faced, and somewhat yellowish complexioned. The white of his eyes are remarkably tinged with black, and he has a fairly gloomy aspect. His dress when he ran off, was an olive-coloured thickset coat, jacket and breeches, a black wig tied behind, and silver buckles in his shoes: but as they were all good, it is probable he would change them for worse, and thereby supply himself with cash.

His name is THOM, but sometimes he assumes the name of THOMAS DIDDY.

A Reward of FIVE GUINEAS, and payment of all reasonable charges, is hereby offered to secure said Negro in any jail in Scotland, so he may be kept safe, and delivered to his Master's order. The money to be paid by Mr John Alston merchant in Glasgow, upon notice being sent to him of the Negro's being secured.

All shipmasters are hereby cautioned against carrying the said Negro abroad; and if any person harbours him, or assists him in making his escape, they will be prosecuted therefor.

BEST OF THE SECOND-RATE, 1771
Thomas Pennant

Hailing from Wales, Thomas Pennant (1726–98) combined his interests in the natural world and travelling, about which he wrote copiously. His travel writings were admired by Samuel Johnson and James Boswell, though the latter disapproving of his portrait of Scotland. Pennant, remarked Johnson, is ‘the best traveller I ever read; he observes more things than any one else does'. This, thought Boswell, ‘was too high praise of a writer who had traversed a wide extent of country in such haste'
.

Reach Glasgow; the best built of any second-rate city I ever saw: the houses of stone, and in general well built, and many in good taste, plain and unaffected. The principal street runs east and west, is near a mile and a half long, but unfortunately not straight; yet the view from the cross, where the two other great streets fall into this, has an air of vast
magnificence. The tolbooth is large and handsome, with the apt motto on the front:

Next to the exchange: within is a spacious room, with full-length portraits of all our monarchs since James I, and an excellent one, by Ramsay, of Archibald, Duke of Argyle, in his robes as Lord of Sessions. Before the exchange is a large equestrian statue of King William. This is the finest and broadest part of the street: many of the houses are built over arcades, but too narrow to be walked in with any conveniency. Numbers of other streets cross this at right angles.

The market-places are great ornaments to the city, the fronts being done up in very fine taste, and the gates adorned with columns of one or other of the orders. Some of these markets are for meal, greens, fish or flesh: there are two for the last which have conduits of water out of several of the pillars, so that they are constantly kept sweet and neat. Before these buildings were constructed, most of those articles were sold in the public streets; and even after the market-places were built, the magistrates with great difficulty compelled the people to take advantage of such cleanly innovations.

Near the meal-market is the public granary, to be filled on any apprehension of scarcity.

The guardhouse is in the great street; where the inhabitants mount guard, and regularly do duty. An excellent police is observed here; and proper officers attend the markets to prevent abuses.

A MEDIOCRITY OF KNOWLEDGE, 1773
Samuel Johnson

James Boswell (1740–95) had long hoped to bring his hero, Samuel Johnson (1709–84), to his native Scotland and, in particular, to the Western Isles. Finally, in the autumn of 1773, he realised his ambition. The pair set off from Edinburgh – ‘a city too well known to admit description' – and crossed the Firth of Forth, heading up the north-east coast before travelling westward, via Banff, Elgin and Inverness (where the intrepid duo bade ‘farewell to the luxury of travelling'), to the Highlands and Islands about which Johnson wrote with his usual forthrightness. Glasgow was one of the last stops on a journey that provided a template for countless future wayfarers
.